LOGINDarrenHeath met me in the war room an hour before dinner with the rosters, the maps, and the patient face of a captain who had answered the same questions from his king four times that week and would answer them a fifth.“Wards,” I said.“Renewed last night. Dayanara walked the full circuit herself, every stone, every threshold. She layered the nursery wing twice and complained about your stonework the entire time. Her exact words were: the castle is sound, the king is paranoid, and I want that in writing.”“Vetting.”“Every soul hired in the past two years re-screened. Every credential checked under merrow ink. Three forgeries in the serving applications, all caught at the gate, all of them
DarrenMy kitchens fell without a single blow being struck.Evette arrived before the party with one trunk, three crates of preserves, and the unstoppable momentum of a mother-in-law on a mission. By the time I came down from the morning councils, my head cook had surrendered her ladle the way a general surrenders a sword, my entire kitchen staff had defected to the invader, and the woman who once outran a royal kill order was elbow-deep in my pantry, reorganizing it by a system she declined to explain to anyone.“Darren.” She pointed a wooden spoon at me the moment I crossed the threshold. “Who ordered the eastern flour?”“I have no idea. I’m the king.”“Then the king can carry these t
AllissaWe lost the children to the gardens before lunch, which was always the plan, because no treaty ever signed could hold a candle to what our gardens did for inter-kingdom relations.The twins held court first. Ciera melted over Mira, who repaid her by seizing two fistfuls of golden hair and attempting to climb her like the aforementioned chandelier. Gunnar, the most feared sovereign on the borders, extended one cautious finger toward Soren and was caught in the iron grip of a six-month-old who then stared up at him in unblinking judgment for a full minute. The Dragon King did not move the entire time. “He’s weighing me,” Gunnar said quietly, with what I could have sworn was respect. “Let him finish.”And then there was Lyra.My daughter had sp
AllissaThree days before the party, my daughter woke the entire east wing at dawn by announcing, at full volume, that today was a Thorin day.“A what day?” Darren muttered into his pillow.“You heard her.” I was already up, peeling Lyra off the foot of our bed where she had materialized like a small determined ghost. “The dragon royals arrive this morning. She’s been counting down on her fingers for over a week.”“She only has ten fingers.”“She borrowed two of mine.”My mate dragged himself upright with the expression of a man preparing for an audit. I knew exactly what was happening behind those green eyes, because it happened every visit. Gunnar he respected. Ciera he adored, though he would phrase it as diplomatic regard. It was one of the smallest members of the delegation who turned my fearsome king into a brooding thundercloud.“Be nice,” I warned, wrestling Lyra into the blue dress she had selected four days ago for this exact occasion.“I am always nice.”“You growled at his
AllissaThe first thrust drove the air from my lungs and a cry from my throat, deep and claiming and perfectly aimed. He set a punishing rhythm and I rode it, meeting him stroke for stroke, the wet slap of our bodies filling the room along with his ragged groans and my climbing gasps. Each drive of his hips hit that place inside me that blurred the candlelight. His hands roamed everywhere he could reach, gripping my hips, my breasts, the curve of my ass, hauling me down harder onto him, possessive even now, especially now.“Name,” he demanded, voice wrecked.“Darren.” It broke out of me on a moan, and his answering snarl was triumphant.He sat up without slipping free, wrapping an arm around my back and changing the angle so exquisitely that I clutched hi
Allissa“You kept count.”“I count every hour I’m not buried in you.” He caught my hand before it could close around him and dragged my knuckles to his lips, breathing ragged. “Not yet. I have plans, and they begin with my mouth and your thighs around my head.”Heat flooded between my legs at the promise alone. He felt it, of course he did, his nostrils flaring as my arousal hit the air, and the growl that rolled out of him was pure animal.“Gods,” he rasped. “I can smell how wet you already are for me.”He lifted me as if I weighed nothing and laid me across the sheets, following me down, his body a wall of heat above mine. His mouth started at my collarbone and worke
I walked down the hallway with purpose. I had been here for a week and they still refused to let me leave. I felt the familiar press of invisible chains reminding me that I couldn’t just run away. I held my stomach to help support it as it swayed with my steps. At this rate, I was going to end up gi
I felt the pulse of the invisible chain on my wrist, a reminder that I was bound by the magic that held me captive. I pushed through the courtyard, determined to make an escape plan. If Darren couldn’t come to me, then I would go to him. The air was full of unfamiliar scents, both sweet and fiery, a
AllissaI floated between consciousness and some dark sea, adrift in shadows with nothing to cling to but his smell. There was no mistake that Alfred was beside me. A thin thread of memory tried to pull me back, but everything slipped through my fingers, leaving me drowning in uncertainty. How long
The months slipped away, barely recognizable, barely there, and then suddenly it was as if I’d always been alone, like it was normal to pad through the halls without Darren by my side. Calls, messages, each one fleeting, each one hurting as much as it healed. I touched the place where he should hav







