by Marian Tee
A ROYAL HEARTBREAK
The Werewolf Prince and I, Book 2
By: Marian Tee
Copyright © 2013 Firebrand Romance
All rights reserved.
No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
Table of Contents
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Epilogue
Prologue
One month after the ending of The Werewolf Prince and I
“Mama.” Little Dylan beamed at Misty before gurgling out the same word.
The others laughed as Misty’s eyes widened in shock at what her baby brother said. “Did you guys teach him that?”
Kelly opened her mouth to answer but closed it quickly at the warning look sent by her twin. Kevin was probably right. It just wasn’t the time yet to talk about Domenico. Misty might not appreciate learning that Dylan spent every night in their brother-in-law’s bedroom, with a freaking prince as his nanny.
And a few nights ago, Kelly herself had overheard Domenico teaching Dylan to say that very word. She had also forgotten how extraordinarily strong a Lyccan’s ability to pick out scents was, which allowed Domenico to catch her red-faced at the doorway.
Instead of giving her his infamous tight-lipped look – like the one he had when he discovered Kelly sneaking out of the Moretti compound to date the quarterback in her school – Domenico had simply given her a heartbreakingly wry smile and said, “It might help keep the other men away from Misty while I’m…not around.”
The memory made Kelly bite her lip very hard.
As she adjusted the yawning Dylan on her lap, Misty caught the look of worry in her sister’s face. “Hey. Is everything all right?”
Kelly bit her lip harder. To prevent herself from crying, she busied herself playing with her hair and fiddling with the sunglasses perched on her nose. The words “shiny, shimmery, splendid” from the Little Mermaid song had immediately come to mind on her first sight of the realm of the Faeries. Even though it was a late Sunday afternoon and sunlight never able to penetrate the realm’s protective shield, everything was still so glaringly…bright. Here, the grass shone like emeralds, the skies were the color of sapphires, and the lilies that floated on a nearby pond sparkled like diamonds.
She watched her sister smile and laugh with her other siblings. She so badly wanted to ask if Misty truly didn’t want Domenico back anymore. But Kelly couldn’t make herself say the words, not when the answer frightened her. She had never believed in true love until she had seen Misty and Domenico together. She needed a little more time to cling to her hopes…even if they’d one day prove false.
“I’m just worried about school,” Kelly finally mumbled when Misty kept glancing at her worriedly.
“Oh.” Concern darkened Misty’s gray eyes. “Is it anything I can help you with?”
Kelly forced a grin. “If you can teach me the latest routine for cheerleading---”
“Forget I even asked,” Misty answered hastily, making everyone laugh again.
A Faerie guard came then, his sudden appearance making Kelly start in surprise. She just couldn’t get used to how stealthy these Faeries were. And they got to be invisible outside their realm, too! Those were very cool abilities, and she didn’t want them to be cool. More to the point, Kelly didn’t want Misty to think they were cooler than Lyccans.
Misty nodded and when the uniformed Faerie retreated, she said in a very casual tone, “Your Lyccan escort’s here.”
Kevin shook their other siblings awake. The younger ones had fallen asleep after gorging themselves with fruit pies, candies made of dried fruits and just about all other dishes that could be made from fruits. One thing Kelly could say about the Faeries’ realm: it was without a doubt a dieting cheerleader’s paradise.
Nicole was awake now. She rubbed her eyes, opened them, and yelped. “Shiny!” Nicole gasped, quickly looking down. Her eyes scanned the array of dishes spread on the blanket for their impromptu picnic and she sighed in relief as she found her shades between the milkshakes and cheese platter.
“I don’t understand how you can stand to live here, Misty,” Nicole mumbled as she grabbed her shades. “And without sunglasses! Everything’s so…sparkly. It’s like living in the belly of Edward Cullen.”
Misty raised a brow. “I thought you’re never going to read Twilight.”
Nicole turned red. “That was before I learned stuff like vampires and werewolves were real.”
Kelly paid close attention to her Misty’s face when Nicole mentioned the word ‘werewolves’, hoping for a reaction – anything that would make her feel more hopeful.
But Misty only smiled. “Don’t forget Faeries. You should also check out books about Faeries and see if they have any inkling of truth in them.”
A little while later, when it was truly time to go, Misty asked the twins to stay behind. “We didn’t get to talk much about…what’s happening…because of the kids.” Misty took a deep breath. “I’m hoping you all could move in here with me.”
Before Kevin could say anything, Kelly blurted out, “I…don’t think it’s possible.”
