Page 67 of Until the End of Ever
She announced she needed a couple of days to prep the Perthro Root before returning to her classes. For myself, I was grateful for the break; I needed a couple of days to look into it. Not that I didn’t trust Lucky, and I certainly had heard of spellsdesigned to check lineage, but I’d never heard of a ritual such as what she’d described. Something that would have made the kid in question, along with others, wander in the forest and connect with nature? Whatever it was, it didn’t feel safe.
While Kleos checked the forced marriage runes, I looked into the Perthro.
Or at least I tried to. Except we were alone—or as alone as one could be, with a demon cat playing with a night fox and a semi-divine grandfather somewhere in the house. And Kleos was still wearing that damnable top, teasing me with the knowledge that I could access her skin so easily. I had the right to, now. Sheliked me. And yes, we absolutely had not defined our relationship beyond that, but my understanding was that I was given leave to touch however much of her skin I wanted to.
Right now, I wanted.
The irresistible creature had slid her dainty feet out of their ballerina flats, crossing them at the ankles while she reclined on one end of the sofa, so very close.
Who gave a damn about the details of the blood rituals? I needed my hand on her skin now. Right this second.
An alarm rang just as my hands reached her shoulder.Damn it!
Kleos sighed. “She’s never going to stop if I don’t answer.”
“Hm?” My thumb started to knead her muscle, finding it too taut.
“My mother. I put my phone on Do Not Disturb for two hours; it must have run out. She’s called me, like, a dozen times since yesterday.”
No wonder she was tense. Wordlessly, I brought my arm around her middle and dragged her to me, spreading my thighs to fit her between my legs. Then I got to work, thumb pressing on the trapezius, working its way up to her neck. Kleos moaned, the sound shooting straight to my cock, but I didn’t let the littleminx distract me from the very important task of making her feel better. First, I needed all the stress eliminated. Then she could scream my name while I fucked her into next week.
“Why not answer?” I suggested. “Get it out of the way.”
She grunted. “I know exactly what she’ll say. You remember the Velvet Lounge. You know what she’ll say too.”
I chuckled, recalling the events that had the idiot who dared to think he was good enough for her scurrying and pouting. “Poor Castor Pendros-Valmont.”
“I don’t feel particularly sorry for him,” Kleos confessed, making me smile.
The phone rang again. With my hands on her, I could directly feel her shoulders contract under my fingers the moment Zenya’s name flashed.
Wasn’t it strange, that her mother was entered on her phone as Zenya Pendros?
“Answer. Tell her you’re being courted by Lucian Regis, and therefore, unable to accept further suitors.”
She laughed out loud. “Courted!”
I tried not to let it get to me. “That’s the word I’d use, yes. Alternatively, you could say, fucked within an inch of your life at any opportunity, exclusively and for the foreseeable future.”
Or the future, full stop.
“Lucian, I truly wish it were that simple. But if I don’t play her game, take her suitors, my mother will withdraw her guardianship with the council.”
I stopped moving.
Fucking seriously?
“I’ll be listed as dangerous,” Kleos pressed on, as though she hadn’t completely turned my world off of its axis with that revelation. “She’s threatened to, many times. My not playing by noble rules gets her in the shit with her family, so she holds that over my head. That’s why I do it.”
I…couldn’t compute that.Breathe, I willed myself, feeling my rage bubble into a bottomless source of power. It was lucky Kleos was the only one present. I might have sucked the life out of anyone else.
“She’s yourmother,” I finally growled.
Wasn’t it the simple, natural duty of a parent to protect their child? Against anything, really, but especially systematic discrimination? Then again, Elias’s mother wanted to have him for dinner. But they were dragons; brutal instincts were expected from them. Zenya was just a bitch.
“Yeah, well,” Kleos said with a shrug, “she thinks that title should come with complete obedience on my part.”
“Hera’s tits,” I growled. “Kleos, I’ll handle the guardianship, all right?”
