Page 21 of Gemini Queen
I also focus on keeping my face hidden and my tone level. “And you wonder why I turned my back on the so-called family gift that’s actually more like a curse? You wonder why I choose to be the stupid ignorant moron you keep calling me, when you know what the alternative looks like?”
“All I wonder,” he says, low and savage, “is why in blazes anyone at Icarus thinks you’ll end up any different—”
“Ronin!”The snap of Lucius’ voice behind me makes us both jump. “That’s quite enough from you, Mr. Pendragon.” Then he dials down the menace. “I’ll finish up with him for you if you like, Ms. Gemini.”
What I’d like is to walk straight out the door and leave these two to clear the air between them and clean up the mess their fucked-up dynamic has made of Ronin’s shoulder. But I’m stronger than that, and I want them to know it.
“It’s okay, Master Aries.” I’ll give him that one if he’ll stop calling me Zarina. “He isn’t saying anything I haven’t heard before.”
Or anything I don’t deserve to hear.
“All the same, he’ll keep a civil tongue in his head.” The warning in his teacher’s tone is clear.
Now Ronin holds his silence, even though he sneers.
I situate the gauze pad carefully over the nasty bite and start taping it in place. Wondering why the hell all that hatred Ronin clearly feels toward me seems so goddamn personal.
Lucius hovers at my shoulder, watching me work, and he’s close enough now to make me nervous. He’s way taller than I am, like pretty much everyone when you’re barely five foot two, and his warm breath teases my hair. He smells like wolf and brandy, and he too seems to run hot. I can feel all that body heat licking at my back like a fever.
Making me suddenly way too aware that I’m standing there wearing nothing but panties and a shirt that’s probably his.
My nervous fingers slip off the tape, and Lucius leans into me and holds the gauze in place. He’s wearing honest-to-God shirt cuffs pinning his sleeves, embossed with a ram’s horns worked in gold and jet, which makes me realize this guy’s more than a shifter stray.
The Oxford don comes from money.
Now we’re both touching Ronin, I’m basically standing between his leather-sheathed thighs, and my unwilling patient’s breath sounds a little ragged. In fact, it’s so quiet I can hear the shifter pull in a long slow inhale against my hair. Right before he rubs his face gently into the side of my neck.
I’m so startled I drop the tape roll completely. Ronin’s hands close around my waist to steady me, while Lucius deftly catches the tape.
“Don’t be alarmed, Zarina,” the shifter breathes in my ear, with that thick Transylvanian accent he’s rocking. “It’s only my wolf. It seems that he… likes you.”
That little revelation makes goosebumps cascade down my spine and the fine hairs rise down the back of my neck.
Because I’m suddenly wondering what it would take for that wolf of his to biteme.
Ronin groans softly and I figure he’s heard that thought too. My face lifts to find him less than a foot away, luscious lips parted, lids heavy over his golden eyes. He holds my gaze as Lucius leans into another slow inhale, his nose gently nuzzling my ear.
I clear my throat, but my voice comes out barely above a whisper. “Nice wolf.”
The shifter chuckles into my hair, and I realize Ronin’s still holding me, that he’s holding me steady for Lucius to scent, and that I don’t exactly mind. In fact, this entire experience of being trapped between the two of them is making me remember that scorching scene I just interrupted.
And making me wonder if, in all that volatile chemistry between them, there’s ever room for a girl.
My hands drop to Ronin’s quads, all sinew sheathed in leather, and he purrs deep in his chest like a cat. Lucius rumbles a little in response, and I know without asking that’s his wolf.
My voice turns low and husky. “Does your wolf do this with everyone?”
“Quite the contrary. You’re very special, Zarina.” Lucius is all finished taping the gauze to Ronin’s shoulder, but he doesn’t back away. “He’s paying homage to our future queen.”
“What?” I blurt out, gripping Ronin’s thighs hard enough to make him hiss. “Get a grip. You’ve already got a fucking queen. The Aquarius queen. The daughter of the current monarch. And the day Cybelle Aquarius mates my asshole brother, you’ll have a Gemini king.”
And then we’ll all suffer.
“I can’t take this anymore,” Ronin mutters, glaring over my shoulder at the shifter. “Forget about easing her into it, mate. Either you tell her or I will.”
“Tell mewhat?” I release my clench on Ronin’s quads and try to turn, but his grip tightens on my waist to hold me. The shifter joins in, hands closing over Ronin’s, and presses into my back like he really is the tactile beast that lurks beneath his skin.
“Zarina, listen to me,” Lucius breathes in my ear. “Your brother and his fated mate are dead.”