Her twin gave her a questioning look. What are you doing? Kelly didn’t need ESP to read what that look meant. She gave him a look back, one that said just two words: Trust me.
“I heard Lyccan guards talking. They say the vampires are all around. If we move here, it’s going to be a big thing…they could know about it and we could be ambushed.” Kelly felt extremely guilty at the sad and appalled look in her sister’s eyes.
“Shick,” Misty whispered, seemingly more to herself than anyone else. Her shoulders slumped. “I never even considered what kind of trouble I’d brought you guys into---”
Kelly shook her head quickly. “No, no, don’t blame yourself, Misty. None of us would trade our lives now for anything in this world. Even with all the threats…we’ve never been happier. You know that, right?” She ignored Kevin’s look and continued, almost desperately, “You remember how we felt so much more complete with Domenico around?”
Misty froze.
Shit. Shick. Shit. Kelly was so torn apart by the look on her sister’s face she was completely confused about which bad word to use.
“Misty---”
Her sister squeezed her hand, and Kelly fell silent, understanding everything that Misty was telling her without words. Misty was the kindest person Kelly had ever known. The strongest, too, and it was that steely spine of Misty that told her not to talk anymore about Domenico Moretti. Most people thought her older sister was a wimp, a crybaby, but most people were stupid. They couldn’t see the real Misty, the one who had singlehandedly brought them up and made sure their selfish cold-hearted foster mother didn’t turn them into screw-ups.
“I
just want to be sure you’re all okay there.”
“You do not have to worry about us anymore, Misty.” Kevin’s voice was quiet and firm, a far cry from how young he had sounded before he turned Lyccan. “We just want you to be okay, too. To be happy.”
“I am happy here, Kevin.”
Kelly looked away, not wanting anyone to see how Misty’s words scared her. She got that Domenico did something unforgivable to Misty, but she also believed with all her heart that every person deserved a chance for atonement. Misty herself had taught her that. She used to teach Kelly that every morning, telling her over breakfast – which was basically just cereal and water in those days – how Kelly should take the higher ground whenever other girls in school posted nasty comments about her online.
“We’ll visit you every weekend,” Kelly promised. “But for now, is it okay if we just stay where we are?” The hurt in Misty’s eyes made Kelly want to take her words back but she managed to stay silent. She had to do this. With every day that her family stayed with the Morettis, Misty would also be forced to remember that she had once loved a man named Domenico Moretti.
After, Misty kept her smile in place as she continued waving goodbye at her siblings. When they disappeared completely from view, Misty immediately broke into a run, gasping when she reached the beautiful brick house that Daryl shared with his lover Milo.
She raised her fist to pound on the door heavily, but with Daryl opening the door right away Misty almost ended up pounding his face.
“Whoa!” Daryl grimaced. “That bad?”
“Please” was all Misty could say.
Daryl stepped aside and locked the door behind them without a word. The silence persisted as they walked to a small room kept hidden at the back of the house, away from prying eyes, its doors hidden behind a full-length gilded mirror.
It was dark inside the room, Daryl lighting only a lantern that created a tiny halo of golden light. She sat on one armchair while Daryl sat next to her. “Are you sure?” he asked, worry lining his voice.
“I need this, Daryl. Please.” Misty didn’t like how desperate and needy she sounded but knew it was exactly how she felt. It had taken all of her control not to cover her ears every time her siblings talked about Domenico.
“Open your hand then,” Daryl said quietly.
Her fingers uncurled. She closed her eyes. She had done this every night and had memorized every step of the routine. Her heart started to hammer in a horribly twisted mix of fear and excitement as Daryl placed a burning-hot crystal on her palm. Her fingers closed around it, tearing out a gasp from her throat.
The crystal, imbued with Faerie powers, allowed her to replay and experience just one day of her life. And every night, she made the same choice.
The festive sounds of a ball played in her mind like a fading melody, the laughter and music, the chatter of familiar voices, all of it making her heart ache with painful nostalgia. This was the night that ended it all.
Her breath caught when she saw herself smiling up at Domenico, listening to what he had to say like he was her god. How beautiful he was. And how exquisitely stupid and foolish she had been to believe he truly loved her!
Tears blurred her vision, and when she blinked them away, Rafaella was already there.
“When we say ‘mated’ we’re not talking about sexual intercourse, you idiot. We’re talking about mating as the true joining of two mates…of you becoming like us.”
