Page 15 of Princess Broken

But revealing weakness proves unavoidable as they create a tight, circular wall around me. For an instant, I fear they’re attacking while I’m in this incapacitated, vulnerable state, but instead they turn outward, forming a fortress of muscle to house my pain.

The adrenaline from the battle has worn off, but I still can’t fully process what happened. Timur is dead.

Guilt stabs my head with a searing pain, and I fight to find enough grief. Remembering how grief feels, I drop into a fetal position on the cold stone floor, wrapping my arms tightly over my knees and pulling them hard against my chest. I make myself as small as possible, the same position I urged my brother Alexei to take when we hid from the Bolsheviks’ bayonets in the forest.

Wounded myself that day, I carried my little brother as far as I could, and when I could no longer run, I curled myself over him, hoping to hide him and to stop the blood flowing from the worst of his gunshot wounds. But only Our Friend could ever stop my brother’s bleeding, and soon Alexei died in my arms. I’m not sure how long I held my little brother’s dead body before I was rescued by King Dunkan.

It took decades for me to recover from the loss of my human family—it still haunts me some nights, and it certainly is haunting me today—but I can’t let myself fall apart like I did back then. I’m no longer a teenager. I may look the same, I still may not have seen much of the world, but I am stronger. I can survive this loss. And as fond as I was of Timur, he was not my love, not my mate. My lack of deep grief proves I was right not to conjure false feelings for him.

Perhaps, with time, I can even learn to forgive myself for my part in my blood partner’s death. If I hadn’t panicked, I could have fought too, and he wouldn’t have been distracted in his attempts to protect me.

But right now, I must force down my pain so I can escape these four crazed vampires, admitted killers, who are holding me captive.

Around me, the men are breathing slowly, in unison like some kind of symbiotic machine. They’re all wearing the same heavy black boots, and similar jeans drape over their sculpted calves pressing against the denim in a way that makes my fingers twitch, wanting to reach up to test if the oversized muscles are real.

My gaze slides up the legs of one of the men, skimming over the creased denim at the dip behind his knees, and then over the elliptical ridges of his hamstrings that lead to the mounds of his backside. The power in those rounded muscles is obvious, even as the vampire remains still.

Which of the men am I looking at?

The baseball cap tucked into the waistband of his jean’s makes me guess that it’s Phil; but the scent of the forest makes me think it’s Crusher. But with the four of them standing so close together—so close to me—it’s difficult to uncouple the commingled masculine smells.

Closing my eyes, I focus on the rush of the blood in their veins and begin to separate each of their scents and vibrations from the other’s. I don’t need their distinct physical features to know which is which. The one whose muscled buttocks is best in view is definitely Crusher, the one who carried me out of the melee.

Across from him is Phil, the mean one who said he liked explosions and collapsed the tunnel behind us. To my right is the aptly name Blade, the stunningly gorgeous Black vampire with the scars and the knife, and on the right is Flame—the blond one who lights matches from thin air.

Opening my eyes, I glance around the circle above me. While all four men are tall and broad, Phil’s backside is thickest and, as he’s also the tallest, his ass is the farthest from my position on the ground. The mounds of Phil’s ass are like boulders, impossibly firm under the denim, and it’s easy to imagine the power they have to move his large body, to lift him, to drive his hips forward.

Heat rushes into my sex. It pulses and dampens. Where did that thought come from?

I recognize the feelings inside my body, but I don’t understand their cause. I have no memory of sensations like these before Timur first touched me down there, the day he first prepared me before penetrating my body with his stiff rod. Which wasn’t nearly as painful as he predicted. I didn’t even bleed down there as he told me I would.

My insides flutter again, as my body remembers how Timur asked me to lie back, then positioned himself between my legs as he pressed his stiffness inside me. And how, after sliding inside me for a while, he grimaced and pulled out to spill his seed on the sheets beside me. But no one is currently touching my sex. No hand, not even my own, is triggering the intense ache that’s momentarily distracted me from my shock, fear and grief.

Is my body grieving Timur? The loss of my one and only sexual partner?

My sex pulses again, thinking of how greedy I became as his manhood thrusted inside me, even after he stopped. How it never felt like enough. How each time we had sex, I’d immediately want him to do it again, and again. How I wanted to attribute that needy feeling to love, when I knew that it wasn’t.

A new flavor of grief slams into me. I only just discovered how much I like sex, and now my partner for that activity is gone.

I shake my head. I am beyond selfish to think of my own needs right now. And I remind myself that I’d already decided never to have sex with Timur again.

Pushing all these indulgent, self-pitying thoughts from my mind, I focus on the crimes committed today. I must get back to DEFTA so I can complete my mission, which now includes bringing Mariano and these four kidnappers to justice. My captors assume that Timur was my mate. And while I never outwardly lied to these men, neither did I correct them. But I refuse to feel guilty about my lie of omission.

Once I’m safe, I will release these men from their misplaced duty, from the debt they believe they’re obligated to repay by protecting me for life. But I will see they stand trial for all the murders they’ve committed.

Just as these men think they owe me, I owe Timur, and right now I owe it to him to see that Mariano and his men are held accountable for his murder. Whoever wielded that stake must be punished.

I draw a few long breaths to clear my emotions, and then I leap to my feet. Unlinking their arms, the men turn toward me, remaining in a tight circle, but facing inward now, towering above me. Raising my chin, I turn slowly so I can look at each of them directly.

Which one is in charge? Better yet, which one should I work on to help me escape? It’s best if I go along with letting them think that they saved me.

“Thank you for the rescue,” I say. “Now, take me to DEFTA. Immediately.”

“Too dangerous,” Crusher says gruffly, and the other three grunt in agreement.

“Don’t be ridiculous.” I fold my arms over my chest, feeling naked under their collective gazes as they stand in a tight circle around me.

Did they sense my earlier arousal? What a mortifying thought.

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