Malicious Prince: A Reverse Harem Romance (Territorial Mates Book 3) Read online

  “Justice!” she shrieks. The moonlight catches on the blade in her hand, and I know she’s not here to administer Queen Butcher’s regular dose of bella donna. She’s come to the end of her rope, and is tying up all loose ends.

  It’s two steps between her and me before I jump on her back. It’s a foolhardy move, but at this point, it’s all or nothing. My ribs hurt so badly at the movement; I cry out at the pain I’m causing myself to make sure Justice stays innocent. Despite everything, he loves Vera. I can’t let his sweet soul get damaged when mine is already beyond repair and far easier to sacrifice.

  “I’ve got this, Lily!” Justice protests, but it’s already done. My palms are sweaty as I cup my hand over Vera’s mouth. I don’t care about sound leaking out. I care that she gets the full brunt of the petals that bloom from the center of my hand. Her scream as my other arm wraps around her throat traps itself between her lips and my fingers. I could fill her mouth with tiny white flowers. A flash of my childhood tragedy forces its way to the forefront of my mind. I killed them all, and they didn’t deserve it. But this woman does. Despite Salem’s argument that criminals deserve a fair trial, I don’t want to let Salem and Justice endure another minute of this torment.

  “I could kill you right now, you know,” I seethe, ignoring Justice’s shouts as Vera struggles for breath in my chokehold. “But Salem doesn’t believe in that. He’ll want you to have a fair trial.”

  She claws at my arm, her fingernails drawing blood on the second swipe.

  I’m malicious when I conjure a clump of blue petals in my palm, but maybe I should be magnanimous. Maybe I should leave her unharmed after all she’s done, and simply secure her and turn her over to the prison system.

  When she finally works out a breathy, “Fae whore!” any doubt steels to resolve.

  “I hope you enjoyed your last word. Taste that?” Blue petals are filling her mouth faster than she can spit them out. “Quicker than anything you’ve got and twice as potent,” I tell Vera as she topples forward onto her knees with a scream I catch in my palm. I fall with her, and she smacks her chin on the stone floor. But I don’t call the job done because she’s still struggling beneath my weight. My ribs beg me to stop, but my fury over anyone harming Salem holds me in place. Justice is shouting at me, but I don’t care enough to make out his words. It’s just me and the woman who hurt Salem.

  She attacked my mate.

  My knees fix to the stone on either side of her, my arm hooked around her neck to keep her head angled where I need it. My hand stays in place over her screams, filling her mouth until the petals spill out.

  Her shrieks and desperate twitches don’t instill anything in me but a calmness that surpasses everything scared or sad inside my heart. This is what I was born to do, malicious as my magic is. Salem will be safe from Vera now, and I will have protected what’s mine. Though he may belong to another woman, in my heart, he is mine to guard, mine to fight for, mine to avenge.

  I’m a mix of vengeance and mercy, punishment and grace, not knowing which will win out. I don’t know who I want to be, and barely know who I am.

  I know who I was—a scared girl who killed her friends, and then an isolated adolescent who feared her own magic. But I’m a woman now, and my magic needs to become what I make of it.

  Who do I want to become? What sort of ruler do I want to be?

  Purple petals will knock Vera out so the guards can take her away. White petals will rid the world of her once and for all.

  Purple or white? Purple or white? Mercy or death?

  I finally choose, latching on to the woman I want to become—a ruler who believes in the justice system and can respect its process.

  The moment my decision is made, a flurry of petals fill Vera’s mouth.

  The perfume of the purple fills me with hope that perhaps I’m not the worst version of myself—that there’s the possibility of redemption for Vera, and perhaps for me as well.

  The purple is my one kindness I offer—to knock her out while the blue flowers eat through her tongue. She inhales the fragrance, and then I shove them in her mouth to keep Justice from breathing them in.

  I don’t realize how hard my chest is heaving until Vera goes limp beneath me. I close the petals inside of her mouth, knowing full well what a horrible person I am. I’m burning out a person’s tongue, and then knocking her out. If Vera wants to poison the world with her venomous words that will only divide us, and attack the throne that gave her such freedoms, she can do so without a functional tongue.

