Page 90 of Sky’s Edge

But I’d been desperate.

Desperate to have what my friend had.

Desperate to avoid my father doing what he did with some male that was not of my choosing.

Desperate to have someone of my own.

“And then my balls shriveled…I mean, my stomach dropped,” Nayden was saying, “when the dude just jumps out of the helo, no fucking shoot, he can’t transform into a dragon, but on his way down, the male grabs onto the branch of a tree, swings around like he’s a decorated gymnast and lands on his feet on the ground. He then pulls out his TXMag and starts blasting everything that was moving. Shit, brother,” he said to Tanyn, “everyone in that helo, including me, were stunned inert by that demonstration of you being a sheer badass.”

“That must have been why you left me there to fight those training bots by myself,” Tanyn drawled.

Nayden flashed a sexy grin. “You took them all out.”

Tanyn made my stomach knot when he returned, “I was tagged three times.”

Nayden waved a dismissive hand and went back to his (excellent, according to me) shrimp scampi. “None of them were mortal wounds.”

Tanyn cast his eyes to the ceiling before he trained them again on his friend.

“Though, thanks to you and the rest of the team not initiating a rescue or, say, helping me out at all, I would have bled out before anyone got to me.”

“War sucks,” Nayden mumbled and grinned again. “Thank Lilith that was a simulation. That said, my mark was so poor on that assignment, my dad was pissed.”

Tanyn released a beleaguered breath.

Nayden looked to me. “He was a loss to the forces when he decided to chuck it all and fight for the throne that was rightfully his. By now, he’d be a commander, at least.”

“Youngest one in the Blood Scythe, if that happened,” Aleksei noted.

The Blood Scythe was what all the arms of the military in Sky’s Edge were called.

And really, these males needed to give it a break.

I should just announce, “Relax, I’m into him.”

But I didn’t want Tanyn to hear that for the first time at a dinner table with company.

I wanted to tell him just between us.

I was far from ready for what doing that might bring, but I knew I had to share it anyway.

Instead, I said to Nayden, “Not to rain on your parade, we all can agree Tanyn is awesome.” It was a heavy burden to bear to continue speaking when Tanyn’s gaze locked on me after I said that. “But even talking about simulations, I’d rather not chat at dinner about my fiancé getting tagged by war training bots.”

Nayden was unoffended in a way I wondered if anyone could offend him.

And he stated, “It was still mega times a thousand when we went back to that forest and saw downed bots littering the quarter mile arena.”

“Without a single blast coming from your mag,” I reminded him.

Proving my theory correct, he was still unoffended and simply lazed back in his seat, smiling and saying, “Yeah. Like I said. Mega times a thousand.”

It was me releasing a beleaguered breath then.

More members of staff I hadn’t yet seen (except when they brought in all the other food) came in to take away our scampi dishes.

“We should go to some museums while we’re here, dear,” Mom said to me. “And maybe do a spot of shopping.”

“For the two of you, a ‘spot’ of shopping means I’ll need to sell some stocks to reimburse my credit line,” Dad put in.