Page 53 of Bonds of Pain
Because all I want is to be up all night. “Great.”
“If you won’t be here, then would it be alright if I spend the night in the harem?” Maya asks.
My reaction isn’t even the strongest.
“Absolutely not,” Poe declares.
“Fuck, no,” Ares says at the same time.
She looks in askance between them. “Are you serious? Why not?”
Cillian almost sounds apologetic. “That attack on the palace targeted the harem. You won’t ever go back there without an escort. Maybe not even then.”
I reach across her for the bottle of wine, noticing the minute way she flinches away. “Not to mention, how it would look. The crowned prince’s Omega doesn’t belong in the royal harem.”
She stares at me. “I don’t even have my own room here.”
I take a swig of wine, tamping down on a surge of annoyance. “You’ll sleep in my bed.”
“And wake up to you stumbling back in the wee hours of the morning, no thank you.”
It doesn’t take an idiot to see what she’s doing. If she wants a break from my attention, that’s fine.
But she’s going to have to earn it.
I gesture around the table with my glass. “You sleep with one of us, or you don’t sleep at all. You decide.”
The palpable tension in the room is now overlaid with anticipation. Poe and Ares briefly eye each other before they both begin to speak at the same time.
“Ares snores. You’ll be up all night, regardless.”
“Poe sleeps with knives under all the pillows.”
“Assuming you wake up at all after a few hundred pounds of muscle crushes you in his sleep.”
Cillian barely makes a sound, no more than a clearing of his throat before they’re turning on him.
“Or if you could share the camping cot that Cillian has in his shoebox of a room.”
“Nothing wrong with building a nest on the hard floor, if that’s your thing.”
It’s a masterful move, I have to admit.
I’d given into the selfish urge to keep Maya to myself, cement our fragile bond before the others get a chance to dilute it with their own claims. But that doesn’t mean I haven’t noticed the fomenting resentment, the way Poe and Ares sniff after her like dogs scenting a choice cut of meat. Keeping her to myself is sowing division, creating discord, and I can’t let it get out of hand.
Maybe some time spent being fought over like a chew toy will help Maya appreciate what I have to offer her.
When Maya finally opens her mouth and I already know what she’s going to say, practically hear the words forming in her mind.
With a single pointed finger and a voice loud enough to be heard over the din, I command, “Sleeping on the couch is not an option.” Ignoring the barely concealed outrage on her face, I drain the dregs of my wine and smoothly rise from my seat. “Apparently, I have somewhere to be this evening, so I’ll leave the rest of you to sort this out.”
Maya follows me to the door, going so far as to grab my arm to stop me. Her touch shoots up my skin like a trail of fire and I bite back a groan at just how good it feels.
“Logan…”
“Poor baby, she doesn’t want to choose?” I murmur, voice practically purring with faux sympathy. I make a point of stepping back before I lose my fight to the urge to put her up against the wall. “I think I have the solution.”
She swallows hard, already anticipating something she isn’t going to want to hear.
