Page 162 of Gemini Queen
In fact, I’m pretty sure we’ll all be biting Neo if my fated mate keeps this up.
“Now there’s a sight I never thought I’d see,” Lucius murmurs.
My breath rushes out in relief and my eyes eat him up.
Our headmaster is standing just inside the door looking all buttoned up and proper in his professorial tweed and houndstooth with his chestnut hair tied back. All he’s missing is his oxblood briefcase. I’m still learning to read him, though I can sense his wolf frisking happily at the sight of me and wanting to be let out so he can play with my dragon.
At least he’s not in handcuffs.
Or paw cuffs.
“There you are, love. It’s about blooming time.” Ronin levers out of the pool in a lithe scramble. Naked and dripping, he prowls across thethermaeto grab Lucius by the tie and pulls him into a hard kiss.
A few days ago, Lucius would have resisted, out of some misplaced sense of decorum. Now he wraps a rough arm around Ronin’s waist, shoves a possessive hand into the man-bun thing Ronin’s done with his hair, dislodges the whole arrangement, and claims our mate with a thorough kiss.
“Mmmm.” I sigh and squirm happily on Neo’s lap, his hard cock sliding between my slick folds, one thrust away from penetration.
Bathtub sex is one of my favorite kinds of sex, and I like where this is going.
Silently sharing my sentiment, Ronin starts unbuttoning Lucius and coaxing him toward the pool, which is a nice prelude to totally undoing him. “Didn’t fire you, did she, Lucius?”
“Entirely to my surprise, she didn’t.” Lucius’ rapidly heating gaze locks on mine. “I tendered my letter of resignation so I can join our queen’s harem with a clear conscience, but the Dean refused to accept my letter. Since our queen’s place is emphatically here at this Academy until she masters her rapidly growing powers—and since my place is at your side and in your bed, my queen—it seems the Dean’s opted to make a virtue out of a necessity.”
“That’s bloody large of her,” Ronin snorts, pushing Lucius’ coat and shirt off his shoulders, “since she’s got no one else to teach History of Witchcraft, you’re bloody brilliant in the classroom, and she’s not about to go and make Vasili headmaster of this house. Even she’s not that mental.”
“I’m really not sure I shouldn’t be offended,” Vasili muses, hands sliding up my ribs to cradle my tits and toy with my piercings. I turn my face into his shoulder to nibble his sleek neck and arch into his grip with a murmur of encouragement.
Lucius’ voice deepens and his accent thickens, because he clearly likes what he’s seeing. “It seems the Dean is far less troubled by my various sins than I’ve been myself. We’ve agreed I’ll finish out the term on probation, then we’ll have the entire summer once everyone else goes home for the holidays to continue Zara’s studies. The Dean claims she’ll decide later whether to keep me on permanently, but she’s not known for indecision. In all likelihood, I’ll be allowed to remain in my post, notwithstanding my indiscretions, though I fully expect an excoriating letter in my personnel file. I consider that a price well worth paying.”
“Thank fuck,” Ronin mutters, rough with relief, and definitely speaking for all of us. “You and that Catholic guilt. You’re nothing like Zerxes and the Dean bloody knows it. Told you that you were giving yourself a fucking complex for nothing, didn’t I?”
“I believe you may have mentioned that, dear one,” Lucius says wryly.
By now Ronin’s gotten Lucius out of the rest of his clothes, and I’m really glad to see the damage that bear’s claws and teeth left on my shifter’s rangy body is mostly gone. Purebred shifters like Lucius healreallyfast if they survive an attack long enough to shift, according to those textbooks I’ve finally started studying in earnest.
Looks like those textbooks weren’t lying.
Watching Lucius hoist Ronin into his powerful arms and descend the stairs into the pool with our mate wrapped around him, I’m overwhelmed by how lucky I am to have them.
All four of them.
We still have plenty of issues to work through, the most pressing being that inspector who’s come to conduct the inquest and fly Zerxes and Bjorn back to the mainland. Speaking of which…
I slither around in Neo’s arms to tuck my back against his front and loop my arms around Vasili’s slim waist. “Out of curiosity, is either one of you ever planning to tell me what the inspector said? Or do I just wait for him to show up here and arrest us?”
“He’s flying back to the mainland with the remains as we speak.” Lucius wades toward us with Ronin still wrapped around him. “He’s launched an inquest, of course, but the Dean’s discouraged the inspector from undertaking a witch hunt, and this fellow doesn’t seem overly interested in burning witches at the stake. All Academy personnel sign a liability waiver when we join the staff, given the… perilous nature of our duties. And neither Bjorn nor Zerxes had much in the way of friends or family to press charges.”
“That’s really sad,” I sigh, and I mean it, but it sounds like I’ve got a stay of execution. At least for now. The worst of the nervous knot in my chest loosens its grip. Looks like it’ll be a while before we know for sure.
At least now, today, we’re free.
That’s all I’ve ever wanted.
Vasili distracts me by leaning in to tongue his mating bite on my tit. I’m healing up nicely with both of them to tend me, but that hit of biochemicals and the accompanying mating ritual are still really soothing. I let out a happy sigh that makes Neo hum in my ear.
“Not to mention,” Vasili says casually between slow sizzling licks, “your wealthy father’s generous charitable contribution… to the Arcane Foundation. The inspector’s a founding member… made a point of mentioning his gratitude. Seems your father… made that sizable donation… in your name.”
What he’s saying makes zero sense, so I figure he’s fucking with me. That’s getting harder for him to do given our mating bond. But I still wind my hands in Vasili’s hair to stop his distracting licking and look to Lucius for validation.
