Page 14 of Gemini Kings
Zero. Zip. Nada.
Either from Vasili or from Ronin.
“Geez.” I frown at my Catwoman reflection in the glass wall. “Where is everybody?”
Xiao’s medallion gleams against my chest. So warm and heavy, the thing almost seems to pulse and hum in the dim light like a second heart. I wrap my fist around the ancient Spanish gold with a curl of satisfaction.
Xiao’s gonna regret what he did to me every time he looks in the goddamn mirror and doesn’t see King Ferdinand of Aragon looking back.
Outside the glass, the casino falls away as the lift shoots up. Now I’ve got a primo view of the Las Vegas Strip spread out before me, all neon billboards and flashing lights and laser shows pulsing against the night. The shadowy skeleton of the Gemini coaster’s big hill flashes past.
With my guys incommunicado, I guess I better get ready for the goddamn Russian.
Whoever that is.
A hum builds in my throat, but my mouth is dry and my tongue sticks to the roof of my mouth. Suddenly my heart is hammering.
Lucius has been teaching me to control the lightning. And yeah, I might be the Gemini clan’s only functioning lightning witch, but Ireallydon’t want to try summoning that shit without Lucius.
Because last time I summoned lightning in a Gemini casino, even though it was unplanned and involuntary and purely in self-defense, eighty-seven people ended up dead.
Including my psycho mom.
My chest tightens with old grief and my gut twists in a knot of guilt. That’s not gonna happen again.
Not ever.
Sure, I’ll use the little lightning if I have to, like I just did with Xiao. But I definitelywon’tsummon the little guy’s big brother.
Because I’m not, like, homicidal.
That’s one more reason I’m lukewarm at best about this whole queen gig. Once I ascend, I’ll be expected, required, practically forced to use my witchcraft.
The same witchcraft that’s always terrified me.
The problem with using it tonight is, my newly honed witchcraft’s never really been tested like this, in actual combat, not without Lucius. I ache with a violent longing for my broody headmaster, the guy who makes me feel safe when I summon, the guy who even makes me feel safe when he’s growling threats and vibrating with violence and his wolf’s rising and his monster cock’s reaming me in our medieval bed.
The elevator floods with the sudden scent of roses and vanilla. That’s my mating scent, that truckload of pheromones and come-fuck-me biochemicals. Which is pretty much the only Mogadon trait I manifest.
I scent when I get horny.
I scent to mark what’s mine.
My reflection floats against the Sin City night, hair drifting around my shoulders like seaweed in a current, light pouring from my turquoise eyes, which is a pretty witchy effect that’s heightened by the big dark ovals of my Catwoman mask. My bubblegum pink lipstick and drama queen mascara have somehow survived the fray without a smudge.
When I snap my fingers, lavender sparks and crackles.
That light in my eyes is psi fire. That’s a Valyrian trait, and it’s a trait Ronin shares, he’s almost pure Valyrian. The lightning’s a weather gift, which is Kryll like my fated mate Neo. The shifter genes from my splash of Protean DNA are all recessives, not generally good for much, though I’ve got a pretty strong hunch that, since both Lucius (full shifter) and Vasili (part shifter) have given me mating bites, that’s maybe gonna change?
Someday.
Sure, these days I’m feeling kinda shifty, but I haven’t exactly sprouted wings. Suffice it to say, despite having a cocktail of genes from all four arcane races in my Gemini DNA, I got nothing in the witchcraft department that’s really gonna help me on that roof…
Except the lightning I’m terrified to use.
Yep.
Queen or no queen, right now it sucks to be me.
