Page 28 of The Aether

Soleil, who’d been silent until that moment, gasped. “That’s cruel, Damian, even for you.”

“But accurate,” he said, as if bored by the conversation.

Understanding dawned in Vivian’s ice-blue eyes, and she shot a quelling glance at Soleil. “Don’t waste your outrage, sister. For as many women as Damian’s had, I’m surprised he can keep all our names straight.”

Well done, my dear!

As if out on a morning stroll, he casually circled the ring of chairs and paused next to her. With his knuckle, he tilted her chin up. “I’ll always remember you, Vivian. You are, after all, the mother of my Beastie.”

Bending, he kissed her, infusing her body with a preemptive antidote for any toxin Morcant intended to unleash.

He lifted his head. “Mm, yes. I’ll most definitely remember you, my love.”

CHAPTER10

Not only did Damian’s spell sizzle Vivian’s cells, but so did his steamy-as-fuck kiss. Breathless, she could only stare when he raised his head and winked.

“Mm, yes. I’ll most definitely remember you, my love.”

Goddess, how she wished it was so.

With one last lingering brush of his fingertips across her lips, he moved away.

“I’m not a fool, Aether,” Morcant hissed. “I know what you’re doing. Trying to calm everyone. Provide protection.” He gestured with his head toward Alastair. “Set them free.”

“I never mistook you for a fool, Morcant. Not once,” Damian replied smoothly. “But I’d be remiss if I didn’t protect my own.”

Lifting the bottle high, Morcant shook it. “This isn’t just to poison you all. It’s to separate you from your magic. Long enough that I can claim it for my own.”

Vivian’s heart rate rocketed straight into the stratosphere the second Nate appeared on the stairway. Those old steps creaked most times, and he was seconds from giving himself away.

“How do you hope to hold all that you steal, Morgan?” she asked coolly. “You’retwo stepsfrom the grave, you creaky old fool.”

She purposely used the insult she’d previously heard Evie jokingly hurl at Nate.

From her peripheral, she saw him pause, glance down, then look at her.

She nodded vigorously. “Yes, you heard me correctly. So, Morgan, you may hold the advantage now, but how long before your muscles atrophy and your fetid breath precedes your arrival?”

“Long enough, you ignorant bitch!” Spittle gathered at the sides of Morcant’s mouth, and he reminded Vivian of a rabid animal.

“No name-calling, Morcant,” Alastair said as he shifted in his seat. Dropping the pretense of being tied, he straightened his suit jacket and tugged each of his cuffs. “It only shows your lack of intelligence, man.”

Josie, too, dropped the act of being bound and rose to her feet to approach Morcant. “And I don’t particularly care for people calling my sisters ‘bitch,’” she snarled.

Vivian wondered if he ever saw the punch coming.

One moment, he was glaring down at Josie, and the next, his head was snapping back from the force of her blow.

“Suppress your anger, Josie,” Damian warned. “Remember, it strengthens him.”

Seeming to recognize he was outnumbered, Morcant threw the bottle and turned to run.

Time froze for everyone but Damian, Nate, and Vivian.

“Get the bottle, Viv. And for the love of the Goddess, don’t drop it,” her husband ordered.

Shaking off the oddity of movement when everyone around her was locked in place, she rushed to comply as her husband approached Morcant.

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