I reach for Luna under her arms, taking her from Lilith and kissing her little head. With a full head of dark hair and dark lashes, she reminds me more and more of her father every day. I’ll guard her with my life, Eli. She is mine, as were you.
“Are we ready?” Lilith is still gathering her shit around the house as I bounce Luna downstairs.
Luna-Nox Rebellis. Her name came naturally. We wanted to keep in theme with Lilith’s name, while staying true to her King and family heritage. So we got Luna, meaning moon goddess in ancient Roman mythology, and Nox, Latin for goddess of the night (her King family). She’s a complete cut down between The Elite Kings and Midnight Mayhem. There were no second guesses what playing field she would be on, though. She is a King, after all.
Lilith ducks beneath my arm as we make our way into the sitting room together, reaching for her phone and sliding it into her back pocket. “You think she’ll always want to have a birthday month?”
“If she does, she gets it.”
Today is the date of Luna’s birth day, but not the month, and to say that it has been easy is probably an understatement. First, we were grateful that the place where Kennedy had been keeping Luna wasn’t a hole-in-the-wall, shit-for-fucking nothing. It was a nunnery in the city, somewhere we would have never looked, essentially. Thank fuck Benny did. Lilith jokes that we should put her into a Catholic boarding school for high school and then Riverside for university. If Satan doesn’t ignite her into flames for just mentioning it, I just might.
Everyone is scattered around the sitting room, the gas fireplace burning against the wall as soft music plays quietly in the background. Perse and King are snuggled in the corner, with her hand over her swollen belly. She’s been better since everything has settled down—still pisses me off how she treated Lilith.
Cartier has gone, which is going to be my tomorrow issue, considering I’m almost certain the girl is acting up on purpose. If one more tabloid runs a story on the “Instagram influencer/bike stunt rider who has been caught in bed with a royal prince”, I’m flying to Europe myself and dragging her ass back home, maybe with a trail of dead royal dukes and princes behind me.
Beside King and Perse is Killian. The frown lines he’s sporting are about to age him ten years if the pretty boy doesn’t get his shit straight. Saskia is in the kitchen cooking up a storm. Obviously, Killian isn’t happy about that fact because she’s not close enough to him. Typical clingy bastard.
Near the burning fireplace are Keaton and Kohen. Kohen, who is dealing considerably well for someone who has been chasing the ashes of an ex-lover all to find out she’s been alive this whole time. This fact should disturb me, but along with my rogue sister, it’s a tomorrow problem.
Through the opening doors that lead out onto the patio, I can see Bishop and Nate walking up with Brantley in tow behind him.
Everyone stops their talking, suddenly the music too loud.
Lilith squeezes my hand as the door opens and The Elite Kings walk through, shaking the snow out of their hair.
“So…” Bishop grins up at me, his eyes on Luna. “She ready to meet her future best friends?”
“Oh!” a girl’s voice comes through, and I see Madison Montgomery push past the wall of muscle in front of her, carrying hers and Bishop’s twins. One boy and one girl. Around the same age as Luna-Nox, but younger—by months, I’d say. Madison comes straight for me, holding her two little royal children side-by-side. “Priest! Look! Isn’t she cute!”
I sat toward the back this time. The lights were darker than usual, but the crowd the same. I popped a handful of popcorn into my mouth and sucked the buttery salt off my fingers as she appeared on stage in a flash, her top hat shining against the light. She had a baby; they were happy. I could be happy about that. Just not now. Not right now because I always had her. She made me feel good, see the good, despite her being far from good. Now with her gone, it was me alone with my thoughts, desperate to keep myself in line. I usually loved this part. Where I’d hang back and wait for the show, study every single act. It hurt more this time to do that, though, so before I could stop myself, I stood from my chair and turned to the exit. My eyes swung up to the same way I came in and I stopped in my tracks. He hadn’t changed much, still looked the same. Dark hair, green eyes, and a hard jaw. He’s bigger now, though, obviously, and—grown. He smudged eyeliner around his eyes and wore ripped jean overalls with suspenders clipped to the front. He pushed his glasses down the bridge of his nose, flashing me an evil smirk.