Secret Heir (Dynasty #1)(97)

All my life I’ve been running. Drifting from one place to another like a ghost. But as Raph’s arms tighten around me, holding me so close to him as if he’s terrified at the very thought of me leaving, I feel something that I’ve never felt before. Like after all those years of running, of searching for something, although I never knew what, I’ve found it. I’ve found where I belong—and it’s here. With him. In these arms, and I don’t have to run anymore.

He leans his forehead against mine, his hands cupping my cheeks and when he speaks, it’s with those endless blue eyes locked onto mine, looking into my very core and his words mirror everything that I feel there.

“I told you on that first night that you didn’t belong here. But it was only because I knew from that first moment exactly where you belong. You don’t need to run anymore because you belong with me now, Jaz. You always have.”

All the doubts, all the questions just fade away. For good this time, leaving only the two of us in the vastness of time and space.





31





“I’ve been hearing about how well you’ve been settling into life at Regency Mount,” Magnus says as we have breakfast on one of the garden terraces. It’s in the middle of winter but he heats the air around us to make it pleasant enough.

I can’t help but remember that only a few months ago, we were sitting in this very same place. Magnus telling me that I was about to be shipped off to a boarding school full of royal brats and me wanting more than anything to go back to Earth. But now … now, things are undeniably different. In that relatively short space of time, I feel like I’ve lived more than I had in all of my seventeen years on Earth and I know that it has something to do with something I’m certain Magnus knows nothing about. Or more accurately, someone.

But the way that Magnus is eyeing me, makes me wonder. Jethro told me at the Fall Ball that he had eyes and ears all over Regency. I wonder if that’s the case for all the Dynasty heads.

I find it hard to meet Magnus’s eyes as he studies me across the breakfast table.

I grasp for something to say to distract him from just how well I have been settling in at Regency.

“You mentioned that you’ve been heading a lot of missions lately—does it have anything to do with what you told me before? About Earth not being safe for me anymore?”

That does the trick, because Magnus becomes instantly wary at the question.

“Yes,” he replies simply.

“Care to elaborate?” I ask, quirking an eyebrow and now I really do want to know. I’ve been so immersed in all the drama at Regency, that Magnus’s warnings from when he first dragged me through that portal have fallen by the wayside. In hindsight, I see how warped my priorities have become—life in danger or guy drama. Which is more important? But Magnus’s determination to keep me in the dark has made the threat feel so distant, that it’s easy to forget that it exists at all.

It also reminds me just how much my life has changed these past few months. I feel like if I look in the mirror right now, really look, I might not even be able to recognize myself. Whether that’s a good or bad thing, I’ve yet to decide.

“You know I can’t,” he says flatly.

“But it’s my life that’s supposedly in danger there—or were you just saying that to keep me here? Because when I—” I stop abruptly before I let slip that Raph had stolen the St. Tristan key so that we could take a little forbidden field trip to Earth just to spend an afternoon at the beach. I know that Magnus would be furious, but nothing happened while we were there. Not a single hint of danger. Something gnaws at the back of my mind, as I remember that feeling of being watched. I brush the thought away just as I had that day, because like I told myself then, it was clearly nothing more than paranoia.

Magnus looks back at me expectantly. Waiting for me to finish. Dammit.

“Because I don’t see any danger from where I’m sitting,” I finish lamely.

“That’s as it should be. It is essential that state threats are dealt with sensitively and confidentially. As I told you before, this matter in particular, is something that not even the other Dynasties know about.”

Alarm whispers through me at those words. State threats? That sounds pretty serious.

“One day, when you’re dealing with such matters, you’ll understand.”

I scoff at that.

“Just because I haven’t tried to run off back to Earth yet doesn’t mean I’m now ready and willing to take up the mantle as heir to the Evenstar Dynasty or whatever else you want me to be.”

Something flickers in the depths of Magnus’s eyes and I feel myself bristle at what I see there.

“When the time comes, Jazmine, you will have little choice and I have every belief that you will be ready.”

I roll my eyes. These people and their propensity to take away choices.

“Then I don’t think you know me very well,” I retort.

Magnus’s eyes grow thoughtful.

“No, I think it’s quite the contrary—it’s you who doesn’t know yourself very well.”

I stare back at him blankly. What the hell is that supposed to mean?

“You’re destined for great things, Jazmine. In time, you’ll realize that.”