The Fae Princes (Vicious Lost Boys #4)

BASH

When we return to the house, Pan is still missing, but Vane and Darling are in the loft, hair wet and disheveled. I try like hell to hide the heaviness in my bones.

The encounter with my sister is plaguing me like a fucking fat house fly that I can’t catch.

I see my sister’s face every time I turn inward, and worse, I see her fear.

She had no idea what she was signing us all up for when she made an offering of the throne to the lagoon. And now she doesn’t know how to get out of it, even if she won’t admit it.

And do I even want to help her?

She made her bed; now she can lie in it.

But even as I think the words, they feel hollow.

I’m frightened for her too.

“Hey,” Darling says when she sees us come in through the balcony. “How are you?”

Kas pours us drinks and I drop onto the couch beside Darling. She’s wearing a fuzzy robe that I think used to belong to Cherry. Her feet are bare, her legs curled beneath her body. Vane is close beside her, sharpening a knife, because of course he is.

“We saw Tilly,” I confess.

The blade stops scraping against the whetstone and Vane looks up from beneath a lock of his dark hair. “She still alive?”

I grunt. “Barely. Kas tried strangling her.”

“You did?” Darling asks him.

He’s at the bar, stoppering the rum and his back tenses at her question. He doesn’t like Darling seeing his dark side.

“She deserved it,” Vane says.

Darling frowns.

Kas comes over, two glasses nestled into the palm of one hand. His hair is tied up again in a messy twist at the back of his head. He gives me a glass and then sits across from me in one of the club chairs. “Tilly gave the fae throne to the lagoon as a sacrifice. She didn’t ask for our mother to be resurrected. But it’s what she got.”

Darling unfolds her legs and I can’t help but drag my eyes over her milky skin. Without thinking, I reach over, fingers on her bare thigh.

Immediately I feel better, if not exactly satiated.

I wish I was feeding her wet, ripe berries so I could watch the way her mouth parted for me, the way her eyes widened at the sweetness.

Why does everyone have to constantly be fighting on this island? Can we not just indulge in sweets and sex for longer than a day? For fuck’s sake.

The long, sharp claws of a wolf sound on the hardwood floor and a second later, Balder comes into the room, his dark fur still covered in snow.

“Where the fuck have you been?” I ask him.

His tongue hangs out, panting.

“Chasing tail?” I lift a suggestive brow.

He closes his mouth and sits back on his haunches, clearly having none of my bullshit.

Vane spits on the whetstone again and continues sharpening the knife. “A throne is a symbol of power, sure, and it has its worth, but it’s odd the lagoon would resurrect a dead fairy in exchange for it.”

“That’s what I thought,” I say. Darling nestles into my side, her head on my shoulder as Balder comes over and drops onto the floor in front of her. Darling hangs her foot so her toes can nestle into Balder’s thick ruff.

Everything happens with purpose.

We all look down at the wolf.

“Now you speak?” I say to him.

He blinks up at me, his head propped on his long, thick legs.

“So what is the purpose of bringing Tinker Bell back?” I ask him, but he is silent once again. “Bastard,” I mutter, so he grumbles deep in his throat. “I said what I said.”

Darling takes my hand into hers, drawing my attention away from the wolf. She peers up at me and bats her eyelashes. “Are there any leftovers?”

I reach over and part her lips with my thumb. “Maybe.”

“Could you heat some up for me before we go?”

I lean into her and plant a kiss on her puffy lips. “And what will you give me?”

She hitches her leg over me and settles onto my lap. My hands are on her waist, positioning her right against my cock. It’s already taking notice, twitching beneath the heat of her pussy.

Darling bends forward, her mouth at my ear. “I’ll let you tie me up later.”

“Excuse me. ‘Let me?’” I shake my head. “If I want to tie you up, Darling, I’ll tie you up and you’ll take it like a good girl.”

She smiles, rocks against my groin, and a heavy exhale escapes me before I can get control of myself.

“Fine. I’m holding you to that promise.” Hand on her throat, I drag her in again, my mouth to hers. She tastes divine. Her tongue darts out to meet mine and my cock is immediately rock hard. She moans, sinking forward so she can put more pressure on her center where her pussy is teasing the fuck out of me.

“Hey.” Vane snaps his fingers.

I blink over at him through a curtain of Darling’s damp hair. “What?”

“Make her something to eat. She’s starving.”

