Home > Neon Drops(6)

Neon Drops(6)
Author: M. Sinclair

-Boy with a Coin by Iron & Wine

 

 

“Why are you being so fucking stubborn?” I demanded softly, my voice not nearly as harsh as I was attempting to make it. Instead, it drew a smile onto my princess’s face. An infuriating smile that only made me want to kiss the shit out of her ten times more than before. Which was a feat in itself, trust me.

It was painful how beautiful she looked. Her golden skin was highlighted by the afternoon sun, the windows barely muting the golden rays. She looked nearly angelic. Fuck that. She did look angelic. Her eyes ran over my face as I tried to not get a goddamn hard-on from having her full attention on me. Shit was intoxicating.

The scent of sea salt, storms, and the cosmos surrounded me as her siren brushed up against my magic, attempting to pull at it. Antagonize it. I didn’t think she realized what would happen if my magic came out to play.

Lorcan was asking for something far more than she was ready for. I knew this because even I wasn’t fucking ready to handle what the release of that would mean for the two of us. I was trying to give her time. Time for her to adjust to me being in her life. Time for her to feel as strongly for me as I did for her.

“I’m not being stubborn, Adri,” she purred, her seafoam green eyes lighting up with amusement. The woman put classical art to goddamn shame. Her eyes were a deep leaf green in the center, streaked with blue, lavender, and gold. I found myself diving into her gaze without meaning to, and if I had to guess, based on the way she shifted closer to me, she had no idea. If she did, she would probably run from the crazy in my head.

I knew Lorcan Louvre appealed to every fucking man and woman in the universe, but in some ways she was a special hell for me. I was about as damn close as one could get to being what she was, so everything from her magic to the way she smelled pulled me into an intoxicating spiral pattern. I didn’t think she understood the full extent of the effect she had on me, and I was wondering how long I could keep it that way.

My guess? Not very fucking long.

“Let me get rid of him,” I nearly begged, feeling frustrated that one of these kids had tried to hit on her almost right in front of me. Actually, I wasn’t frustrated. I was fucking livid.

Who hits on a woman that has already been claimed? And mark my words, she was very, very claimed. Stupid fucking humans. I swear to christ, I could have a ring on her finger and they still probably would do something idiotic.

I nearly groaned at the thought of her wearing such a human marker on her skin, telling the entire world to fuck off from thinking they had a chance with her. A ring. I bet I could convince her it was a piece of jewelry, right? But I had a feeling Lorcan would see right the hell through that. Damn it.

“He’s not worth either of our time,” she pointed out. Easy for her to say. I narrowed my eyes, thinking about how many chances I’d give him until I finally broke.

This was the same kid from the other day. The one that had been trying to get her to open up about how hard it was to have all that media attention on her. I mean, not that I blamed the kid for his curiosity, but I knew his intentions were far from innocent.

Plus, if Lorcan wanted to rant about her frustrations with human society, she could do it with us, not with some asshole who could barely get through his calculus class without flipping through half-naked pictures of women he followed on Instagram. Yeah, I may have been glaring at him throughout the class period.

“He won’t be missed,” I said, trying a different tactic, attempting to sway her opinion while placing a hand on her hip. I found myself wanting to fall to my knees and kiss along her delicate skin but held back. You know, since people were around and shit.

Lorcan ran a hand through her thick, golden hair that seemed to be growing longer every day, aqua highlights flashing like precious stones. The color looked oddly natural on her. I found myself jealous of her hand. I wanted to be running my fingers through her golden locks. Or maybe I just wanted her to touch me. Needed her to.

One of those things.

Her plush red lips broke into a smile as she stepped closer to me, running a hand up my chest before cupping my jaw, making the nightmarish creature that resided inside of me open its eyes with curiosity. Yeah, that wasn’t good.

The woman was terrible for my self-control. I wasn’t exactly the King of Nightmares because of my peachy personality, but I’d been able to hold myself to an asshole level of behavior… you know, instead of my usual psychosis, when I did things like drive entire armies to suicide on the battlefield by playing out their worst fucking nightmares in front of them.

Yeah, she didn’t need to see that shit.

It wasn’t that I didn’t think Lorcan could handle it, but I didn’t want her to have to. She had been through enough. She had handled enough. My chest squeezed thinking about her dream last night, making me furious and sad at the same time. Bloodlust surged through me, making me crave revenge that wasn't currently possible. I inhaled and repeated to myself that I would focus on the dreams when we were alone. Only then.

I wasn’t afraid to admit that I loved marking the hell out of her subconscious. I was naturally competitive, and when I’d heard Draven had memory walked I’d nearly lost my shit. So now I had her nightmares. Those were mine. End of story.

Marking her dreamscape wasn’t a light thing, as one could probably assume, but in elven culture it was far more important than she even realized. While elves don’t have ‘mates,’ per se, like shifters, they do have a maité anam, which loosely translates into ‘soul mate.’ Alright, so it was exactly like mates.

Except you had the choice to not form the bond. The pull was strong, but in the elven realms everything was fucked up and individuals cheated on their ‘soul mates’ almost always. In my kingdom, it seemed that people were better about it, but the entire concept of being tied to one person for life seemed to make most elves uneasy.

It didn’t bother me in the least.

Lorcan had been long gone before I’d realized the nature of the connection that had always existed between us, even when we were younger. Now that she was back, it was not only intensifying in strength but growing to the point that it was nearly all-consuming.

There was only one thing that was possibly stronger and more possessive than a maité anam bond… and that was marking someone with your magic. Which I had done, extensively. While those around us couldn’t see the marker like Dean’s mating bite or Desmond’s soul brand, I could guarantee it was going to be crystal fucking clear to any elves we came across.

Which was good, because eventually we were going to have to go back to my kingdom for a period of time, along with Draven’s and Desmond’s kingdoms, if I had to assume. I suppose that's the problem with having three kings, four if you count Dean—you had a lot of fucking places you needed to be.

My lip twitched in realization that Lorcan would essentially be Queen in three different realms. Now my nickname ‘princess’ would be far more true. My stubborn, strong fucking princess, who dealt and suffered with so much yet managed to find hope. I knew the road to healing was far from over, and while I knew it was a personal journey, I would be there every single step of the way.

“You can’t just kill someone because they asked for my number,” she mused, her eyes filled with undisguised mirth. I knew she found my jealousy amusing, and while I loved making the woman happy, I was really fucking serious about killing him.

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