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“Yes. He’s kind and won’t hurt me.”
“He is?”
Klaus raised a brow, annoyed and amused at Sapphire’s dumbfounded expression. “I think she would rather swallow her bitter pill than believe that.”
On cue, she glared at him.
“You—”
“Saph, I forgot about our session,” Emerald said loudly, shooting him a pleading look. He raised another brow. “Would you excuse us, Klaus?”
“Sure. Session?”
“Magic session. Habitual practice.” Emerald smiled. “I can discuss with Saph too about how I have made up my mind about this.”
Sapphire was still perplexed, even when Emerald navigated her away and distracted her with casual talk. Klaus watched, convinced that Emerald had done this before. Curiosity had him trudging toward the castle and finding a window where he had a view of the two standing on barren land.
An argument was ongoing, with Sapphire mostly looking disconcerted and Emerald soothing her with occasional smiles and shoulder rubs. After a while, the former reluctantly calmed down and let the latter bring her to a greener open area, where Emerald held out her hands and let them glow.
She shot the glow at Sapphire, who slapped an invisible wall and shot a glow back. They went back and forth with it, an activity that showed their experience before they went on to bigger, brighter attacks. These attacks created a display of fireworks that would have grabbed anyone’s attention, but he found his focus locked in on Sapphire most of the time.
“Again,” her lips read, gesturing at Emerald while she crouched. Her fisted hands dipped in her pockets and her brows furrowed in concentration. When Emerald made the next attack, it was so large that Klaus instinctually moved, a wing snapping out to block the energy from hitting Sapphire.
Sapphire jumped, blocking. Her invisible wall shattered with a bang, but she slapped her palms below her and hurtled herself to the sky. From his window, a faint scream sounded before he registered the joy in it, and he watched, thunderstruck, as she floated down like a feather to shoulder height before she stopped. A second later, the feather turned to lead and she dropped to the ground at an alarming speed.
Emerald raced toward her, shouting.
“You’re crazy!” the lips read. “That was insane.”
Sapphire remained on her back, spreadeagled and gaping at the sky. Worry sparked over her spine breaking and his feet were moving before he glimpsed her face lighting up again.
“Crystals,” she declared. “Crystals…”
He couldn’t read the rest, but whatever she said had Emerald sighing in relief and pulling her up. Sapphire sat up, dazed, before she fell again into hysterical laughter. The more Emerald reprimanded her, the more she laughed until she was flushed all over and Emerald gave up and joined in.
His heart pounded hard. His cock was hard, pulsing with an electric charge as he greedily took in her sheer joy. When she grinned cockily at Emerald, his arousal hit a new wave and he sucked in a breath at its intensity, consumed with one wish: to have her smile at him like that. To have her look at him with that much joy.
Not your bride.
Klaus abruptly took a step back, then another. The loss of her sight tumbled his stomach into hollowness, and he hissed in exasperation. But his cock was still in its painful state, jutting insistently against his trousers. He fisted his hand at his side, battling the temptation to wrap around it. There was no way in hell he was jerking to thoughts of this woman.
Not your bride.
“No. Hell, no. Over my dead body and my ancestor’s dead bodies.”
Fine. So, he was attracted. But the attraction was unexpected and confusing—and unwanted—especially because he didn’t like her. A part of him protested, remembering every encounter they had and how he…enjoyed the way she tried to one-up him. She was good at challenging his thoughts and making him question himself.
Shut it all down.
She couldn’t be his bride. She wasn’t. Even if she was, it would be a disaster with the way she drove him too crazy to think straight, and that just wasn’t good for someone like him: a lone survivor of his line with a lot of things depending on him. As if agreeing, a scale fell off his wrist when he didn’t even know it was there.
Emerald. She’s your solution. That’s it.
Klaus closed his eyes and tried not to envision blue eyes instead of green.
Chapter 5
“We have seven kitchens, scattered in all wings and divided between floors. There are three in the first, two in the second, and two in the third. The first floor one at the back of the castle is the biggest but also the most used by our staff. The fanciest one is on the second floor, but the one with the biggest food cabinet is on the third floor, close to the master’s bedroom. There’s also a private kitchen in his tower room, but no one else can use that.”
