Three Kinds of Lost: A Reverse Harem Academy Romance (The True and the Crown Book 3)

by May Dawson

  “I was actually invited,” I say. “Although I might be a roustabout, I can’t say I’m familiar with the definition.”

  Penny bounds from the mattress beside me to him, and he smiles down at her, half-squatting to hold out his hand. She sniffs him, then licks his hand.

  So apparently we’re all friends here.

  He sets the tray on the table. “Are you hungry? The kitchen’s pretty good. There’s chicken, potatoes, some kind of soup.”

  When he turns to me, there’s a roll in his hand, which I’m pretty sure was supposed to be my roll. He munches it as he takes a seat next to me on the bed.

  I raise an eyebrow at him. “I feel like you don’t see me as a threat.”

  “Should I?” He raises both eyebrows in return.

  “I think there’s probably a procedure for guards-and-prisoners that doesn’t involve guards stealing baked goods and leaving the door open to the hall.”

  “Oops, you’re right.” He gets up, holding the roll between strong, even white teeth, and shuts the door. He returns to sit beside me, taking a bite out of the roll and swallowing. “Sorry about that.”

  “I think you know I don’t belong here,” I say.

  “I do have that feeling,” he admits. “But I don’t really mind a pretty girl in cuffs, to be honest.”

  I hold the cuffs out anyway, and he runs his palm over them. When his fingertips brush the inside of my wrists, an unexpected thrill runs up my spine. What the hell is that about? The chains fall away, but I feel unsettled by the desire that raced through my body at his casual touch.

  “You’re bossy,” he says.

  “I have to be,” I return.

  “Who are you?” he asks, even though I’m quite confident he already knows.

  “Your friend walked off with my invitation.”

  “I’ll know if you’re on the guest list,” he promises.

  I sigh. “My name is Tera Donovan.”

  He whistles. But he already knew that; there’s no surprise on his face. He just thinks he’s funny. “Are you sure? You don’t want to try being someone else?”

  Maybe he is a little bit funny.

  “Believe me, if they’d allow it, I’d much prefer to be someone else.”

  “Who’s they?”

  I flash him a smile instead of answering. That’s a dangerous question. Who is it that decided I have to be Tera Donovan in a world that doesn’t want me? The Crown? Is it the True’s fault?

  Is it the men I love that force me to stay Tera Donovan?

  The thought jolts me, but his gaze on mine is too thoughtful, as if he sees the thoughts beneath my surface, and I make myself smile. “What’s your name, new friend?”

  He pulls a face. “I’d give mine up if I could too.”

  “Let me guess. You’re the prince of Avalon?”

  He presses a hand to his chest, looking down at his uniform as if he can’t make sense of what I’ve just said. It’s a bit melodramatic.

  “Anyone who wasn’t a prince would be happy to be mistaken for one,” I remind him.

  “Not if they knew my life,” he teases. “Well, you seem like you’re everything I heard about.”

  “Oh?”

  “You’re an interesting person, Tera Donovan.”

  That’s very kind of him. I have a funny feeling that the prince hates to be bored, so I decide to be frank. “Honestly, I can never remember your name.”

  His eyes widen. Genuine surprise, this time. Then he grins. “Most of the girls in Avalon that are your age are a bit obsessed with me.”

  “Then you should find me refreshing.” I’m already full-up on obnoxious noble-born men with an affinity for keeping secrets. I don’t need any more.

  “My name’s Rian.” He takes my hand in his, his fingers warm and deft, and raises it to his lips. When he bows his head over my hand to kiss my knuckles, I can’t hide a self-conscious smile. He adds, “You can call me Rian when it’s just the two of us.”

  “How kind of you.” My voice is arch.

  “Otherwise—” he breaks off, and squeezes my hand gently in his. “That was about to sound pretentious.”

  “Honestly, everything about this—the costume, the flirting—was already a bit pretentious. Poor people don’t do all this. Just rich people who need to be entertained.” I wave around the room.

