The Emperor of Evening Stars (The Bargainer Book 3)

by Laura Thalassa

  “You never went to high school?” Callie asks.

  The smell of Arestys’ cloistered caves, the sound of clashing swords as I cut through my enemy, the look on my father’s face when I killed him—

  “My upbringing was a little more unconventional,” I say.

  The song blasting around us ends, and the melody that follows is sweetly slow and painfully human. It’s so unlike the music of the Otherworld. There our songs are a driving force, they spin spells and move magic.

  In an instant, Callie’s eyes are large and panicked as she listens to the love song. I almost smile at the sight.

  I place my hand on the small of her back, her bare skin warm against mine. She stands stiffly in my arms, afraid to move.

  “Put your arms around my neck,” I tell her gently.

  It takes her nearly an eternity to do so, and I feel every second of it. But the moment her fingertips brush the nape of my neck, I can feel myself slipping, my fae urges spurred by the feel of her.

  She flashes me a nervous smile, and I am the wolf about to gobble up Red Riding Hood.

  My mate is ripe for the taking, and this is a night for carting away brides.

  I shut the thought down, and all that’s left is the throb of my heart in my chest.

  “Relax, cherub.” I stroke the skin of her back.

  My chest burns fiercely as I feel her body against mine.

  Love. This is love.

  It’s being bewitched by the curve of her lips and the way the light makes her eyes glitter. It’s enjoying her vulnerability because only Callie could spend a hundred nights with me and still be unsure about my feelings for her. It’s wanting to buy her a cup of coffee and some macaroons just to see her smile, or making her homework dance around her desk so I can hear her laugh. It’s all those nights I fled her room because I was afraid of her seeing me just as she has every other man in her life. It’s holding her close when she cries because her pain is my own and the world won’t be right until it’s gone. And it’s being absolutely certain that things cannot go on like this for another year.

  I can’t continue being just her friend. Truth be told, for the last several months, I haven’t been just her friend. I’ve let us become something more, and I never should’ve. Callie deserves to live the rest of her high school years getting hounded by idiot boys. She deserves some semblance of normalcy, and she’s never going to get that with me.

  Honorable as my intentions might be, I’m no saint. It’s not in my nature to keep my mate at arm’s length. I’m a fairy; I take what I want when I want it. I encourage debauchery, sex and romance, and right now Callie is all my worst vices rolled into one.

  She furrows her brows. “What’s wrong?”

  I stare down at her. “Everything, cherub,” I say. “Everything.”

  May, 7 years ago

  The rest of the evening falls somewhere between pleasure and pain. By the time we leave the dance, Callie’s cheeks are flushed and a sheen of sweat coats her skin.

  I’m having very inappropriate thoughts about precisely how I’d make use of that sweat.

  She limps out of Peel Academy’s makeshift ballroom, kicking off her heels a minute later. Her feet are red and angry, and I can see several blisters forming.

  And the big bad Bargainer had no idea she had aching feet. Smooth.

  Without a moment’s hesitation, I scoop Callie up and throw her over my shoulder.

  “Des!” she squeals, squirming in my arms as I carry her down her school’s hallway and out the door.

  “Don’t act like you weren’t angling for this moment the whole night,” I say, winking at a nearby student who overheard us. The girl blushes and ducks her head.

  “I wasn’t!” Callie declares, mortified.

  I suppress the urge to press her in closer. The truth is, I’m enjoying having her body cradled so close to mine.

  She tugs on my hair. “You can put me down.”

  “And what will you give me in return?”

  She lets out a long-suffering sigh. “Does everything have to be a bargain with you?”

  “Is the night dark?” I respond, marching us across the lawn and back to her dormitory.

  My blood is steeped in a evening’s worth of magic. It’s crawling through my veins, turning my thoughts nefarious.

  I could simply fly us to the nearest ley line. From there it would take seconds to return to the Otherworld. She could live there with me, far from posturing peers and bad memories.

  I could be hers and she could be mine.

  My wings begin to manifest, and I have to smother my thoughts.

  Get control of yourself, Flynn.

  “Are the stars the same where you’re from?” Callie asks.

  I peer over my shoulder at her only to see she’s gazing up at the night sky. Most of the time, the Isle of Man is steeped in fog—especially along the coast, which is exactly where Peel Academy is situated. Tonight, however, the sky is clear and the stars twinkle far above us.

  I shake my head. “No, they’re different.”

  “Why?” she asks languidly.

  “Why not?” I respond.

  That earns me an amused smile. She turns her head to face me. “One day you’re going to give me straight answers.” She says it with such surety that I should be worried. Magic lives in words just as much as it does in anything else. Believe in something hard enough and you’ll manifest it.

  The possibility that I might share my secrets with my mate one day is frightening … frightening and electrifying.

  After a few more protests from Callie, I set her down, and the two of us walk back to her dorm room. I disappear only long enough to get past the poor sap manning the girl’s dorm lobby who has to stop anything with a penis from getting past the front desk.

  Right now Callie’s dormitory floor might as well be a ghost town. The place is utterly abandoned. The only thing left of its prior occupants is the makeup strewn along the communal bathroom counters and the putrid smell of too many clashing perfumes.