  It’s not the due process Salem insisted all criminals go through, but it’s a compromise from the swift death my fingers are itching to deliver.

  I don’t want to look at Justice, but in my periphery, I can see the outline of his dropped jaw. “Is she dead?”

  “No.” I take the hand he offers me and stand to my feet, grimacing as I cradle my side. My ribs are plenty angry I didn’t let Justice handle the whole thing with his blade. “Salem frowns on capital punishment. Vera’s knocked out for now, and she’s going to be different when she wakes up, but she won’t hurt your mother ever again.”

  Justice runs his hand over his face, his eyes wide. “It’s me who was supposed to defend my mammy.”

  “Actually, it’s me who’s supposed to defend my future mother-in-law, my husband and his brother. Dirty hands don’t rule as well as clean ones.” I glance down at my handiwork. “Besides, you loved Vera. You shouldn’t have to be the one to take her down. You don’t need that keeping you up at night.”

  Justice swallows hard as his eyes meet mine in the dark. “Ye did tha for me?”

  I nod once. “You’re my brother.”

  Justice is gentle with me as he helps me sit on the floor a fair distance away from Vera. “Ye look like ye might pass out. Stay right here. I’ll get the guards. Let them know it’s over. Then all we have to do is wait for Mammy to wake up when the poison wears off.” He fists the doorknob, but pauses. “I haven’t heard her voice in years. Ye… Ye don’t know the good you’ve done for us.”

  “Get Salem,” I say, though there’s no one I want to see less in this moment. “I can wake your mom sooner than that, but I’ll need his help.”

  “Aye.” The opened door introduces a sliver of light into the room, highlighting emotion ripe in Justice’s gray eyes. “I don’t know how to thank ye.”

  I tear my gaze away from his gratitude. I don’t feel heroic or happy. I’m weighted with the heaviness that comes when it’s clear there are villains in the world we cannot escape. I don’t like that I had to take a woman down by force in order to liberate another. I can only hope that when Queen Butcher opens her eyes, she sees the goodness still left in the world, and not the wickedness in me.

  23

  Hannah

  Salem

  Three days is too long for Lily to be out, but apparently there’s nothing I can do for her but wait. I’m torn, wanting to be by her side and never move an inch from her bed, and also getting my mammy acclimated to being upright again. I also need to finish up the project Lily requested. So I spend my days by my mammy’s side with Justice, helping her learn to use her muscles again, and explaining to her all she missed while she slept. Then my nights are spent in bed with Lily and the lads. We cuddle close to her, though she can’t see or hear us. We’re lost pups without her, the whole lot of us. My mate is injured, so my guts feel cobwebby and disgusting as the poison works its way through her.

  Alex doesn’t leave her side, insisting any contract negotiations are put on hold until Lily is awake to weigh in on them. I like tha he’s adamant she has a voice in shaping the future, even though it’s not her turn to rule yet.

  Alex’s mammy looks in on Lily during the day. I’ve never seen Queen Kloe Fairbucks show interest in anything aside from her martini glass, but I’m grateful for the help. All of us are unifying, whether we realize it or not. We’re centered around getting Mammy on her feet again, and seeing Lily through the worst of the illness
she took upon herself so my mammy could come back to us faster.

  My mate belongs in my bed. My sheets smell like lilies now, and I want to roll around in them for years on end. I can’t bring myself to break out of my wolf form at night while Lily’s too sick to lift her head, her curls fanned across my pillow. She’s perpetually cold, so I keep my fur pressed to her all night long, lifting my head only when Justice pops in to check on her every few hours. Her hair was black after she sucked out Mammy’s poison and took it into herself, but it’s been slowly changing back to its normal color, adding more beauty to the world than a shifter like me has a right to expect.

  “How is she?” my brother asks again. I like tha he cares. She’ll be his sister soon. Whatever grudge he’s held against her, she’s managed to melt with her sweetness. No big surprise there. She saved our mammy and single-handedly brought down our attacker. She deserves more than me, yet somehow, I’m the thing she wants.