I turn my attention to Darling’s belly and hear it growl loudly between us. Fucker. I could have pretended not to hear it for at least another five minutes. Long enough to bury myself inside of her.

I lift her off of me and toss her aside. She scowls at Vane for interrupting her fun, but he ignores her. Instead he says to Kas, “Find her something to wear in Cherry’s closet. Something appropriate for the palace.”

“Why are you ordering us around?” I ask him. “Oh, shit. That’s right. You’re no longer just a Lost Boy.” I grin at him.

“Don’t fucking say it,” he warns.

“You’re a Daddy.”

“Christ.”

Kas buries a laugh and I am relieved the mood is lighter, even if by a fraction. “I don’t even know what this is about, but seeing Vane squirm is my favorite past time.”

“I’m not squirming.”

Darling laughs too and Vane cuts her with a look. “What?” she says. “I’m sorry. You do have that daddy energy, and one could argue I have daddy issues. Very big daddy issues.” She clamps her hand over her mouth to stop the laughter from growing.

“Go on.” He gives her a push. “Kas, new rule: we don’t leave her side. Got it?”

Kas engulfs Darling in the wide span of his arms. “Got it.”

“Strip poker,” I yell at him as he steers Darling toward the stairs. “That’s where Daddy Vane was born. You missed it.”

“Clearly!” Kas yells up the stairwell.

Vane glares at me with the intensity of the sun.

I turn for the kitchen and the sound of his footsteps follow me. “Tell me what really happened with your sister.”

“Oh, I see.” I open the ice box and peer in. “Shooing Darling off with my twin was just a ploy to get me alone. You think I’m just going to spill all of our secrets? Tell you all of the sordid family details? Okay, fine, you twisted my arm.”

I pull out the glass container with the chicken and biscuits from last night and turn to find Vane staring at me, his hands on his hips. He’s giving me one of those looks like he wishes he could twist my head off like a bottle cap.

Left one dysfunctional family for another, I guess.

“Tilly is getting really desperate,” I tell him, dropping the levity. “And when my sister gets desperate, she makes really big fucking mistakes.”

“Like accidentally bringing your dead mother back to life.”

“Yep.”

Hands on the island top, I hunch over, trying to think. I’m not sure anything I say would convince Vane. But I don’t want to let this opportunity to try slip through my fingers.

I don’t know what I want to happen to Tilly. If I want vengeance or forgiveness. It changes day by day. Depends on my mood and the waxing of the moon. Depends on nothing at all.

“If I can just get through to my sister, I know we can fix this.” I look over at Vane. His anger has always been easy to read. His irritation and his weariness too. I’ve rarely seen empathy on his face. But the fine lines around his eyes soften and his jaw unclenches.

“What will it take?” he asks.

I shake my head and glance out the balcony doors at the swirling snow and the gray sky. It’s never snowed on Neverland in my lifetime, but the fae have always been clever about creating seasons in the palace. Every year, around the end of the year, we’d throw a winter celebration and the fae that were talented at illusions would make snow fall from the domed ceiling in the throne room.

When I think of it now, it seems like a dream. But I can still see Tilly swirling in the haloed glow of the twinkling lights, her skirt lifting with her momentum as she turns her face toward the ceiling, mouth open to catch snowflakes. Back then she was never meant to rule and she lived her life as if it were her own.

“I just need to get her alone again,” I tell Vane. “Away from our mother and anyone at court who might be whispering in her ear.”

Vane nods. “Then let’s make it happen.”

“Really?”

“Yes, really.”

“So you can kill her?”

“No, dipshit. So you can save her.”

He starts for the door.

“Wait. Hold on.” I follow his footsteps. “Save Tilly? The fae queen that’s tried to outmaneuver us around every corner and who has scrambled all the Darlings’ brains? That one?”

He stops abruptly and I nearly smack into him when he turns back around. Vane isn’t as brawny as I am, but he does have a few inches on me so when he looks at me, he looks down.

I don’t care what he says. He definitely has daddy energy.

“Save your sister, Bash,” he says. “And make amends. Otherwise, one day you’ll look back on this and realize you are full of regret.”

I can tell we are no longer just talking about me and my sister. I never did hear the full story of Vane and Roc and the loss of their sister, but I know they carry the weight of her death like an albatross around their necks.

Vane walks away again.

“You’ve changed,” I call out. I’ve grown soft. He’s grown soft. What is this world coming to?

“I like it!” I yell at him.

“Fuck off.”