  Next to me, it’s clear that Callie doesn’t give two shits about the fact that the people she’s lived alongside for the past year are having fun somewhere without her. No, she looks pretty content just being by my side.

  Callie pulls out her key and opens her door, heading inside her room.

  I hesitate behind her. I’m saturated in the evening’s worth of magic, my body pulsating with it. I might as well have consumed a gallon of the Otherworld’s strongest spirits; the effect is nearly the same. Selfish, greedy, fae thoughts are pressing in on me. If I stay, I’m going to do something regrettable.

  Leave her here. Tell her you need to go and flee this place before it’s too late.

  Callie turns to me, every single inch of her chipping away a bit more of my resolve. She grabs my hand and pulls me inside, not giving me a choice.

  Once the two of us are alone in her room, she reverts back to shy Callie.

  She smooths her hands down her dress, and it’s taking all of my willpower not to stare everywhere those hands touch.

  “Thank you,” she says to her swollen, grass-stained feet. “Tonight was … wonderful.”

  She’s cutting me to the core. Here I am trying to keep my hands off her, and she’s thanking me for the evening.

  Cling to your humanity, Desmond!

  I run my hands through my hair as impulses I thought I’d conquered centuries ago now tug at me.

  My humanity is the white rabbit, and I’m chasing it farther and farther down the rabbit hole …

  “Is something wrong?” Callie asks, and she sounds so damn vulnerable.

  Leave! Now, before it’s too late!

  I drop my hands. “I can’t do this anymore.”

  My control is slipping, slipping—

  I glance up at her.

  Slipping.

  “Des? What are you talking about?” she asks.

  Gone.

  Claim your bride. Make her drink lilac wine so she ma
y never be human again.

  “Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t take you away from here tonight,” I say. “Right now.” It’s satisfying to finally give in to temptation. And how long I’ve held out.

  “Take me away?” Callie looks at me quizzically. “Do you have another bargain tonight?”

  I begin to circle her. She’s a mouse and I’m a cat come to play. “I would take you away and never release you. My sweet little siren.” I run a hand along the exposed skin of her back. Gods, I want to touch more. As her mate, I will touch more. Nothing will satisfy me until that happens, nothing.

  “You don’t belong here,” I say hypnotically, “and both my patience and my humanity grow thin.”

  Take her. Claim her. Make her yours.

  “I could make you do so many things—so many, many things,” I say, my voice dropping low.

  I can see it now. Her body beneath mine, her legs wrapped around me. Already I can imagine driving myself into her, her body cleaved to me. On and on it would go, one position more creative than the last. I’d make love to her until she’d forget everything save me.

  “You would enjoy them all,” I continue, “that I promise you. You would enjoy them, and so would I.”

  I need her. On my throne and in my bed. Next to me always and forever. I need it more than air to breathe, and I’m going to have it.

  The magic I’ve gathered throughout the evening now begins to release. It’s too ephemeral to be a spell, but it’s now in the air between us, luring her closer.

  She glances at her bracelet. She must feel it.

  This is what happens when darkness comes out to play.

  “We could start tonight,” I say. “I don’t think I can bear another year. And I don’t think you can either.”

  Take. Claim. Keep.

  She catches my hand as I stalk around her. “Des, what are you talking about?”

  I hold our clasped hands up between us, my eyes moving from them to my siren’s face. A face born to make men die for. Dangerous, dangerous creature. I want her so badly I nearly shake from it.

  Her deep, haunted eyes search mine. To take that wounded sheen away! I won’t rest until I’ve banished it from her features.

  I smile at her. “How would you like to begin repayment tonight?”

  Take—claim—keep.

  “Desmond Flynn, whatever’s going on, I need you to snap out of it.”

  Her voice drags me from the darkness.

  I can feel Callie’s hand trembling just the slightest. At best she’s apprehensive of me; at worst, I’ve frightened her.

  What am I doing? Tonight was supposed to be about her, not me.

  I bring her hand to my lips, closing my eyes as I do so. My fae inclinations batter at me. It’s all I can do to stand there and ride through the urges that want to take over.

  At some point, the almost painful need to cart Callie off finally retreats, leaving me exhausted. My muscles ache; even my bones are weary.

  I open my eyes.

  “I’m sorry, cherub,” I say hoarsely. “You weren’t meant to see that.” Centuries of control—all gone in a single instant. “I am … not human, for all I appear to be.”

  Callie steps closer to me, and it’s the last thing I expect.

  She tilts her head. “Do you … like me?” she asks.

  Shit. Now’s not a good time to have this conversation, not when the urge to claim her is skewering me.

  I release her hand. “Callie.” I say her name the same way I’d say stop.

  Need to leave.

  “Do you?” she presses.

  Of course I do, cherub. To anyone else it would’ve been painfully obvious. But not my Callie, who believes love is something she only gets to window shop.

  I brush my thumb against her cheekbone, wanting her so desperately. I’m so damn tired of fighting myself, denying these feelings, pushing her away.

  So for once, I don’t.

  I bow my head in a nod.