  “Same,” Des answers, while Alex stares vacantly at her form, as if silently willing her to get up.

  My whole being stutters when Lily stirs at the sound of Justice’s voice, her arm moving over my body in a stretch I’ve been waiting to witness. I lick her chin and cheeks over and over, coaxing her to come back to me. When her sigh greets me as her arm tightens around my neck, I give a few sharp yowls in case she’s considering drifting back to sleep. I can’t wait much longer. The suspense of not hearing her voice has been a slow torture.

  Alex is at her other side in a flash, his palm tipping to her mouth as he helps me prop her up. A well of water forms and slides between her lips, waking her more fully. Her eyes open as she sags against Alex’s chest while Des sits at her feet on the mattress.

  “Lexi,” she rasps, her eyes closing again. “You didn’t leave.”

  “Never again,” Alex vows, and this time, I believe him. It’s not the power of his words tha sway me, but the fact tha he hasn’t left her side this entire time. “You’ve been out for three days, and I’m still here.”

  “Three days? Oh, wow. The bella donna must’ve been in deep in Queen Butcher. Is she awake? Is she alright?”

  Justice answers because I’m too enraptured by the sound of her voice to transform back into a man who can speak to her. I just want to be near her, to watch her lashes open and shut as she tries to regain her bearings. “Mammy’s sitting on her own, and even stood for a minute this morning. She’s determined to thank ye personally, but wants to be able to get up the stairs on her own first. She’s a proud woman,” Justice says with a smile. “How are ye feeling?”

  She barely works out “A little hungry” before Des is trotting toward the door. “I’ll get you something,” he offers.

  Bastard.

  Alex waits until Des is gone before he sprouts a small plant from his palm that blooms berries. “Here you are.”

  Justice comes further in and sits in the chair by her bedside. “Ye can go back to her,” he tells me. “I’ll sit with Lily.”

  I let out a derisive snort at the notion tha anything could part me from my mate now.

  “Go on. You’ve been either with this lot or with Mammy for days. I know all about your little secret affair. So does Lily. Best give her some space now. Besides, Lily will be my wife soon enough. I’ll sit with her.”

  Alex and I both whip our heads in his direction. I’m on two legs in the next breath, standing next to the bed with my fists clenched. “I’m to marry her. We already decided.”

  “Tha’s hardly fair to Lily. She knows all about the reason ye disappear for days on end. I can do this duty, Brother. Then ye can go be happy.”

  “What?”

  Alex’s nostrils widen. “Salem wants to marry Lily. Did I miss something?”

  Lily keeps her eyes from me. “I can marry Justice. It’s not a big deal. We talked about it, and it’s for the best.”

  Just like tha, my heart is trampled on by the woman I love most in the world, and by my own brother, which I truly didn’t see coming. “What about our kiss? You’re my mate! Ye can’t marry Justice. Ye can’t!”

  Justice frowns at me. “What are ye running your gob about? Ye aren’t mated. Tha’s not possible.”

  I point to my one blue eye tha’s gone largely overlooked. “Ye can’t have her. I don’t know how it happened, but it did. She’s my mate. I’ll not let her marry my brother.” I shake my head, utterly flummoxed. “Ye really want to marry Justice? Don’t ye understand what tha does to me? I can share with Alex and Des, but Justice?” I can’t stop shaking my head, lost in a nightmare I’m not sure how I landed myself in.

  Justice stands, his mouth falling open at the evidence he can read in my eyes. “It’s not possible,” he says again.

  I don’t want to talk to him about it. I don’t care tha I look pathetic. I’m a sap for her, and I want the whole world to know it. “I’m in love with ye, Lily. I’m not sure what happened tha you’re pulling back now.”

  She’s only just awake, and we’re forcing her to talk about all of this far too soon. Her eyes water, but tears don’t fall when she shoots me the most agonized look I’ve ever seen on my mate. “I know you have a girlfriend!”

  Of all the things I’m expecting her to say, tha’s nowhere on the list. My fists loosen as I take a step back. “What?”

