23. Sage

CHAPTER 23

Sage

“It’s not you,” he said, his voice low, edged with that broken resignation that I’d heard when we’d been cuddling in the nook after having sex. “I’m not good mate material.”

“I’ve felt your cock,” I teased, trying to lighten the mood. “If the only thing that makes Moor a good mate is his size, then you have nothing to worry about.”

“Moor’s job isn’t dangerous.” He wrapped his arms around me and held me tight as if he didn’t want to let me go. “And he hasn’t had to kill anyone. You deserve someone who’s soul isn’t stained.”

Except if that was what stained a soul, mine was just as stained.

The memory of Pylos’s death flashed through me. My stepfather’s armsmaster had tumbled over that mountain’s edge with wild, desperate screams and had fallen to his death, and I hadn’t given it a second thought. Sawyer and I had kept running until we were as safe as we could get under the circumstances, and then I’d gone to the Black Tower and become a Guardsman.

I hadn’t had time to think about what I’d done or what I would have done if he hadn’t fallen off that cliff, but I knew in my heart if the mountain hadn’t killed him, I would have. I would have fought with everything I had and used every dirty trick I could think of because it had been his life or Sawyer’s.

“If that’s the requirement then Moor doesn’t deserve me,” I whispered. “I’ve killed someone, too.” And I’d do it again if I had to.

“Accidents don’t count, Red.” He pressed his lips against the top of my head.

I didn’t correct him. If I was really fae, Sawyer and I wouldn’t have had to run for our lives. We wouldn’t have watched our family die and been left with a stepfather who only saw us for what we could get him.

“I’m sorry you had to experience that, though,” he murmured, his thumb tracing soft circles against my ribs as if he was trying to soothe me and didn’t even realize it.

“And there you go being thoughtful again, just like making sure I came before you did even if that meant I disappeared before you were done,” I murmured back. “ I’m not sure you’ve convinced me that you’re bad mate material.”

“Murder doesn’t disqualify me?” he asked, his tone turning wry.

“You mentioned it in the same breath as you mentioned your dangerous job, so I doubt you just go around killing people for fun,” I replied. “My father had been forced to kill a lot of men, evil men who hurt people. It’s all about your intent.”

And everything inside me said Fantasy Man didn’t have evil intent. Which was crazy. My imagination could just be turning him into someone I wanted him to be, not who he really was.

But that thing in my soul assured me that I was right. I could trust him. I was safe with him.

“Your father?” he asked, making my thoughts stutter.

Oh, crap. I was supposed to have multiple fathers and an enormous extended family. Except I didn’t want to make up a bunch of lies. Sure, I was going to avoid Fantasy Man and every other man in the Garden after this, but I still couldn’t risk telling lies then forgetting them and getting caught.

“He… upheld the law.” Which was true and hopefully vague enough that he wouldn’t push for more information. “So, what else is so horrible about you? You hog the covers in bed?”

“Yep. I roll myself into a cocoon and snore like thunder all night long,” he said with a chuckle, thankfully not fighting me on the change in conversation.

“So extra blankets and cotton for my ears. Not a problem.”

“All right. Fine. If I drink too much, I sing bawdy songs all night long,” he warned.

“What a coincidence! So do I,” I shot back in mock surprise. “And I have a horrible singing voice.”

“I doubt you have a bad voice.” He dipped in and brushed his lips against my temple. “Not if the sounds you make when I touch you are anything to go by,” he purred, his tone low and sensual, making it clear that by touch he really meant sex.

“I’m not sure I believe you,” I replied, my voice husky with need. “I think you should touch me again to prove it.”

“I think we should find someone down there to touch you so I can have an objective opinion,” he murmured. “If Falcon and Moor don’t catch your interest what about?—”

The curtain on the far side of the courtyard swept open, and Wells and Crane strode inside exuding confidence and that hungry danger that made my skin crawl.

A shiver ran down my spine at the memory of them trapping me between them, chilling some of the desire Fantasy Man had reignited. I shrank back, pressing myself even closer to him, afraid they’d look up and see me.

“Not Wells or Crane, hunh?” Fantasy Man said, his voice darkening.

I opened my mouth to say I wouldn’t want either of them as a husband let alone touching me but managed to stop myself. I still didn’t know how forthright I could be, and for all I knew Fantasy Man was friends with them.

“I probably didn’t get the best first impression of them,” I hedged. “I was disoriented my first time here.”

“Or maybe your first impression was the right one. What do your instincts say?”

That I could trust Fantasy Man even though I knew nothing about him and that— “Wells and Crane are dangerous. And not like how Blaze or Rider are dangerous. It’s something— I can’t explain it. There’s just something…”

“Wrong about them?” he finished for me.