  “And Tera Donovan is beyond that.” His lips quirk up. He has a nice mouth—very kissable—despite everything I’ve said so far.

  “I guess I learned a few things dirtside.”

  “I can’t believe you didn’t remember my name. You don’t remember me at all?”

  “I know you’re in the news a lot, but it usually says prince of Avalon…”

  “Not like that. We met when we were kids.” He frowns, running a hand through his mop of chestnut brown curls. “Okay, I have a highly forgettable face, apparently.”

  “How old were we?”

  “I was six or seven. You must have been around the same age.”

  That was before I went to boarding school. I shrug. “Someone may have stolen some of my memories, inadvertently or on purpose. Don’t take it personally. Maybe you were very charming.”

  His current playful pique flips to protectiveness. “Someone stole your memories?”

  “Among other things.” My voice is light. I hope my guys can’t hear me through the wall because I’m randomly spilling far too many secrets to the prince of Avalon. “Tell me about when we met. Maybe it will jog something in my memory.”`

  “Not now. We’ll have time to reminisce tonight.” He stands and then hesitates. “Thank you for coming to my ball.”

  “What the prince wants, he gets.”

  “I’m not so sure about that.” His gaze is on my lips.

  I cross my arms, staring at him until his eyes flicker to mine. His cheeks color slightly as if I’ve made him abashed.

  “I’m sorry for the poor welcome,” he says. “The guard will be dealt with.”

  “Please don’t,” I say. “My whole party is a bit unbearable and could use some humbling. It was good for Airren, I’m sure.”

  “Are the two of you—?” he trails off delicately.

  “Really?” I ask him.

  He shrugs.

  “Status: it’s complicated,” I say. “How is Mycroft?”

  “Recovering. He took on some dark magic, and my healer was able to soak it out quickly once he found the source. But he took quite a hit.”

  Mycroft is all right. Relief floods my chest. “Can I see him?”

  “Yes. I’ll take you to your room; he’s resting just down the hall in the guest wing. That’s what I really came down here for.” He cocks his head at me curiously. “I can’t believe you didn’t recognize me and yet still figured out who I was.”

  “Do you make a habit of doing this kind of thing?” I ask. “Because I can’t imagine it would ever work very well.”

  His lips quirk to one side. “You must promise me that you’ll save a dance for me tomorrow night?”

  “I came all this way to your ball, Rian. You had better save more than one dance for me.”

  My snarky words bring a genuine smile to his lips. A delighted smile.

  The prince of Avalon has a crush on me.

  This is totally wild.

  Chapter 11

  “I’ll have your men sent for once they look presentable for you,” Rian tells me. Servants flit around us, ahead just out of sight, but we’re alone in the hallway when he pushes open the door to a sumptuous bedroom. “I’ve put all four of you up in the royal guest wing.”

  “Thanks.” Is that supposed to impress me? He doesn’t realize how little it takes to impress me after a few years dirtside. I’m delighted by hot coffee and white mattresses and boys who smell like clean laundry.

  He hesitates. “Would you have dinner with me tonight?”

  “I’m sure we’d all love that.”

  “I was inviting you,” he says, a sudden, cocky grin flashing
across his face.

  “I know. And I was inviting them.” I set Penny down on the ground. She winds around my ankles, almost knocking me off balance.

  Rian reaches out and steadies me, his hand on my shoulder. His touch sends sparks rising through my chest, and his voice is playful when he says, “You’re impossible, Tera Donovan.”

  There’s that last name that always makes my ears burn, the one I can’t get away from. Maybe I shouldn’t want to.

  “I’m not impossible.” I flash him a devilish smile as I take the door in my hand, using my foot to gently push Penny back into the room. “I’m just very, very difficult.”

  His eyes watch me with a mix of curiosity and hunger as I close the door between us.

  Oh, come on. Like the prince of Avalon can seriously pursue Donovan’s daughter. He might be curious about me because of a childhood crush, but if I let him take me to bed—which I wouldn’t—it would be over as soon as he’d satisfied himself that he could have me.

  I’m stupid, sometimes, but I’m not that stupid.

