Maybe I should stay away from all of the men until their drama had been straightened out. But knowing these angsty assholes, I didn’t like the idea of waiting for dick until they fixed their endless drama.
I gave him a quick peck on the lips that turned into more lingering kisses as he caught me around the waist. One of his hands settled on my jaw, tilting my head back, angling so that his tongue could slip into mine. My hips swayed forward, brushing against his hard cock.
I pulled away, laughing. “If we don’t get out of here, the two of us will never leave the bed.”
“I’ll walk you down to Calla’s room,” Jaik agreed reluctantly.
I had a feeling he was about to lose his willingness to let me out of his sight—but how the hell was I going to be Lucien otherwise?
“We’re in the Academy. What do you think is going to happen to me?”
“Absolutely nothing,” Jaik agreed. “Because one of us is going to be with you all of the time, so nothing can happen to you.”
“I need some tea before I even begin to talk to you, but we are going to have to come up with some more reasonable compromises between your protectiveness and my right to control my own destiny. Which doesn’t include getting myself murdered, by the way.” I pointed my finger at him, but he just caught my finger in his, pulled my hand up to its lips and pressed a quick kiss to my knuckles.
“I’m sure we can work something out,” he said.
That made one of us who was confident.
Arren would raise an awkward conversation over breakfast. I could just picture him looking happy about my discomfort—or at least as happy as he was capable of experiencing. I should tell Jaik about the previous night’s misadventure with Caldren and the encounter with the attempted assassin first before I had to deal with a group chat and oatmeal at the same time.
Telling Jaik was the mature, responsible thing to do in a relationship. Because we were both mature, responsible human beings.
“I need to tell you about something that happened last night.”
“Oh?” Jaik paused, still holding my hand, his gaze suddenly intent on my face. “Last night when you said you intended to spend the evening in my quarters, having a nice bath and catching up on your sleep?”
I stared at him. “Why do you sound like you don’t trust me?”
“Are you really going on the offensive right now?” he asked in wonder. “All right, fine. I will give you the benefit of the doubt. Tell me about your relaxing bath last night, Honor.”
“You are impossible to talk to.”
Jaik tugged me with him to the couch, where he made a show of arranging himself attentively, one arm propped on the back of the couch, one arm crossed over the other. He fixed a pleasant look on his face. “Go on.”
“Last night,” I began, then cautioned, “Try not to lose your mind.”
“I would never,” Jaik promised.
Neither of us believed that for a minute.
“I went to see Caldren.”
“Yes, of course you did.”
“Jaik, you need to be reasonable.”
“I have been. Please, go on.”
“We were attacked by an assassin,” I blurted out.
The tension in the room shifted so quickly it could have given me whiplash. Jaik’s jealousy was suddenly forgotten. He had a hundred questions about what exactly happened, and they all centered around the danger and not whether or not I had kissed his brother.
“You make me crazy,” he said. “Why didn’t you just tell me you wanted to go see Caldren? Then we could have arranged it safely, with Talisyn, Branok, Lynx, Arren and I keeping an eye on you.”
Yes, that sounded like a cozy meeting with Caldren. “First of all, I knew I was safe. As evidenced by the fact that the assassin never got within ten feet of me. Second of all, do you think maybe I would like to have some of my conversations without you glowering at whoever I’m talking to?”
“What the hell kind of conversations are you having you can’t have in front of me?”
“I don’t know, Jaik, you’re not exactly the most forgiving guy out there. Maybe I talked to Caldren about what happened between the two of you. Maybe to try to fix it.”
“It’s not your problem to fix! I don’t need you to get involved, and I definitely don’t need you to put your own life in danger to try to fix something that I don’t want to fix!”
“What if I want you to fix it? I care about both you and Caldren.”
“Why do you care about Caldren? What the hell has he ever done to impress you?”
“It isn’t a competition. You don’t win the sword fighting, the archery and the hand-to-hand competitions, then you win the hand of the princess.”
“Well, you are no princess, are you?” Jaik’s tone was as harsh as his words.
I stared at him for a heartbeat.
His face instantly softened with regret. “You’re far more important to me than any noble girl.”
“Oh no you don’t,” I shot back. “You meant what you said first. I’m not worthy of you. I should be grateful to have a prince slumming with me, I shouldn’t have any expectations for you, right?”
Jaik put his hand over my mouth. “Stop it, Honor. It’s not like that.”
I had been trying to have a mature and open conversation with him. But neither Jaik nor I had a lot of capacity for maturity.
I’d reached the limit of mine, with his palm pressed over my lips.
Look if you don’t want to get bitten, don’t put your hand over someone else’s mouth. It’s common sense. But they don’t teach common sense to royal men.
I bit him.
He yanked his hand away from my mouth, his expression shocked, and examined the blood on his palm.
“You bit me!”
“You tried to shut me up.”
“I should’ve known that was an impossible task! But you hurt me. We don’t hurt each other.”
Wait until he discovered I was Lucien. He hurt me all the time. “I think you’ll live.”
“Seriously? That’s all you have to say? You’re not going to apologize.”
“No, I’m not. I’m not sorry.”
“So let me get this straight.” Jaik’s voice was pure ice. “You lied to me, snuck out without proper security to consort with one of the kingdom’s biggest criminals, managed to survive an assassin attack only because Arren didn’t trust you, then threw a big tantrum about the whole thing and bit me?”
“I would not say that that is what just happened.”
“Do you remember when I threatened to spank your ass for various misdeeds?”
“Yes, I do.” I found the idea of the prince’s hands on my body in that domineering kind of way to be a pretty big turn on. But not now. I smiled at him sweetly. “But I assume you have too much common sense to start a fight you can’t win.”
For the record, if anyone is looking for a way to tempt a domineering alpha royal into spanking their ass, I’d highly recommend that challenge.
Jaik stared at me for a half-second, while both of us were probably wondering what was wrong with me. Then he grabbed me, tossed me over his shoulder and carried me toward the bed. Usually this was the start of something fun. But not today.
I was not having it. I drove my elbow into his kidney, and he let out a soft huff of pain.