Page 48 of Her Tortured Beasts

“Is your dress ready?” I ask pointedly. “Mother, is yours?” Both women avoid looking at me, and suddenly, the energy changes in the room. “What is it?”

Sissy turns to regard me, her face stony. “I’m not to attend the wedding.”

A fiery spear shoots through my chest. “What?”

“Father has decreed it. The Hellfires requested it. Me and the hatchlings will stay in our rooms.”

Slowly, I rise to my feet, leashing my composure with a band of metal. “Did he care to mention why?”

“Don’t start an argument, dear,” Mother says softly. “This is not the time.”

“This is just the right time, Mother. Sissy, what was the reason?”

Sissy swallows, and I suddenly want to tear the world apart. “They said it would be bad luck.”

Violence threatens to tear from my body, and I’m out the door a heartbeat later, Spawn stumbling along behind me.

“Xander!” Mother cries. “Xander, no!”

I pause outside, hating to hear the fear and anguish in my mother’s voice, directed not for me, butatme.

Sissy comes rushing out and grips my elbow, turning me around to look at her. “Don’t,” she says, her eyes shining. “Please. Do not cause a fuss over me.” She swallows again. “Yet another time.”

I frown, the backs of my eyes burning. I take her face in my palms to speak to her fiercely. “You deserve respect, Selena.Respect. You deserve fuss. And I will always be here to stand up for you.”

She pulls away from my palms, casting her eyes down. “I’m the older sister. I’m supposed to be protectingyou.”

“We’ve been through this before,” I sigh. “It is my right and privilege to care for you. And now that I’m here, I can do that better. This is part of the reason I came back, after all.”

Sissy stares at me in horror, stepping away from me with a horrified expression, as if I’m some terrible monster. “Donotuse me as the reason you’re here.” She takes another step back and all I can do is stare while my stomach sinks. “Donotuse me as the reason you did something horrible tothis”—she points to Spawn standing as far as the leash will allow, staring pale-faced at us—“poor girl. You did the most heinous thing, Xander. Do you even know whatyou’vebecome?” She points a shaking finger at me and I stumble a step back as if she’s shot me. “You’re the same as Ragnar. Don’t you see that? What you did is almost theexact same thingmy husband did to me.”

All violence, all rage, suddenlypoofsout of my body as my sister turns her back on me and slams the drawing-room door shut in my face. I blink at the door. I blink again.

Chapter 27

Aurelia

My heart pounds as I stare at the closed drawing-room door. Xander is still as a statue, in shock, I think at the words of his sister. One breath passes, then another before he seems to recover and turns away from the door, silently heading down the corridor.

Hurrying to keep up, I stare at the stony set of his shoulders.

Selena’s husband. What had happened between her and the children’s father? Something so awful that the Hellfire family thought she and the children werebad luck? It should make me profoundly happy that finally someone gave Xander a piece of their mind, but instead, I feel sick.

Xander reaches his room and unlocks the door. With a snap, I’m free of the gold chain, and telekinesis shoves me through the door. It shuts between us, leaving me in the quiet of his room. Cold footsteps sound on the carpet outside before they fade away completely.

I suddenly feel extremely alone.

Eugene is my only comfort, hidden in a bubble shield by my side. Xander, despite his advanced hearing likely alerting him, has not mentioned it.

In fact, the dragon made no mention of anything that had happened during my heat yesterday, as if we’re pretending it didn’t even happen. I’m completely fine with that game since I made a complete fool of myself, slobbering all over him like a thirsty, feral creature.

Lyle said this was all because I have five mates and my regina instincts push my heat times five. It doesn’t make me feel any better right now, of course, especially since they’ve planned for the auction around my heat.

And then there’s Raquel. Poor Raquel, who’d likely been told to try to contact me and is now captured in the Drakos dungeon. They must be terrified. An idea strikes me, and I hurry to my cage and pull down the blackout flap.

Xander is in a state, and will likely leave to gather his thoughts for a while. I no doubt have some time up my sleeve. I settle myself in a sitting position in the cage and close my eyes, protecting myself with a bubble of invisibility, then reaching out with my telepathy. Remembering the way to the dungeons from last night, I follow the same path carefully in case a wandering Flores Drakos or someone just as bad detects me.

But this late in the afternoon, I sense no one other than a stray maid rushing down the corridor with an armful of laundry, and I make it underground with no fuss.

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