Page 40 of Mane Attraction
“You found her, or you manufactured her?” Christoph’s laugh was cold. “Your track record shows you’re quite skilled at manipulation when it serves your purposes. Charm, lies, whatever gets people to give you what you want. Why should I believe this is any different?”
“Because it’s the truth.”
“Is it? Because I watched your mate very carefully today, Lev. Saw the way she holds herself—controlled, resistant, like a woman fighting against something rather than embracing it. She doesn’t look like a woman who chose her fate. She looks like a woman who had it forced upon her.”
The accusation hit its mark. Lev sank onto the edge of his bed, the truth of Christoph’s observation cutting deep. Xelene was still fighting the accidental bond, still holding part of herself back. To outside eyes, it would absolutely look like coercion.
“The mate bond can’t be faked,” Lev said, but the words sounded weak even to him.
“No, but it can be manipulated. Exploited. Used as a tool to gain advantages you could never achieve on your own.” Christoph’s voice dropped to a deadly whisper. “I saw what happened during your fight with Crispin. The way your strength suddenly amplified beyond anything you’d shown before. That wasn’t natural ability, Lev—that was the mate bond giving you power you don’t deserve.”
“Every mated shifter draws strength from their bond.”
“Every mated shifter who earned their bond honestly. Not every shifter who marked an unwilling woman to cheat his way to a crown.”
Lev shot to his feet, pacing to the window that overlooked the castle gardens. “You’re twisting everything. Making it sound calculated when it was?—”
“When it was what? Love at first sight? Please. You’ve never loved anything more than your own pleasure.” Christoph paused, letting the words sink in like poison. “I’m calling to inform you of the council’s decision.”
Ice formed in Lev’s gut. “What decision?”
“We’re allowing the Trial to continue, but under new conditions. Your... consultant... will no longer be permitted to attend the remaining tests. She will also cease all reputation management activities on your behalf, effective immediately.”
“You can’t do that.”
“I can and I am. If you truly have changed, if this transformation is genuine, then you should have no trouble completing the Trial without her influence. Unless, of course, you’ve been depending on her guidance more than you care to admit.”
Lev’s lion roared inside his chest, demanding he challenge the elder’s authority. But Christoph held all the cards here, and they both knew it.
“And if I refuse these terms?”
“Then I’ll not only send your human back to Earth, I’ll halt the Trial entirely and open the floor to formal challenges for the crown.” The satisfaction in Christoph’s voice was unmistakable. “I wonder who might step forward to claim your birthright? Someone with a proven track record of stability, perhaps. Someone who hasn’t spent decades embarrassing the pride.”
Crispin.
Lev didn’t need to hear the name to know exactly who Christoph had in mind. The entire conversation was a carefully orchestrated trap, designed to force Lev into an impossible choice: lose Xelene’s support and risk failing the Trial, or refuse and hand the crown to Christoph’s son on a silver platter.
“You orchestrated this whole thing, didn’t you?” Lev’s voice came out deadly quiet. “The rogue attack on Xelene. Using Crispin as my opponent today. All of it.”
“I’m sure I don’t know what you mean.”
But the slight pause before Christoph’s denial told Lev everything he needed to know. The elder had been planning this campaign from the moment Lev’s father died, perhaps even before.
“You have until tomorrow morning to give me your answer,” Christoph continued. “The wisdom test is scheduled for midday. Your mate will either be absent, or the Trial ends. Choose wisely, Your Highness.”
The line went dead, leaving Lev staring at his communicator with a mixture of rage and despair. He’d played right into Christoph’s hands, giving the elder exactly the ammunition needed to destroy everything Lev had worked for.
How could he tell Xelene that her job—the reason she’d come to Nova Aurora in the first place—was being stripped away? That she was being used as a weapon against him, her very presence turned into proof of his unworthiness? And how could he ask her to stay when she still hadn’t fully chosen him, when part of her was clearly fighting the bond that tied them together?
TWENTY-EIGHT
LEV
Lev hurled his communicator across the room, watching it shatter against the stone wall. The sound was satisfying for exactly three seconds before the weight of his situation crashed back down.
He needed to find Xelene. Needed to tell her what was happening before someone else did.
But first, he needed to figure out how to explain that everything they’d built together was about to be used to tear them apart and destroy him.
