Page 33 of Tortured Royals

“The forest?” Alaric asks.

“We can’t head straight to the castle,” I explain. “Not until we know what the situation is there. So, we’re making a stop here first.”

Prince Callan doesn’t speak as he stays at the back of the group.

It’s a short walk through the trees, and then I stop before a darkened building. “I trained out here a lot when I was younger. When I was learning to control my power,” I explain. “And when I was older, I would come to this spot when I needed a moment to breathe, away from the castle. There are multiple rooms, and there should be enough supplies for us to last a while, though I don’t suspect we’ll be here long.”

I move to the front door, and the moment I touch the handle, a retina scanner zaps my eye, and there’s a click as the door unlocks. I swing it open, and the lights blink on, lighting the main living area as I walk inside. My mates follow me, and soon we’re all standing in the common room surrounded by plush couches. A red fire bursts to life in the fireplace, casting shadows on the decorative blades lining the walls, and on the far end of the room is an eating area and an open kitchen.

Nate whistles. “Nice hideout, gorgeous.”

“It’s not a hideout,” I reply.

My mates all stare at me, but I ignore them.

Lifting my hand, I point to an archway that leads to a wide hallway. “Down there you’ll find the washrooms and the bedrooms.”

Nate goes to flop onto one of the couches, but Dante’s tail snaps out slapping him on the ass.

“Ow, what the fuck was that for?” the shifter says, rubbing his ass cheek, and looking more intrigued than irritated.

“I highly doubt the princess wants your blood and sweat all over her furniture, shifter.” Dante peers pointedly at the hallway. “Washroom now, asshole.”

Nate rubs the back of his neck, and he looks at me sheepishly. “Yeah, right. Sorry ’bout that.”

I bite my lip as I fight to hold back my laughter. Truthfully, the blood and the sweat does it for me, but Dante has a point about the furniture.

My demon winks at me, and when he starts toward the hallway, Nate rolls his shoulders and follows.

Mason smiles walking after them. “Join us, our mate. The water will be cold without you.”

The idea of my mates all being in the washroom together makes my thighs tremble, but when I turn back, Prince Callan is still standing there, watching me silently.

“Uh yeah, so I’m just gonna go check out that washroom as well,”Shade mumbles in my head, hopping from one foot to the other on my shoulder.

“Shade,”I warn, because she might be my friend, but that still doesn’t mean I’m down with sharing.

“Relax,”she says with a giggle. “I’m going to go nap in one of the bedrooms so you guys can have some space.”As she lifts from my shoulder, she adds, “Tell Callan that he’s going to have to kiss your feet before I forgive him. I don’t care how sexy he is.”

“He was worried about his sister,”I say wearily.“He made a promise to her.”

“Yeah, but he still didn’t have to be such an asshat,”Shade counters.

When my friend is gone, I turn my attention back to the archangel. Before I can say a word, he drops to his knees, and for a moment, I think he might just be about to kiss my feet like Shade suggested, but he remains kneeling and he stares at the floor, not giving me eye contact.

“What are you doing?” I ask, because he’s making me uncomfortable again. It was bad enough the first time he did it. I’m used to the demons bowing to me, but Prince Callan is my mate.

“Tell me what you want me to do, Blake. Name it,” he says, his voice a low rasp. “I don’t have any excuses. Only regrets.”

I release a breath through my nose. Demons hardly ever apologize, so this is strange for me. In his weird way, Prince Callan is doing it for a second time.

When I don’t answer, he goes on, “You helped me and the angels, and I am grateful. I have not been a good Ahalian Touizda. If you wish to bond with me to get your power, and then reject me, that is your right. I will suffer it.”

“Reject you?” I sigh. Truthfully, the thought had crossed my mind. To let him back in after his betrayal goes against the second rule of being a demon royal:Never show mercy.But I’m quickly learning that the rules I grew up with don’t exactly apply to my mates.

Pain shines in Prince Callan’s eyes when he peers up at me, and his chest rises and falls as he lets out a breath. “I pushed you away, even when I should have known better.”

He’s not wrong, but then I think of him taking his sister’s life. A sister he’d fought for over and over again. He wasn’t trying to deceive us, he had just been choosing his family and was trying to save his sister. And now everything he’d believed about his sister turned out to be a lie. The betrayal he must feel is undoubtedly much deeper than what I’m experiencing, and the idea of leaving him to go through that alone makes me feel sick.

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