“Yes.”

The two men headed to the table with the pitchers of beverages and empty glasses, exchanging friendly greetings with everyone as if I was the only one who thought there was something wrong with them.

A smaller man — at least smaller compared to the other fae but still bigger than the average human man — joined them. Crane poured him a drink as the man said something and Wells threw his head back and laughed a deep, free laugh that made my skin crawl.

“It must just be me because no one else is acting like there’s anything wrong with them.” Except that wasn’t true. Talon had tensed and Lord Quill looked worried.

It was a subtle change in posture and expression, and I shouldn’t have been able to see it since I didn’t know either man very well, but I just knew they sensed there was something wrong with Wells and Crane as well.

“They’re very good at hiding their true nature, but you’re not the only one who’s noticed.” He tightened his grip on me, his body curling forward slightly as if he was trying to protect me. “They won’t hurt you, but it’s probably best to avoid being alone with them.”

“I’ve already figured that out.”

And I had serious doubts about whether they’d hurt me or not. Fae culture might think I was precious because I was a woman, but Wells and Crane acted more like the human men I was familiar with, and those men hadn’t hesitated to hurt me.

The curtain swept aside again and this time a woman entered. A man who was almost as gorgeous as Talon followed her, but she was the one who drew every eye in the courtyard.

And rightly so. She was stunning, dressed in a flowing white and gold gown that accentuated her full breasts and curvy hips and had a plunging neckline just like mine that revealed her mating marks. Most of them were pale yellow, a match to her blond hair, but a few of them were dark red, which I knew had to indicate something, I just wasn’t sure what.

Most of the men headed toward her as if mesmerized by her presence. Wells’s hungry smile grew, but he didn’t join the crowd with the others, which, given how aggressively he and Crane had pursued me, surprised me.

The woman smiled and laughed and radiated a glowing confidence not at all intimidated by the press of the much larger men all around her. She looked men in the eyes, teased and flirted with some while flatly refusing or even ignoring others not worried about the repercussions of saying no or being rude.

It was astounding. I’d never seen a woman act like that before. I had no idea how she stayed so calm and confident in the face of all that masculine hunger, let alone glowed with pleasure from it.

Was that how I was supposed to behave? It went against everything I’d been taught. If I flatly told Wells and Crane no, would they stop pursuing me?

She said something to one of the men who broke apart from the group with a huge smile and headed to the drinks table and poured her a drink while she pushed farther into the courtyard.

The men all moved with her, parting to make way, as if her very presence commanded them. Just a look or a smile or a refusal and the men obeyed. Some looked disappointed but no one raised a hand to her or was sharp with her or told her she wasn’t behaving properly.

“She’s incredible,” I said, as mesmerized by her grace and confidence as the men around her were.

“Ember does make an entrance,” Fantasy Man said, his tone wry.

“But you’re not interested?” I asked, a little surprise and yet strangely satisfied that he wasn’t. “She’s gorgeous.”

“I’m bad mate material,” he reminded me with a shrug then he brushed his lips against the back of my neck, just a whisper of a touch but it stole my breath and made my heart race. “And you’re gorgeous, too.”

“Not like that, I’m not,” I said, my voice husky as I melted into him. She was a goddess among her worshipers. “She’s not afraid of any of them.”

“And you are?” he asked, except I had a feeling he’d already figured out that being swarmed like that wouldn’t light me up like it did Ember but would make me want to run away.

“They’re all just so…” Hungry, desperate, overwhelming. “Intense.”

And while Fantasy Man also seemed hungry, his hunger inflamed my desire.

Heat swelled in my marks and curled in my chest, and I ached with need inspired by Talon’s magic but also my own need for Fantasy Man, for how he made me feel the other night.

“The Garden can be a little much at the beginning,” he said his tone low and sensual. He skimmed a hand up my ribs and teased the edge of my breast, stealing my breath for a heart-pounding moment. “But Ember has been searching for her mates for a while now. She bonded her first mate a few years ago but hasn’t had much luck finding the others, so she’s had lots of practice coming to the Garden and being greeted like this.”

I shuddered at the thought of spending years showing up at the Garden and being surrounded by all those hungry men. “It’ll take more than a few years for me to feel comfortable being mobbed like that.”

“I doubt it’ll take you years to find your mates.” His fingers brushed closer to my breasts, and I tensed in anticipation. “A catch like you, willing to put up with a cover-hog who snores and sings rude songs when he’s drunk will be fully mated before you even know it.”

Better yet, I’d find a way to stop waking up in the Garden and avoid being mated at all…

But after tonight.

After I’d had one final night with my Fantasy Man.