Page 27 of Princess For All

I nodded. “Whatever our allies feel is best but obviously not all at once. Nora can head this up and discuss it over there with less ears and only their inner circles. I will turn a blind eye to Florida but make it clear we want to put down land mines and soon.”

“If you had a few dozen boats ready in Jacksonville, that’s far enough north of that coven, and they could easily sail up to Boston and get everything loaded—run back and forth—” Jamelle started to plan.

“Plot it out, not here where we’re being watched,” I reminded him. “And yes, that’s fine. Have Nora slip me a note with her decision and we’ll make it work. No matter what we decide, they will probably hit it. So come up with more plans too.”

I thanked everyone and especially the kitchen for another amazing breakfast. They were looking better now that they weren’t worrying about lunches. Nick said it made all of the difference and now they could talk about training other people which would benefit the coven all around in the long run.

We liked plans like that. Ones that involved the “long run.”

Because it meant we won and had a future.

I went off with Petre and Sisay since they were on my detail. James had already figured out why he had been instructed to meet up with Moon and was brought somewhere. He winked at me and started stripping, changing into his leopard right away and trotting over to me.

I squatted down and gave him love, telling him that the evil turkeys had been mean to me again and I wanted him to avenge my honor… But that I had a present for him first.

Reaching into my bag, I pulled out a pink leather collar loaded with diamonds for bling and a matching leash. I smirked at him as I held it up. “I told you that I would do it. You agreed and—”

His paw swiped out and nabbed it from me before I could finish. The three nobles hissed and I didn’t catch it at first, but James’s claws had been out and two of them had caught my skin.

I watched as a few drops of my blood fell to the ground.

Over a joke.

I glanced between the small cuts on my hand that were already healing to his leopard throwing a fit and destroying my gag gift. Diamonds were flying all over which really upset me because someone had painstakingly set them and sewn them all on at my request. Even if it had been a gag, that was someone’s hard work.

He yowled when he was done, clawing at the ground like he still had a lot to say about whatI’ddone.

Until he saw that I was crying.

“I hate that I love you, and I hope I stop soon,” I whispered so quietly that I barely heard myself but knew he still did. I was going to say more, but… What was the point?

What else was there really to say?

What was the point now in telling him that I wasn’t going to make him wear it in front of others? It wasn’t like I was going to parade him around in front of people wearing that. The bet had been in front of another court. I would never have really done that to James. I would never have let people laugh at him like that.

But he was fine with people laughing atmethat I never actually followed through on the bet or my threats to do it and I was whipped. That was okay.

That wasn’t love.

It was toxic.

“We can be early to Albuquerque,” I whispered as I moved over to Petre.

“Yes, My Princess.”

“Inez, wait,” James said from behind me, having shifted back.

But I didn’t. I hugged closer to Petre when he picked me up to blur off. I was glad when he’d taken the hint and off we went.

Except we didn’t arrive at Albuquerque.

We stopped before there for another problem I didn’t want to deal with… Namely Chris.

“Whatnow?” I asked about as patiently as I could as I took in the scene.

“We can’t keep him here, Princess,” one of Shawn Boyle’s clan answered, seeming just as frustrated. “That’s your orders not to keep anyone at the settlement. He said if no one would take him to the castle then he would walk there.”

But three of them were escorting him because… Well, they knew us losing a human would be bad.

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