Page 70 of Promised to the Alpha Prince

“Um… you’re welcome?”

She lifted a finger. “Look, most betas can’t even do it. The statistics on infidelity are rather shockingly high. Something like seventy percent of people engage in some kind of unfaithfulness at some point in their lives. So, thinking that you’re going to end up in some kind of perfect relationship with a perfect person who never wants anyone except you, it’s a pipe dream. It’s not realistic. But there’s a reason we still want it, regardless, I suppose. And even though I know I’ll never have it, and I don’t even really want it… I don’t want Cole to hurt, for instance. I would never wound him in that way, ask him to give up things that he needs. And I don’t want to give up my freedom either. I don’t want those eight-way sexual experiences to disappear from my life. Even though I don’t want it, I still…” She turned to look at the shot glass, shaking her head. “No, never mind. No, I take it all back. I don’t mean that. I really don’t.”

I didn’t know what to say to that.

“I’m sorry.” She let out an embarrassed laugh. “I really shouldn’t have had that third shot. I’m debating taking another one so that maybe I’ll be drunk enough not to care that I’m too drunk, but I think that’s a particularly stupid idea, and—”

“I’m a little worried, I have to admit,” I said.

“About Corentin?”

“About Dmitri and me,” I said. “Right now, I can’t help but be affected, in some way, about the way he wants me all to himself. It’s nice, even though… even though I want the other men, too, even though I know some deep, instinctive part of me needs the other men. But when he says to me that he wants to wait, that he wants to have me to himself until after the wedding, it makes some part of my chest tight and I… I…” I felt dangerously close to tears. “Why would this happen? Why would my body be made to need multiple partners to ease my needs, when I romanticize monogamy?”

“It’s just society,” she said, waving it away. “We all have all these messages, coming at us, all our lives, all those diamond commercials and the fairy tale princess stories and we internalize things. But it’s just a matter of ignoring that, that’s all.”

“Right,” I said with a little nod. “Ignore Corentin. Ignore the worry. Ignore everything.”

“Exactly,” she said. “I’m glad we’ve had this little talk. Hope I helped?”

“Um…”

“You better get some sleep,” she said. “You’ve got a big day tomorrow.”

15

nikolai

JOHANNES AND I were getting ready for bed. I technically had my own bedchamber in this castle, but the truth was that I never slept there. I tended to split my nights between Johannes and Dmitri. Lately, Dmitri had been occupied, so I’d been with Johannes all the time.

In some ways, it had been very nice, the two of us settling into a rhythm together that felt decidedly domestic. We would watch TV together in bed, snuggling, wake up together every day, have conversations over coffee about what we’d be doing that day.

We weren’t even commiserating over the omega anymore. We both still wanted her, and we both knew that, but there was something about the way we’d settled into our little routine that seemed sweet and strong in the way that the mad desire for the omega didn’t. Johannes and me, what we had… it was more than alpha instinct, more than sexual desire.

There was a knock on our door, and I went to open it, and I scented Dmitri before I got the door open. His scent was a whirlwind, like dead leaves had been whipped up into a frenzy, like an autumnal storm had blown in uncertainty.

“What’s wrong?” I said as I let him in.

He pushed past me. “I went to your room, but you weren’t there, and I realized that of course you’d be here, and I realized I’d been neglecting you for all this time, barely in touch at all, and I felt really guilty about that, and…”

Johannes came out of the bedroom shirtless, in a pair of plaid pajama pants. “Dmitri.”

“Sorry to intrude,” said Dmitri.

“No, you’re not,” said Johannes in a tired voice.

Dmitri stiffened. “What the hell is that?”

Johannes lifted both of his hands. “No, I don’t know why I said that. Forget I did.”

“Well, you did say it,” said Dmitri, his scent swirling tighter, growing more volatile, and more… delectable.

I stiffened inside my own pajama pants. I was wearing a t-shirt with my plaid pants, though.

“No, it’s the way you are,” said Johannes, shrugging. “You’re the heir to the throne. Everything revolves around you. You always get whatever you want. If you’re upset about something, everything focuses on you. I’m not even angry about it anymore. Actually, I’ve accepted it. It’s the dynamic. It’s fine.”

Dmitri scoffed. “Fuck you, Johannes,” he muttered.

“Hey,” I said. “Did you come here to pick a fight?” But part of me might have been eager for a fight, part of me might have been turned on by that idea.

---