Mack (King #4)(46)

I could tell that comment got under his skin. Deep, deep under. Jaw flexing, fists clenching hard.

“No,” he replied. “Because you are a vile, treacherous woman and my dick would rather shrivel up and fall off than enter that three-hundred-year-old rotting hole you call a vagina.”

Ouch! That had to hurt. Good one, King. I hoped he was listening in on my thoughts. Wait—she’s three hundred years old?

She cocked her head to the side, almost as if she knew she had him by the balls. “That’s my price, King. Take it or leave it.”

He stared at her, unflinching.

Oh, God. He’s not actually considering her offer, is he? I needed to intervene.

“I think it would be pretty humiliating to have a man’s dick literally fall off at the sight of you.” Talia shot poison darts from her eyes at me. “What? Just sayin’.” I shrugged. “Also saying that Seers are extremely rare. Would you want one as a trade instead?”

“Theodora,” King barked, “you are to remain silent.”

But…wasn’t that the plan? Trading me? I thought.

Silence, he projected into my head.

Talia lifted a brow and then took a good hard look at me. “A Seer,” she said with delight. “I thought you killed them all, King. Except for your Mia of course, who I hear is no longer useful. Just had to break her, didn’t you?”

Given my and King’s history, I wasn’t shocked by hearing he had killed Seers. I just wondered why. A question for another day.

“Well,” he said, “I clearly have not killed them all, but I am not willing to part with this one.” He gave me a shushing glance, urging me to keep my mouth shut.

Talia shrugged. “Suit yourself. My terms still stand if you want the chalice.”

What the hell had just happened? Because if I didn’t know any better, I’d say that King had…protected me again, like he had at the party. Yes. This man who’d hunted me and hated me for killing his brother was now saving me from whatever horrible fate might become of me if I were to be given to this woman.

“Show me the chalice,” King said.

“Wait.” I grabbed his elbow. “Can we talk? Outside?”

The nostrils on King’s perfectly straight, regal nose flared with contempt.

“It’s important,” I urged.

He narrowed his beautiful eyes at me, which reminded me of why he was doing this: Mack. And while Mia had not gone into detail, the fact that she was willing to save Mack versus her own brother, simply based on the fact that King could not live without his twin, spoke volumes. She knew that these two brothers were clearly joined at the hip and had been for eons. Honestly, I was an only child, but I could still relate. I felt the same way about Mack as King did.

“It better be important, Miss Valentine, or I will be forced to punish you,” King said.

I wanted to kick his shins for that comment, but my Seer goggles told me this was all an act. The colors bursting from his body were vivid greens and white. Not that I’d figured out what any of it meant, but looking at him literally made me feel good.

I lifted my chin, playing along. “That’s Dr. Valentine, King.”

He dipped his head. “Very well, Dr. Valentine, you have two minutes.”

I followed him out the door into the hall. Once the door was closed, I went into hysterics. “What are you doing, King?” I hissed.

“Saving my brother,” he hissed back.

“Then do it,” I barked. “Trade me like you said you would. I don’t care.” Mack was everything to me.

“He will never forgive me if he returns and finds you are the property of Talia. This is the only way.”

“No.” I fumed. “You will just have to tell Mack that I did this for him, because he would never forgive me for ruining his brother’s life.”

“I am over three thousand f*cking years old, Miss Valentine. I will not let some second-rate, pre-Colombian voodoo queen Seer tell me what to do.”

What! “Yes, you will.”

He lowered his head, just inches from my face and then waved his hand across it. “Yes…You…Will…”

His words seeped into my skull like the memory of delicious fresh baked cookies—so welcome and irresistible. Suddenly, I wanted to do everything he said.

He added, “And you will wait out here for me in silence until I retrieve you.”

The front part of my lobe made me nod and say, “Yes. I will wait here.” The back part of my lobe was kicking and cursing—A-hole! A-hole! A-hole!—totally helpless to override his command.

He walked away, leaving me just standing there in the hallway like a useless clump of mashed potatoes. He can’t do this, he can’t, I thought.

But he did. And there was absolutely nothing I could do about it.





CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE





I didn’t know how much time passed, but when King grabbed my hand and began tugging me toward the elevators, I immediately saw the blue light seeping from his body into the air around him.

That can’t be good.

“You okay?” I asked as we rode down in the elevator.

“Why wouldn’t I be?” He lifted his chin a little.

“Because if you just did what I think you did, your dick is in the process of shriveling up.” I’d meant that as a joke, but given my lack of experience in that department, I immediately regretted my choice. Clearly, the man was upset.