  “Justice told me all about it. You should’ve been straight with me. I’m not someone who takes a guy from another woman. That’s not me. And you shouldn’t have kissed me like that! Not if you could never be mine.” Her sad eyes glance up at Justice. “How do you undo the mate bond?”

  A strangled cry breaks out of me, and I stumble back tha she could even consider something so horrible.

  “It can’t be undone,” Justice replies, his eyes on me. “Brother, none of this makes sense. I thought you’d be relieved to go back to Hannah. I offered to marry Lily to let ye off the hook.”

  “What hook? And how do ye know about Hannah?”

  Lily’s head whips back and forth between the two of us, hurt and confusion radiating from all corners of the room.

  “I overheard ye confessing to Mammy when she was in her coma tha ye were in love with a lass named Hannah. I heard ye say it loads of times when ye didn’t think anyone heard. I know ye have a girlfriend you’re mad for. I’m trying to help ye!”

  I blink at him as the pieces slowly fall into place. “Ye heard me talking about the woman I go to see, aye? Ye heard me tell Mammy how in love I am with this Hannah person?”

  Justice nods, and all the color drains from Lily’s face. I want to laugh at the absurdity of it all, but I can’t until I’m certain Lily understands.

  Alex sniggers as I point to Lily. “Tha’s Hannah.”

  Justice’s head tilts to the side. “No, tha’s Lily. And you’ve led her on long enough. I heard the way ye talked about Hannah. Ye love her. Ye belong with her.”

  Lily’s voice is small but fills the cracks of my heart, spackling them so they aren’t so very broken. “I used to go by Hannah when I lived in Neutral Territory. It was safer that way. Fiora renamed me to protect my identity in case General Klein came looking for me.” She tips up her chin in my direction, those wet eyes splintering me into a thousand pieces. “You don’t have a girlfriend?”

  “Only ye. I meant what I said. I’ve never had eyes for anyone but ye.”

  She shakes her head as one tear finally falls. I can’t take it. I have to wipe it off her cheek. Alex moves to swipe it away, but I’m already kneeling on the bed beside her, gathering her dainty body in my arms so I can collect whatever parts of herself she’ll grant me. If tears are the only thing I can hold onto, I’ll take it.

  She buries her face in my chest as I lay down beside her, gathering her in my arms, which is exactly where it belongs. Two heads on one pillow.

  “You disappeared!” she protests into my shirt. “You’ve been gone for like, a week? Two weeks? The second the marriage stuff got real, you split.”

  I throw my head back, looking up at the
ceiling to curse my stupidity. “I was building ye a house. Ye said ye wanted me to ask ye properly for your hand, and I didn’t. Tha’s where I was, building ye a house so I could ask for your hand the right way.”

  “What? That’s not a thing.” Another tear falls onto my chest directly over my heart. “To ask for someone’s hand, it’s a simple conversation, which we never had. You left. If you didn’t go off to be with another woman, then I don’t understand.”

  She feels too good in my arms, so I don’t mind it when Justice answers for me. “Shifter custom is for the lad to provide shelter before asking a lass for her hand. Most of the time it’s a burrow or something, but since you’re fae, tha must be why it took longer, since you’d need an actual structure to live in. You’re really mated with a fae, Brother?” His eyes cut to Lily. “You’re Hannah? All this time, it was ye Salem was in love with?”

  I grumble at him. “How quick do ye assume a man can build a house by himself? Those things take time. I was working day and night to get it finished up so I could marry Lily.” Obviously tha’s what I was doing. “How did I get tha wrong?”

  “You don’t have to build me a house!” Lily blurts out. “All I want is to be with you.”

  It’s the best thing I’ve ever heard a woman say to me. The words are so sweet, I have to kiss the mouth tha said them. Maybe my lips crash against hers with too much passion, but tha doesn’t seem to bother her. Her fingers tangle in my hair and tug, just the way I like it. I need to taste her tongue, to feel her heart race against mine as our chests press together. I don’t want anything between us, but her clothes stay on because we have an audience who doesn’t know when to leave a lad alone with his lass.

  “Marry me,” I beg between kisses.

  Tears are streaming down her face faster than I can clear them with my thumbs. “I’ve been in love with you for so long, Salem.”