“No, it won’t.” Sobs racked her body. “You’ll divorce me now. I know you will. You only married me because of the baby!”
His jaw went slack at her accusation. The same one that was mirrored in her mother’s gaze. And by the smirk on Lil’s face, he could tell that his sister expected him to agree.
But that wasn’t him. And he damn sure wasn’t about to kick her while she was down.
“No … I’m not a cad, Alura. I took a vow to you, before the gods, and I will stand by it.” Those words shocked her mother.
And pissed his sister off to no end.
Alura pulled back with a ragged breath so that she could stare up at him to see if he was lying. “You will?”
He wiped at the tears on her beautiful face and nodded. “Of course. I’m not going to leave you in your hour of need. I’m not a total ass. Just a partial one.”
That only made her cry harder as she clutched at his uniform.
For the first time since Ember had broken up with him, Charlotte looked at him with something other than contempt. If he didn’t know better, he might even think that his mother-in-law finally approved of him again.
Alura trembled and wiped her nose on his shirt. “I love you, Bastien.”
“I know.” He kissed the top of her head, wishing he felt the same for her. Wishing even more that he could bring himself to lie and say the words back to her like she wanted him to. But no matter how hard he tried, they stuck in his craw.
It was a growing wall between them that he barely touched her. Rarely went home. He still hadn’t moved his things from his barracks to the house he’d bought for Alura and the baby. Since he was Gyron Force and they were at war, it was an easy excuse that he was needed for their late-night patrols, and that he was required to stay on base in case they had to scramble for emergency attacks.
He kept telling himself that in time he’d grow to love her. His parents had started out that way—an arranged political marriage between two empires. Now the two of them were best friends and loved each other dearly.
Had he not met Ember, it was what he’d been destined for. His father had been in the middle of negotiations to marry him off to an heiress for the Ritadarion Empire so that Bastien would have been a ruler in his own right. In fact, he would have been married to her by now.
Ember had changed his whole life.
“Bas?”
He met Lil’s gaze.
She tapped her wrist, and it was only then that he realized his own arm was buzzing with an alert. “It’s a scramble. We have to get back to base.”
“Okay.” He wiped the remainder of the tears from Alura’s cheeks and kissed her lips. “I’ll be home as soon as the attack’s over to check on you.”
“Thank you.”
Nodding, he said his good-byes and followed his sister from the room to see that Ember and her sisters had already gone to answer the call. As he and his sister left, Lil cast a censuring glare at him.
“You’re really not planning to divorce her now?”
“Don’t start on me, Lil.”
“C’mon … you’re putting on a brave face. But even I can tell you’re not happy in this marriage. Divorce her already.”
“Meant what I said before the priest. Through good times and bad. I’m here for the long haul.”
“You’re an idiot. And I hope for your sake that she’s as loyal to you.”
*
“—Then I overheard Bastien talking to his uncle, Jackson. He had no idea that I could hear them, plotting his parents’ murders.”
“She’s fucking lying!” Bastien shot to his feet, intending to kill his wife. Had he not been in restraints and surrounded by half a dozen armed guards, he would have torn out Alura’s treacherous throat with his bare hands.
“Lock him in the box!” Alia Mureaux, the Overseer of Justice who ran the Trigon Court where Bastien was being tried for the murders of his parents and siblings, came to her feet. Her face was flushed bright red from the anger that made her dark brown eyes protrude. As a longtime friend of both his parents, she was as disgusted and upset by this trial as he was.
And she’d cut him no slack from the beginning. Because, like the rest of the Nine Worlds, she was convinced Bastien was guilty.
Something not helped by the fact that the media continued to run photos of him being arrested while covered in their blood. Worse, Alura kept giving interviews where she cried about how he’d done her wrong, telling everyone she was the victim, and spilling all manner of bullshit lies about him. How anyone could believe her, he had no idea.
Yet they did.
No one remembered a single act of kindness he’d ever done. Her lies and the willingness of fools to believe them overrode all else.
Shaking in rage, Bastien cried out at the injustice as the guards hauled him to the small, enclosed, soundproof cage. He’d had no time to grieve. To process. He hadn’t even been allowed to attend the funerals.
Please let me wake up from this nightmare!