Even in her memories, the sound of Rafaella’s laughter was poisonous, but it wasn’t what brought the tears back to her eyes and tore her apart. It was the look on her face that night---the moment Misty had the painful inkling that Domenico Moretti would be breaking her heart.
“You may love me, Domenico…but you don’t love me enough.”
Daryl snatched the crystal from her hand, forcing her back into the present.
Misty found herself on her knees, heavy sobs racking her body.
Daryl gathered her in his arms. “Oh, Misty. You have got to stop torturing yourself.”
She shook her head even as the excruciating pain of her memories continued to squeeze her heart like a vise with thorns. “I can’t, Daryl. I need to learn how to stop loving him.”
Chapter One
“Misty, Misty, oh my God, Misty!” Daryl came running into the courtyard, his two-inch wooden sandals making clopping sounds on the brick ground. He skidded to a stop – just to kiss his partner, Milo, on the lips.
The love shining in the gay couple’s eyes made Misty’s own eyes burn, and she hurriedly looked away, trying to distract herself with the shimmering beauty of her surroundings. Because that was how everything was her in the realm of Faeries – shimmering. Probably the only thing that wasn’t shimmering was her heart, which had been crushed to pieces by a no-good---
No, no, no. She wasn’t going to get to that. She wasn’t going to be melodramatic about it. That part of her life was over.
Daryl finally managed to pull himself away from Milo. “Misty, oh my God---”
The alarm in his face finally got to her, and the sword she had been holding fell from her suddenly nerveless fingers. She had been spending most of her time in the realm of Faeries practicing her sword-fighting skills, finding some strange sense of peace with the clashing sound that swords made. She didn’t have to feel when she was fighting. It was…peaceful.
“What is it? Is it my family?”
“No. Well…not really…there had been an attack against the Lyccans and one of their kind had been tortured.” His eyes were bleak. “It’s your sister-in-law…Estrella.”
~~~
After sixteen months of licking her wounds, Misty finally left the realm of the Faeries. As the emissary and liaison officer of the Faeries for the Lyccans, it was her job to make sure that the pact between the two races would be carried out.
The whispers and the stares began the moment she walked inside the majestic main hall of the Lyccan Council. She climbed the grand staircase to the committee office in the second floor, where Daryl’s father, the Castellano pack leader, waited.
“Misty,” Aurelius greeted her warmly. The white-haired old man gave her a slight bow.
“Sir,” she said, returning the bow with one of her own. She didn’t want to do it, but courtesy made her go through the motions. That bow wasn’t because she was the Faeries’ chosen emissary. It was because she was still Misty Moretti in his eyes, wife to the heir of the Moretti pack leader.
Just the thought of anything associated to Domenico Moretti hurt.
“How are you?”
“I’m fine.” She gave the older man a reassuring smile. He was one of the few Lyccans she trusted. Everyone else…was suspect. She told herself she had to feel that way about them, that she couldn’t be naïve about them anymore. She still remembered every painful second of the last time she had been in Lyccan Hall, when Rafaella had shown her how foolish she had been. How gullible.
The doors crashed behind them. Aurelius turned, but Misty didn’t because she knew who it was. She wished she didn’t but the way her skin prickled told her no matter what, she still wasn’t able to ignore his presence.
“Misty?” His voice – even though it sounded ragged now – was tortuously familiar.
She took a deep breath before turning around. Without looking straight at him, she murmured, “Domenico.”
Domenico stared, heart hammering in his chest, unable to believe that after sixteen long months of estrangement he was finally seeing Misty again.
Yet she was different.
It…unnerved him, but at the same time, it attracted him. Everything about Misty made his heart constrict in complete desire.
Damn it, he had missed her so much in the months she had been gone and yet now, she didn’t look as if she cared one whit about their estrangement. Had he truly lost her for good?
She seemed taller, more beautiful, and more ethereal. Something about how Misty looked right now nagged at him. He studied her more caref
ully, or at least he tried to do so when every instinct he possessed urged Domenico to haul her into his arms and never let go. Misty wore a white voluminous one-shouldered dress that fell just a little past her knees in an asymmetrical hemline. The Misty he knew would never have worn something so elegant before, but this Misty carried it easily, as if she was born dressed like---
A Faerie.
She looked like a goddamn Faerie.
His fists clenched. If the Faeries think Misty was theirs, they were in for a goddamn surprise. Domenico had given her time to heal from the scars he had stupidly inflicted, but he knew in his heart he would take her back. If she didn’t want to, that was too fucking bad. Because he would have her back in his life, and he would do whatever it took to make that come true.