Page 138 of Gemini Hunted
“Cheese on toast,” I whisper into the sudden blistering silence.
I don’t even know how to feel, except grateful to be still breathing. This isn’t the ending I ever wanted for Cleo.
As for Mordred, it’s definitely not the ending I’m gonna settle for.
I’m still staring at my ex-lover’s sea dragon statue, now horribly matching the anguished kraken statue beside her, when that awful silence is shattered by the quiet snick of a lock releasing.
A panel in the wall I didn’t even know was a door swings open.
“That’s one way to disarm an ossification curse,” Nikolai Romanov says calmly, stepping through the gap.
To my complete fucking shock, he’s not even looking at me. He’s turned away to speak over his shoulder to Vasili, my Goblin King, who saunters calmly into the room on his heels.
V’s sharp pale eyes, blazing like the northern lights, lock onto my riveted body. In a single penetrating sweep, he assesses every inch of me for damage—an assessment made easier since I’m, you know, naked.
Having reassured himself that I’m ambulatory, his gaze shoots straight to the Horn and statue behind me.
His sexy-pretty face kindles with a fierce possessive pride.
Then my dominant alpha does something he’s never done before.
For anyone.
V drops gracefully to one knee and says, in a voice that makes the walls sing with triumph, “All hail the Gemini queen.”
Swiftly Nikolai pivots toward me. When he catches sight of Cleo, his coolly controlled face turns white as chalk.
At this exact moment, I don’t give a single shit that I’m standing mother-naked in front of V’s dad and the whole witching world on live TV.
I bolt across the floor with a cry and hurl myself into my Goblin King’s arms.
V’s tall body folds around me and wraps me tightly in his supple strength. My alpha’s delicious scent of carameland vetiver swamps my senses, laced with that rich note of birchwood that I associate with his mating rut.
I bury my face in his cool slim neck, grip his uniform blazer in both fists, and swallow a whimper against his skin
“Well done you,” V purrs into my hair. “Although rather less fortunate, I see, for the kraken.”
I know right away he doesn’t wanna give anything away that his shithead dad could use against us. Still, his concern for our kraken pours through our mating bond.
Somewhere in the middle of this revolution we’ve been leading, my horrible snake of an alpha seems to have grown an actual heart.
For fuck’s sake,he hisses in my head.Don’t tell anyone.
“Yeah, no.” I struggle to get my shit together in front of his sharp-eyed dad and twist around to shoot our kraken’s ossified form an anxious look. “Mordred couldn’t control his shift. Then he couldn’t speak the counterspell with his, uh, beak.”
“I see,” V says coolly. “How unfortunate.”
Behind his facade of indifference, his face is bleak and desolate.
I tilt back my head, lock onto his baby blues, and whisper,Don’t despair, bad boy. I got a hunch how to fix him.
How?His sharp eyes narrow to search mine.
I’d like to share the deets with him, I really would. But I don’t wanna lay all my cards on the table with V’s asshole dad right there, somewhere behind me, and hopefully not staring at my bare ass. If Nikolai has mad telepath skillz in his warlock assassin toolkit, I don’t wanna find out the hard way.
Instead I settle for saying vaguely, “I’ve kinda got an idea what to do about Mordred and his, uh, situation. But I’m gonna need you… and all the guys… with me to make it work.”
“Color me intrigued, Your Majesty,” V murmurs. Driving home his point and reinforcing my claim to the throne with every snaky breath.