  With the door firmly closed between me and anyone of royal blood and questionable motive, I turn to take in the room.

  I face an enormous bedroom. There’s a fancy tufted golden couch and two white wing chairs in front of the fireplace—my god, do these people love their white-and-gold color scheme. Penny bounds across the room and stakes her claim on the fluffy white-and-gold bed, which is up two stairs on a marble dais. Well, I’m almost doomed to take a stumble off of that in the middle of the night. Whose bright idea was that?

  Still, it’s gorgeous.

  On the other side of the room is a long stone balcony. I open the French doors and peek outside; far below, I can see the richly blooming gardens and the deep blue water of the pool, which is still open even though it must be cold. There are places like this dirtside, I’m sure. But on Primus, people like me don’t get lush blooms and late night swims. Here, beauty is everywhere; this space might be the prince’s, but it’s not the only one.

  I make my way through the room to the bathroom, which is modern no matter how old-school the furnishings may be. There’s an enormous tub, already filled with hot, bubbly water. In the closet, there’s a broad assortment of clothing from gowns to tanks and jeans neatly hung on white velvet hangers.

  Actually, I guess some things still really do impress me.

  I take a long hot bath, wash my hair, and dress in a pair of jeans and a soft white cardigan. I pull my still-damp hair up off my neck into a loose bun on top of my head, and notice for the first time that there’s a tray of jewelry on one side of the sink. Not going to lie, I hope this is for keeps. I slip pearly studs into my ears and then do a little twirl in front of the mirror.

  I can twirl all I want. I still don’t see why the prince has harbored a twelve-year-crush on me.

  There’s a knock on the door. “What now?” I ask as I head to answer it.

  “Same old trouble.” It’s a low, gruff voice, and I grin before I even register it as Mycroft’s voice.

  When I swing the door open, he’s standing there braced in the doorway, big and unsmiling and scary-looking as usual. That doesn’t stop me from jumping up to wrap my arms around his big shoulders. He catches me with an arm around my waist, and his eyes crinkle at the corners.

  “Sorry for the scare, Tera.” He sounds sincere.

  “I wasn’t scared.”

  “Because you don’t really care about me one bit?” It’s always hard to read Mycroft, but he squeezes my waist as he sets me back down on my feet. He knows that isn’t true.

  “Because you don’t look like anyone or anything could take you down.” I grab his hand to draw him into my room, then stop to look down the hall. Where are the others?

  “I don’t know about that.” His voice is wry.

  “Where’s Airren and Cax?”

  “I told them to give me a ten minute head start before they started annoying me again.”

  “Probably a good call.” I cock my head at him as he walks into the room and I close the doors behind us. “What happened out there?”

  He waves his fingers in the air. Checking for bugs, even here.

  He shrugs as he turns. “I absorb magic. It’s part of why I tend to be more powerful than some.”

  “Then anyone. You don’t have to be modest around me.”

  “We haven’t seen what you can do yet, princess. Anyway, everyone absorbs magic when they use it, but for me—I draw it all the time. It’s useful. Until that much dark magic walks into the room—”

  That doesn’t make any sense. “You’ve spent plenty of time around dark magic.”

  “My defenses were down.”

  “Why?”

  He doesn’t answer me. It’s because he doesn’t want to lie to me. I have a funny feeling there’s a lie waiting; if it were Airren in this room with me, he’d already have spoken whatever that lie is. He wouldn’t give Mycroft the chance to hesitate.

  “Mycroft.” There’s an edge in my voice.

  “My magic is a bit sideways at present,” he says levelly.

  “Your magic and mine?” I say it lightly, but then the two pieces click together for me. “When you tried to loan me your magic—”

  “It wasn’t your fault.”

  “I never said it was.”

  He shrugs. “I just don’t want you to waste energy on feeling guilty.”

  “I’ll feel guilty if I want to.”

  “I thought you just said you wouldn’t.”

  “You really don’t understand how humans work, do you?”

  “I am human, Tera.”

