Page 66 of Savagely Mated

Fine. He wants to follow me? Good for him.

He comes after me, of course, and instead of enjoying his coffee, he spends the next ten minutes chasing me around the house as I sprint up and down the stairs, go down different halls, and generally fuck around.

He’s fit, but this is annoying, as I intend it to be. I loop around corners of Kirin’s big mansion, and finally I get enough distance from him to jump into a powder room, slam the door, and take the world’s most satisfying morning ablutions.

When I open the door, he’s standing there, arms folded.

“What?”

“You just have to push limits, don’t you,” he says.

“If you want to watch me pee, ask nicely,” I say. “You can’t supervise me every second of the day. I’m not controllable.”

“You’re not, are you,” he says. “Explains why you were never sent to the harem.”

I shrug. “I really don’t care about any of this, you know. I have been raised my whole life to guard the king. Maybe I would never have gotten a royal guard post, but I was still raised with that ideal.”

“The true royal line of Eclipse has been deposed by a king chosen by the cardinal. It might seem that we are trying to avert disaster, but Darcy, disaster has already happened. The king you have been raised trying to protect does not sit on the throne.”

“Where is the real king?”

“Close at hand, and will reveal himself when the time is right.”

“When I’ve killed the king.” I shake my head. “We all know if I kill the king, the next thing that’s going to happen, 0.2 secondslater, is I’m going to catch a bullet. There’s no way I survive this plan. It’s insane for me.”

“We will protect you.”

“How? If you can get close enough to protect me, you can get close enough to kill the king yourself.”

“The details of the plan will be revealed closer to the time.”

“Right,” I say. “Sounds like some bullshit, Rafe.”

I don’t like this stupid ‘kill the king’ thing. Maybe these guys are all into being rebels and terrorists, but just because we’re mate bonded, it doesn’t mean I have to agree with their wild political views or their murderous plans.

“Just come and have breakfast,” he sighs.

“You don’t know what to do with me, do you,” I smirk, feeling like I’ve proved my point.

“No,” he says. “I don’t. You want to be taken care of…”

“No, I don’t. I want to be left to my own devices,” I tell him. “I want to live my fucking life. I made a decision for myself the other day. I decided to leave the academy and get a job. And all you three have done, well, two, because Kirin’s actually pretty chill, is try to force me to carry out some crazy fucking plan. I don’t want any part of it, get it? And watching me pee isn’t going to magically make me behave myself. You had it right in the first place. I’m uncontrollable. So stop trying to control me.”

Rafe nods thoughtfully.

“Alright,” he says.

“Alright?”

“Yes. You want to live your life as you see fit, do so. You’re right. We don’t have any real claim to control you. You might be ours, but that’s a mate thing. It should be about love. Not using you as a pawn.”

“Right. Tell that to Einar when you next see him. I’m going to work.”

“One problem,” Rafe says.

“What?”

“Einar hid your bike. He didn’t want you on it anymore. He’s afraid you’re going to kill yourself. So I don’t know where that is.”

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