Jeez. This Ardor was serious business. Mother had said it could lead to insanity, even death, if left unsated. I’d laughed at her. Now I realized my mistake. My body wasn’t my own. Not right now. And I didn’t like that lack of control one little bit.
So I tried to forget my eagerness to fuck Leo and thought of our attackers. It was obvious we’d hit a nerve with someone on Alera, that Mother’s kidnapping had definitely been carried out by an Aleran. We weren’t supposed to be here. We would cause massive amounts of trouble for whomever had taken her. While I was glad to know our existence would piss someone off, I wasn’t really thrilled about being shot at.
From the back seat, Faith leaned forward, squeezing my shoulder. “Look, Trin. Look.”
Her slender finger pointed out the window to the brilliant sparkling light that our mother had described to us, but we’d never seen. Shimmering like holographic glitter, the queen’s light shot into the dark sky like a beacon. It was bright, brighter than the full moon on a cloudless night, and I had no doubt it could be seen for miles and miles. Maybe even from space.
And the light still burned. Mother was alive. For now.
“She’s alive.” Destiny whispered from the back seat.
“Of course the queen is alive. Somewhere. But it’s been almost thirty years since she’s been seen. Most think she was captured and is sitting in a containment cell somewhere, rotting. Most have lost hope that she will ever return.” Leo, all but forgotten in the driver’s seat, supplied the information. I tore my gaze from the citadel, and that all-important light, to watch the emotion, or lack of, cross his face.
“And you? What do you believe?”
“I don’t waste time thinking about these things. I follow orders. I’m a soldier. That is all.”
“Bullshit.” I couldn’t take it, not with my pheromones going crazy. The complete lack of expression on his face was going to make me throw things.
“The queen disappeared when I was very young,” he offered. “I remember her, remember her laughter, her beautiful gowns, the way she would tussle my hair when my father attended meetings with the king. But that was a long, long time ago. Decades. If she were alive, she would have returned by now. Saved us all from years of war.”
“Years of war? What war?” I didn’t want to know. Not really. Mother had tried to talk me into returning years ago. Before law school. But I’d been selfish. Didn’t want the responsibility that came with being a queen. And too scared to leave the only life I’d ever known. Perhaps hadn’t truly believed Alera really existed.
Oh, I believed now.
Leo’s hands gripped the controls, his knuckles white, his hands and muscled forearms crisscrossed with dozens of scars. I wondered if the rest of his body was like that. “What war, Leo?”
He turned to me, allowed the car to shift into some sort of automatic pilot. “I’ll tell you anything you want to know. But know this. You’re mine. So if you get scared or want to run, want to leave, you can’t. I’ll fight to the death to keep you safe and happy.”
“Leo.” God, gorgeous Leo. I didn’t know what to say to that. He’d met me a few minutes ago, and already vowed to keep me? Possessive, much? I knew—well, I’d seen—the evidence of his interest come to life in his pants. That huge, meaty cock that I wanted to ride so badly. But I didn’t know who or what he was. Was he a consort, like Cassander? Had his mate died or was he really a virgin?
That seemed impossible. No woman in her right mind would be able to keep her hands off him. He looked like Henry Cavill’s version of Superman, without the tights. The Aleran uniform he wore did nothing to hide his Fittest Man in the World physique. He had to be six-four, with broad shoulders and a narrow waist. With the weapon holster on his hip, he gave off that
aura of chivalry, as if he were a space-age version of a knight. He wasn’t in shining armor, but when he’d come through the smoking ruins of the suite’s entry, I’d been mesmerized.
And my Ardor? It had gone insane. Hot all over, my pussy had literally flooded with arousal. My mind went all gimme, gimme, gimme.
Now that we were away from danger—at least temporarily—I didn’t have to split my attentions. Faith and Destiny could try and figure out who the assassins were, but they weren’t going to get far. Not on their own. Or, at least, not tonight in a strange city.
The vehicle entered a private parking facility and Leo told us all to duck down so the camera attached to the security gate wouldn’t record our presence when the window slid down automatically.
After the scanner flashed over his eyes, a computer voice thanked him and the window went back up, and he drove into the lot.
“It’s safe now. They don’t allow cameras in soldiers’ quarters.”
“Why not?” Seemed to me, it would be the opposite.
“Code-breakers once infiltrated the vid system and staged a perfectly executed attack. Took out an entire city division of royal guards in one night. Over a hundred guards. Some of the oldest. The best. The code-breakers knew where everyone would be. Where they slept. Where they ate. What time they came out of their rooms. After that, no more vids.”
Hackers. On another planet. Things weren’t that different after all. How horrible. “How long ago was that?” I asked.
“About five years.”
We rode a very plain, dark gray elevator and ran into no one. We hadn’t gone to a penthouse this time, only five floors up. Instead of a hotel suite, Leo had taken us to a small apartment. I looked around. Living room, a library, two bedrooms, a kitchen—although it had appliances I’d never seen before. It wasn’t fancy, more… comfortable. Was this Leo’s home?
My sisters were looking around. Faith staring out at the spire, clearly visible from the largest set of windows, and Destiny scoping out exits and entry points.
Everything was normal.