I shake my head. “That would be Alex, mon ami.”
Dallas snorts. “Your mom is French. How can you still have the shittiest accent ever?”
“Easy. Because I’m a constant disappointment to my folks.”
FOUR
HER
SEBASTIEN
Ihave no intention of ever Claiming a bride. That’s Alexandre’s job, and if my older brother needs to shit or get off the pot, that’s not my problem. With our dear leader’s untimely—and well-deserved—demise last summer, Alex got a small reprieve. He didn’t have to lock down an Offering by thirty, but even my being tight with Dallas won’t save his position in the Order if he’s not saying ‘I do’ by next August.
I don’t have to get married. That doesn’t mean that there aren’t hungry social climbers in the secret society who don’t think it’ll be a coup to get Bas Reynolds wrapped around their finger—a fact that Dallas knows as well as I do.
“Anyway, I told you to be careful because she’s not just some outsider trying to find her way in. The Bait, I mean. She’s got Order connections.”
I peek out into the crowd. I have no idea what she looks like so I can’t find her. Still, I’m curious enough to ask. “You know who she is?”
“Yeah. Jim gave me her name. Something Crawford. She’s Claudia Crawford’s oldest daughter. Twenty-five, maybe twenty-six. She never got Claimed, and I guess she’s feeling the time crunch because she’s working the floor like she’s auditioning to either be an Offering or a Used.”
Crawford… the name’s familiar, but… “Order family? Or she works for us?”
Dallas gives me a look of pure exasperation. Even before his ‘ascension’, the Order was his life. His old man insisted on it. I’ve avoided it just as long. How the hell am I supposed to know all this shit?
I don’t, but he does.
“There’s two daughters. Both were raised to be Offerings, I think. The younger one should be having her Claiming ceremony this August. But the older one… I get the feeling she was already marked by one of the old guard. It didn’t make sense why she went through more than a couple of Claiming ceremonies without a bite otherwise.”
Got it. And yeah. That would definitely explain her desperation now.
It happens. More Order politics that I’ll never approve of. It usually involves members who got branded-in years ago, but every time a new crop of Offerings comes of age, they handpick a few that they want to keep. Some of the fresh-faced eighteen-year-old girls are groomed, then seduced, turned into one of the Used before they ever have the chance to be Claimed. Then there are those who are basically blacklisted. A married Owed will unofficially ‘Claim’ a second Offering as his, making her untouchable until she gives in because no one else will have her. Just like in the first case, she eventually ends up with a Used brand on her throat, and the companion to an Owed until he tosses her aside for another mistress.
An Offering can become one of the Used; all it takes is getting caught fucking before the Claiming ceremony since being ‘virginal’ is a ridiculous part of being an Owed’s bride. It’s rare,but a Used can marry a single Order member and be elevated to a protected member. It’s the same as an Owed marrying outside of the Order. It happens more often in the lower ranks—someone like Dallas or Adrian or, well,mecould never marry anything other than an Offering when Jack ruled Harmony Heights—so I guess it makes sense. If the poor Bait was tossed to the side by her Owed lover, finding someone to marry her is the only way out of her current position before she ends up in the backrooms of the Court instead of working the dance floor.
I get it, but making the rounds at the King’s Court isn’t smart. Sure, it’s where half the Order goes to drink and fuck, but that’s my point. The Used don’t like competition, and the Owed aren’t looking for a bride here. They’re looking for a quick nut, not forever.
Dallas is right. We should shut that shit down.
And if she might be the right sort of Bait to get me out of this rut…
I place my beer bottle down. Theclinkdisappears into the hum of the crowd, the music of the club. “I got this,” I tell Dallas.
“Bas—”
“It’ll be better coming from me,” I point out.
Dallas thinks about it for a second. “Yeah. You’re right. She’s wearing a white dress. Trust me, Bas. You won’t be able to miss her.”
White in a club full of the Order’s whores? A wannabe bride? Dallas is spot-on. No way I’ll miss that. Just like how, as the one member wearing black jeans, a white tee, and my road jacket, I’m probably the only member here who looks like he got lost on his way to a biker bar.
The King’s Court is made up of varying shades of blacks, browns, golds, and reds. Moving into the crowd, viscerally aware that no one is stepping aside for me, I meander my way around, searching for a white dress.
And then I see her.
I seeher.
My cock twitches. My mouth dries. My ears replay her moans, and I’m suddenly thrown back to the Last Prayer, watching her button up her jeans before she left me alone in the bathroom, too weak-legged—and, fuck it,proud—to chase after her.
