Page 96 of Axel

“You’ll wear much more of me when you’re trulymine.”

“Speaking of…” She glides her hands up my naked abs, making my cock hang heavy for her touch under my black pajama bottoms. “I’m wearing a lot of little dried Axel’s on my tits right now, so your queen needs a shower and?—”

The buzz from the button at my front gate startles us.

“Are your sisters early?”

“Never,” she replies.

“Who the fuck?” I mutter, aiming for my phone on the counter. When I open the security app, checking the camera on my front gate … dread twists the pit of my stomach.

“Who is it?” Ruby asks.

“Alena.”

I feel sick. I haven’t had a chance to tell Ruby yet, and I don’t know why she’s here.

“Does she normally stop by?”

I hear it in Ruby’s voice, the doubt I’m giving her, the trust I’m gambling with.

“No,” I answer honestly. “She never does, so something must be wrong.”

“Oh, then let her in.” She sounds relieved. “Make sure she’s okay.”

I press the button to open my gate before I set my phone down and turn, cupping Ruby’s cheeks. Softly, I kiss her before I insist, “Go check on our kittens, then shower, and I’ll speak with her outside. I’m sure it’s wedding drama. Her father’s probably pissing her off, and she needs me to intervene.”

Ruby takes my next kiss, then rushes upstairs while I open my front door and meet Alena in my courtyard.

Violet wisteria drips from the oak, dappling the noon sun above, while a lion’s head wall fountain gurgles, filling my Koi pond.

Alena’s eyes shock open at my exposure. At my sockedfeet, mussed hair, half-naked body and semi-hard cock in my pajamas.

“Oh shit,” she gulps. “I’m sorry. I totally interrupted something, didn’t I?”

“Don’t worry. It’s a not-fucking trend,” I huff a laugh. “What’s wrong?”

“Look. I’d never intrude on your life, but… You’re a groomsman inmywedding.”

“So, I’ve been told. Nash scheduled the fittings for our suits in a few days.”

“But you can’tbea groomsman in my wedding.” Alena’s tawny ponytail sways with the adamant shake of her head. “How can I stand beside Loch with you and my dad standing with him? It’s like rubbing a lie in his face.”

Here I go again, weaving lies to hold our lives together.

“Nash said he offered to be your fiancé’s best man since his brothers can’t do it,” I repeat the plan Nash, Loch, and I devised. It’s how we can witness Alena’s wedding without her knowing everything. “And as your godfather, Nash asked me to be a groomsman, and I can’t turn my best friend down.”

“But it’s all weird,” Alena protests. “Loch said he has five brothers, and I haven’t even met them yet, but he doesn’t want to pick one over the other to be his best man, so he asked my dad for the honor? And my godfather, too?You.I swear, Loch is so trusting. He has no idea about…”

She trails off, upset.

“About us,” I murmur.

I feel the weight of Ruby watching us from her bedroom window. I feel the burden of so many years and this suffocating secret. I see the tears brimming in Alena’s brown eyes; she hates hurting Loch.

Tears from any queen kill me, and I need to be free, as does Alena. I will kill for her honor, but I’m tired of lying forit. I’m tired of lying to my baby brother. I heard his first cry when he was born.

“Tell him if you need to.”

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