Page 55 of The Heir the Fae Forgot
Their footsteps stumbled to a halt in front of us, their own battle cries dying in their throats as they took in the sight of me hastily pulling down my skirts as I scrambled to get out from beneath Icarus.
Icarus, meanwhile, just sat back in slight amusement, making no move to hide the evidence of what we’d been about to do.
Embarrassment flooded through me as I watched recognition turn their faces from rage to confusion, then back, not so surprisingly, to that same rage.
“What the hell is going on here?” Shiel barked, though I thought it was perfectly obviousexactlywhat was going on.
I started to scramble out of Icarus’ bed, but his hand shot out and stopped me, his fingers curling around my arm in a way that made something sour inside my stomach. The intimacy of the moment before drained away in an instant as his claws dug deeper into me the harder I tried to pull myself free.
“I should be the one asking you the questions,” Icarus said, his voice all too cool. He looked lazily from one fae to the next. “Itismy bedroom you’ve just broken into, after all.”
I caught Zev’s eye, then. His face had gone pale, his chest rising and falling furiously with each breath.
That was when I knew.
He bowed his head, his own face starting to redden with an embarrassment that might even rival my own. “I thought…” he started, then glanced at his companions for a second, “I thought you were in danger. I felt it.”
His hand lifted to press to the middle of his chest.
That damned tattoo.
Finch was the only one fighting anything close to amusement on his face.
Shiel, meanwhile, still looked ready to commit murder.
“Aurra,” he said, addressing me while his eyes remained firmly on Icarus, “It’s time to go. Now.”
Icarus’ claws dug into me deeper, so deep that it was all I could do to keep from crying out. I tried not to show the pain he was causing me, because I was sure there was no way to keep Shiel from lashing out with his sword if he saw.
“I thought…” I glanced at him first, and then at Icarus. “The deal…”
“The deal will be up in less than an hour,” Shiel said. “And the moment it is, Icarus has his guard ready to sweep in and capture us.”
His lips curled back in a snarl. “You were never going to let us go freely.”
Icarus still showed no sign that anything Shiel said so much as bothered him. He sat back a bit, looking over the three fae standing at the ready with all the concern of a cat looking at three mice that had just wandered willingly into his trap.
“Only an idiot wouldn’t have contingencies in place,” he said, coolly.
Shiel looked like he was trying so very desperately not to cut Icarus’ head off at any given moment. “Is that what you call it? In case seducing Aurra didn’t work, you were going to imprison her?”
Bile rose in the back of my throat.
“Oh, no,” Icarus sad, “the seduction had nothing to do with my plan. That, actually, was Aurra’s idea.”
Shiel’s eyes slid to mine, and I found I couldn’t meet them.
Icarus was telling the truth, after all.
I had pulled him in. I had kissed him.
It took Shiel only a second to recover before the tip of his sword was once again leveled with the dark fae’s head. “It doesn’t matter,” he said. “The deal is as good as broken. We leave. Now.”
Icarus didn’t move, didn’t even register what Shiel said. “What do you even care, anyway, Lord of the Western Court? What is Aurra, a girl who was human just a few weeks ago, to you?”
I didn’t expect the answer that came bubbling up out of Shiel with a fury.
“She iseverythingto me,” he snarled back, sword gripped tighter than ever. “What she is to me is something that you’re not even capable of understanding.”