  I hold my hand out and tip it from side-to-side. “Maybe you’re a little more than human.”

  His eyes crinkle at the corners. “I like you.”

  “Believe me, I know.” Casually, I add, “And so does the prince.”

  “Is that why we’re all here and there’s a goddamn tux in my room?”

  “There’s something deeply wrong with all of you,” I say, thinking of the day I met Airren, Cax, and Mycroft. They’d been standing outside the train station. They’d been on the lookout for me—the upperclassmen had known I’d have a tough time fitting in—but there had been a lot of surprises for all of us. It was certainly unexpected that there had been a passion and a flirtation between each of them and me from the beginning.

  “And with you,” he returns. “You’ve got terrible taste in men.”

  “This is true.”

  “Nobles are always assholes.”

  I think of the masked man I met at the masquerade, who had said as much. “This is also true.”

  “Miners aren’t any better despite being at the other end of the social scale here in Avalon. We’re all humorless brutes.”

  “I wouldn’t say humorless. I’ve seen you smile twice.”

  “When?” He sounds offended.

  “There was that time Airren tripped at dinner and got cake all over his jacket.”

  That memory makes the smile lines around his eyes deepen.

  “What about Cax? He’s not a noble or a miner.”

  “He wears vests. That’s how you know he’s also an asshole.” Mycroft rolls his eyes. “Do you know he went through a phase where he wore hats too? A wide variety of hats. Fedoras. Berets. One had a plume. Be glad you missed the plume.”

  “But you love him.”

  “Shut up.”

  “And you love me.”

  “Definitely shut your mouth.”

  Despite his harsh words, his hands wrap around my hips.

  “You adore me,” I say.

  His lips brush mine tentatively. “Yes.”

  “So you should be nice to me.”

  He grazes the corner of my mouth. “No.”

  “I really do have terrible taste,” I murmur before I let myself get lost in him, in the fiery kisses that we trade, in his hands sweeping down my curves, in the hungry way our mouths meet. There’s always an edge of desperation when he kisses me. I
don’t think it’s desperation that he’s going to lose me—Mycroft may care for me, but he doesn’t let himself need anyone—but desperation like he’s afraid he’s going to hurt me, like he has to pull me close before his instinct to push me away takes over.

  Maybe I just have an overactive imagination. Maybe he’s as cold inside as he is on the surface. Maybe he just wants this sensation that’s taking me over as we kiss, the heat that sweeps through my body. My cheeks flush as if fever has overtaken me.

  There’s a sweet ache at my core, a desperate, impatient longing for him, but I’m also too unsure to pull his shirt out of his trousers, to trace my fingertips over the curves of his abs and kneel for my lips to follow in trace. I want all of Mycroft—in my mouth, between my thighs, and most of all, I want him to want me even more than I want him.

  Instead, I hold him close to me with my fingers through his belt loops, which also keeps my hands from wandering any further. Only my lips, as they press against his or part to allow him in, give away that I’m at the edge of madness for him.

  I was so scared earlier when I saw him stagger and go down.

  I don’t know why we waste so much time on not-being-together. We live in a rough world, one where death waits with eager fingers to pluck us up from the feet of a Ravenger or a murderous True henchman, and it seems like we should give as much time to life as we can.

  But I can’t say all that, not to Mycroft. I can’t convince him. Sometimes he wants to be close to me, and sometimes he…doesn’t. That’s his problem to fix.

  But for right now, I kiss him anyway.

  Even though I know to expect an interruption, I still jump when there’s a knock on the door. Mycroft’s eyes are warm with humor above the soft pillows of his lips and the chiseled jaw. He tweaks the bun on top of my head, which has fallen into a mess. “Are you ready for an incredibly awkward dinner?”

  “Why would it be awkward?” I ask innocently as Cax swings open the door and comes in. Airren is right behind him.

  “Because you’re going to have dinner with four men with embarrassing crushes on you?” Cax asks.

  “Cax,” Airren says. “Come on. We don’t acknowledge it.”

  “I, for one, am not ashamed,” Cax says.