  Callie’s skin brightens at my confession, she and her siren clearly thrilled. She rises to her tip-toes, her eyelids dropping low, her lips parting.

  “Callie—”

  Before I finish protesting, she presses her mouth to mine.

  Ye gods! It’s demanding all of my restraint to keep my own lips immobile against hers. Even so, the world explodes in a kaleidoscope of color and magic.

  Reflexively I reach up, my hands encircling her upper arms. I squeeze them, wanting to drag her closer and part her sweet lips so I can discover exactly what Callie tastes like.

  My mouth was made to kiss hers.

  Useless to fight this, like trying to make a stand against a hurricane. With a groan, the last of my battered self-restraint gives. It bent me until I broke. Now all I can do is let it sweep me away.

  I enfold her in my arms, my mouth moving hungrily over hers.

  Better than my wildest imaginings!

  The kiss is nothing more than a taste of passion, and yet it redefines everything. I’ve enjoyed thousands of kisses over my lifetime, but this is the one that ruins me for all others. Knowing that I shouldn’t be savoring these lips only makes me all the more consumed by them.

  Callie’s arms encircle me. A hundred times I’d imagined this moment. All my imaginings pale to the reality of it.

  I move one of my hands to her hair, my fingers delving into her rich locks. I need her closer.

  Callie pulls away to draw in air—

  What in seven hells are you doing, you fool? The sobering thought cuts through my passion and my raging instincts.

  Fucking fuck.

  All at once I drop my hold on her and stagger back. Callie coats my lips, and all I want is more.

  No. No more.

  The shadows around me churn as I fight myself. They reach for Callie, wanting to shroud her in my magic.

  Claim—keep!

  My wings punch through my magic. They spread wide behind me, forcing me to recognize my mate.

  She is mine.

  Her eyes widen. “Your wings …”

  My little secret is out.

  All my plans—to bide my time, to learn her ways and be her companion for another year—all gone in an instant. There will be no slow burn wooing her; we’re a lit fuse and this situation is going to explode any second now.

  I’ll either need to backpedal my way out of this situation or rush my young mate into a relationship she might not be ready for.

  “I’m sorry,” I say. Impossible, this situation I’ve created for us. “It was never supposed to happen like this. I should’ve waited. I’d intended to wait.”

  “Des, what’s wrong?” Callie moves towards me.

  I run a hand through my hair. Should’ve known it would end like this. Should’ve realized how close I already was to caving to my urges.

  “I have to go.”

  “No,” she says, her skin losing its luminescence.

  I can see her heart breaking in front of me, and for the millionth time in my life I wonder if being honorable is doing us more damage than good.

  But she needs to see what honor looks like on a man. I’m the last person to advocate for it—truly, I am—but for once in my life, I’m trying to not be a selfish bastard.

  “I’m sorry,” I repeat, my resolve hardening. “I meant to give you more time. I never should have done this—any of it.”

  Her face falls.

  Really fucking need to leave. I’m going to cave again if I stay.

  “But you like me,” she insists.

  What I would give for the world to be that simple. If I could act on my emotions the way she seems to think I can, I’d have mated and crowned her months ago. Hell, the two of us would be ruling my kingdom from my bed.

  Only that’s not the way the world works. Callie still has to enjoy her youth and discover herself. She’s been so desperate for my company and I’ve been too weak to deny her it, that neither of us have given her a chance to figure out who exactly Callypso Lil
lis is under all that pain and beauty.

  “I’m a king, Callie,” I try to reason with her. “And you’re …”

  Mine. Take her. Mine.

  I force the thought away.

  “Innocent,” I finish.

  “I’m not innocent,” she insists.

  I move to her and cup her cheek. She might still have shadows in her eyes, but she hasn’t lost her vivacity for life. She hasn’t become cynical. Not like me, and not like most of the world.

  “You are,” I insist. “You are so painfully innocent in so many ways, and I’m a very, very bad man. You should stay away from me because I can’t seem to.”

  I see the moment my words register.

  Her eyebrows lift in horror. “Stay away? But why?”

  Wasn’t planning on unloading my heart tonight, but screw it.

  “I can’t just be your friend, Callie.”

  “Then don’t,” she says.

  Ah, more of that young innocence. To cast all logic and reason aside for love. I want to. Oh, how badly I want to. The fairy in me demands I do so.

  “You don’t know what you’re asking,” I say, my eyes roving over her.

  “I don’t care.”

  I don’t want to care either, but I’m neither an unseasoned youth, nor am I ruled by all the wild impulses my kind are known to have.

  “But I do,” I say with finality.

  A tear leaks out of her eye.

  I can’t bear it. “Don’t cry.”

  Couldn’t even give her an evening without ruining it.

  “You don’t have to go,” she pleads. “Everything can go back to the way it was. We can just … pretend tonight never happened.”

  Something in me breaks at her words. I feel about an inch tall.

  I lean forward and kiss away her tears, knowing that I’m giving her mixed messages. “Just … give me some time,” I say. I force myself to back away.

  “How long are you going to be gone?” she asks.

  As long as I can stand.

  “Long enough to figure out what I want and what you deserve.”