throat as she realized he was hers to command in every way but the one she wanted. Head held high, she choked the emotion down, all too aware of Stolas’s unrelenting stare.
His eyes were like a thousand suns on her back.
And on other areas . . .
Good. She might have let her hips sway a little more than normal. Might have tossed her hair over her shoulder in the silly habit she used to judge other females for.
If he was going to treat pleasuring her as his runeforsaken duty, then she was going to make sure he regretted every second he failed at that task.
19
Haven expected King Eros to be waiting in another ostentatious room with rich foods and wines to regale her. So when Neri led them through a servant’s hallway outside to a covered walkway and then to a corroded iron ladder, Haven nearly hesitated. Only Stolas’s presence behind her, both comforting and a source of constant shame, pushed her to kick off her heels and scale the rungs to the edge of a copper roof.
The king sat a little ways down on the roof, his legs dangling over the edge like a child, staring out into the fleet of ships dotting the dark waters as waves crashed far below. There was only one way to scuttle across the roof in a dress, and it wasn’t pretty. Haven managed to secure a spot next to Eros as Stolas took to the clouds above, his shadow making slow, pointed circles around them.
“Do you always keep the leash to your monster so short?” Eros asked as he poured dark wine into a simple steel tumbler and handed it to her.
If he was trying to get a rise out of her, it would take more than that. She accepted the glass and shrugged. “Only when half the realm is trying to kill me. I still haven’t figured out which half you fall in.”
“Neither have I.”
She couldn’t tell if he was joking or serious. “Would you rather I send him away? I will, if he makes you nervous.”
“That is the point, yes? To make people nervous?” He craned his neck to study the clouds, a curious tilt to his mouth. “Did he tell you I sent him two females before dinner?”
Her eyebrows shot up in surprise, but she smoothed over her expression into one of boredom. “Only two?”
His lips curved at the edges, teasing a smile, but she didn’t confuse that with anything close to warmth. “I had heard rumors, of course, but I wasn’t sure.”
“You weren’t afraid he would hurt them?”
“I was cautiously optimistic he could restrain himself, considering we are in the middle of negotiating an alliance.”
“Is that what this is?” she drawled.
“Aren’t you curious if he behaved himself?”
Yes, yes she was. “Considering you haven’t thrown us out yet, I assume he didn’t hurt them. The rest is none of my business.”
He ran his thumb over the top of his leather boot, just above his knee. “Every ruler has their necessary evils. You’ve seen him feed then, I take it?”
“Only once,” she admitted.
“And? Was his victim alive at the end?”
A pit of unease formed in her gut as she remembered the screams. “Yes. In a sense.”
His glass clinked against hers. “To necessary evils.”
She nearly choked as the harsh red liquid hit her mouth, burning all the way into her stomach. Good. It reminded her to drink with care, unlike the heavenly wines he’d served at dinner that went down much too easily for her comfort.
Around a man like Eros, she needed her wits completely intact.
She thought he would jump right in with more questions like at dinner, but he was strangely quiet, his solemn gaze as he stared out into the harbor making him seem so much older than before. In the distance, a ship’s foghorn cut through the cry of seagulls.
“Is this your plan?” She lifted her tumbler. “Get me drunk on cheap wine and then push me off the roof? Because, if so, it has some serious flaws and we should probably discuss that.”
A smile—perhaps the first real one she’d seen—graced his face, reminding Haven that when he wanted, he could be handsome and charming, a dangerous combination. “You know, you’re nothing like I expected.”
“I could say the same for you. I’ve had the misfortune of knowing a few mortal kings, and you’re nothing like them. Then again, I’ve never met a king called the Smiling Cat.”
Another grin. He really was beautiful when he smiled. Perhaps that’s where