Page 49 of Mastering their Maiden

“Summer doesn’t know,” I said. “She’s worried, too. And Kaze and Ellis are too busy trying to teach Makan how to act with a woman to help us look.”

Kaiden gave me a curious look. “He’s been with women.”

“He’s been with the women Ryne kept chained. Women he didn’t have to subdue and seduce. You know there’s a difference.”

“If any more time passes, I might forget.” He cracked a wry smile and elbowed me. “You might have to re-teach me.”

“Umber and Dex are the seducers. You and I are takers.”

“It didn’t feel like taking last night with Dex,” Kaiden said, and I shrugged.

“He misses her too, and we’re all restless. The full moon is tonight.”

Kaiden sat back against the fence, letting out a long sigh. “I don’t want to find a new maiden. I don’t want to spend months watching and—”

“What are you saying?” I snapped, every muscle in my body going taut when Kaiden averted his eyes. “Kaiden. We’re not finding a new maiden.”

“Even if Aria comes back, she may never forgive us.”

“She will.”

“She’d be right not to.”

I grabbed hold of his jaw, turning his eyes to mine. “She will. If I have to spend the rest of my days proving my loyalty to that girl, proving my devotion, proving that she wants to bend to us just as much as we want to kneel for her, I’ll do it. And so will you. There is no one else. She’s it. Has been since the moment we laid eyes on her.”

He stared back at me, his handsome face shadowed by remorse. I felt the same emotion in my chest before I smothered it under anger, lust, and longing. I wanted Aria back in my arms, pressed between our bodies. I wanted her lips, her tongue, the sweetness between her thighs.

I wanted her loyal, passionate, fearless heart.

And I wasn’t going to give up on claiming it.

Kaiden’s face stayed sad for a moment, then he smiled softly and set his forehead against mine. He only looked up when the men guarding Ryne’s soldiers called his name. There had been a few defections, but I didn’t trust them. Neither did Kaiden, but he vowed to hear the men out anyway, wanting to honor his loyalty to all Kavari even when there were disagreements.

He stood, leaving behind the bow he’d been fiddling with. Not one of our heavier ones. It was designed for smaller hands. Specifically, for Aria’s hands. He still hadn’t seen her shoot, I realized, but I’d told him about all the makeshift bows she’d crafted from bent branches and string. Frayne taught her how to do it when she first…

Everything inside me went tense when I thought of the old man. Of his cabin just off the trail out in the woods. How Aria said he’d saved her after her sister left. Taught her to hunt, to shoot, to defend herself. Gave her a place to go when she needed to escape.

I shot to my feet, practically racing toward the gate with one thought racing through my head.

How had we not thought to search further out in the forest? Kaiden had been distracted by the chaos of keeping Ryne’s men locked up, but the rest of us…

Umber had been out. Dex had. I had. But none of us had thought to look at Frayne’s.

Maybe we did deserve her contempt for being such idiots.

I kept my eyes forward, focused solely on my destination. If Aria wasn’t there, Frayne might know where she’d gone. At least the general direction, but I had a feeling in my gut that she stayed with him. That she was waiting…

Waiting to see if she could so easily leave us behind. Waiting to see if we’d give up our quest to claim her and simply let her go on her way.

No, we wouldn’t do that. She was ours.

And I was going to get her back.

CHAPTER 18

Dex

Zander stormed out the gate and down the slightly worn path that led from village to village, his body tense when he passed us. Kaiden frowned, but he and Umber were talking with the guards we’d placed with Ryne’s men, trying to decide how to handle the ones wanting to switch sides. Wanting to give up their loyalty to the king and swear it to the Kavari as a whole.

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