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“Precisely.” His smile was cruel and delicious. I tucked my hand around his neck and drew him in for a kiss.
“Wicked.”
“With your permission.” A thrill coursed through my body. He’d not change but he’d provide a world for me where I could dictate the terms. “But a dress? And perhaps a bath?”
Mother had been leftin the Hell’s dining room. The long table was littered with remnants of the feast that had been provide during my heat.
When a child, I’d thought there was no one quite so spectacular as my mother. That estimate had not changed. As always, she was dressed impeccably. Her hair covered with some turban and the lean lines of a high waisted pelisse over what would be not doubt and equally stunning gown suited her despite the fact she was entering her fifty-sixth year. She’d never been a smiley person but her face had been serene. Now she looked drawn, and lines made her expressive mouth appear pinched. I couldn’t help but acknowledge that in thirty years time, I would look exactly like her.
My mother’s skirts twitched as she strode the length of the room to meet me at the head of the table. “Your father would be ashamed that you submitted to these alphas and the one who took alpha bane. Is he even an alpha?”
“A pleasant hello, mother. If I remember, my father preached equality of the dynamics, including equality of choice. Do you hear yourself? Or are you blind to your own—”
My mother’s snarl brought back to many ugly memories and I froze. “Hippolyta you are naive if you think I would permit my daughters to marry beneath them. Your father’s theories were sound but theories not suited our society. I allowed him to teach you as he pleased but we both knew that when it came to it, I would be in charge of finding you suitable mates. Only Viola has met my expectations by marrying the duke.”
Of course it was my brother-in-law’s rank weighed more with her than his care for Viola.
“Mrs Hartwell get gone.” My mate’s soft growl had me spinning towards him. Mate. Puck. “Be gone I say.” His bark rang in my ears. “Now, before you are thrown out.”
“Look how unfit this…thing is.”
Jude moved faster than I and to my joy punched my mother in the jaw. She fell to the floor for though she might be an alpha Jude had a hundred pounds on her of pure muscle. “Take your prejudices elsewhere.”
“I was protecting my omega daughter,” she said, uncaring that her jaw was reddening or that her lip was split.
“Protecting her but from what? From other alphas?” Jude growled. I knew then he understood in part his own motivations. “You thought to keep her and her sisters close by offering them one kind of freedom. You are no better than any of us. Putting a hawk in a cage, only letting them out to hunt before calling them back to return to bars of gold.”
“Jude, enough.” Oberon laid a hand on his shoulder. “You’ve made your point.”
Dear goddess, must these alphas discover their faults at a time like this.
“And what of your grandchild?” Puck hurled the accusation I’d ached to make.
“The twins—“
“No. Beatrice’s boy.”
My mother stood and raised her chin. So impressive looking, yet brittle as well. “That child died.”
“Out,” I barked. “I wish to talk with my mother alone.”
My mates left without a word or touch.
“You have them well trained.”
“Are you telling me that you thought the child died.”
“Of course it did. Your father told me. He was devastated because he’d wanted a son so desperately. When he returned with you, he told me how we had lost a grandchild.”
“Then he lied to you. The midwife’s assistant raised him. Then Oberon and Puck.”
“You mean…”
“Yes. Tod. Thaddeus.”
“I refuse to believe it. Bring the boy here.”
“No. I’ll not subject him to you. Besides.” I smiled. “He looks more like his father. No doubt I’ll see—”
