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“You need to wrap your mind around the idea that I’m the one in charge. After they pay the ransom, I’ll send you back to your pack and your omega, none the worse for wear. You aren’t an omega yourself, but you’ll act like one until I say differently. You’ll agree to be sweet and submissive and ruled by me. You’ll be mine to fuck as I please.”
“Don’t be insufferable. What if I refuse?”
“I’ll do it anyway.”
“You arrogant ass,” he snarled.
He shrugged and smiled. “I learned it a long time ago. In school. And from your own relatives.”
“I’ll kill you first. And I’ll take back the king’s gold you stole from me.”
For the first time, I saw the real fury on his face. It made me smile in defiance. I had to be careful not to underestimate Brandon. He wasn’t quite as large as I was, but he was still muscular and beautifully built—and an Alpha, though I’d never seen him in quite that way. I had no idea why. Maybe it had something to do with the lust I felt for him every time I saw him. I wanted to own him.
I’d always admired how he looked, but I’d never felt any sense of challenge from him when we were growing up, like I did with other Alphas. I’d loved him, plain and simple—up until the night he’d rejected me. I guess it was true what they said—nothing turns to hate so bitter as what once was love.
But just because I was angry with him didn’t mean I was willing to hurt him. If he had a head injury, I wouldn’t risk him until I took him to a healer. After that, once he was well again, all bets were off. I said as much to him.
“For now, it wouldn’t be a fair fight, and I don’t want you saying I had an advantage. I’ll take you to my own healer. Once you’re better, stronger…we can get the fight out of the way, and you can start learning how to please me.” I patted his cheek. “Like a good boy.”
He jerked his head away and glared furiously at me. “I realize you don’t fully know your place yet, dearie, but you will soon enough. Once I’ve knotted you, you’ll understand where your duty and your allegiance lie.” I looked at him with an expression that I hoped he interpreted as amused affection—or the closest I could come to that—instead of the all-consuming, burning lust I was experiencing at the moment.
“What about your precious ransom?”
I smiled. “Haven’t you heard there’s no honor among thieves? I might take both the ransom and you. And I won’t give you back until I’m done with you.”
He scoffed in my face—I’d finally managed to arouse that bad temper I knew he had simmering inside—but I couldn’t help but notice the way his cheeks turned pink at my words. Or was it the knotting I’d mentioned earlier that had him turning such a pretty shade?
“Fuck you,” he sneered at me.
Gods, that defiance made me hard as a rock.
“Maybe later.”
He glared at me and folded his arms over his chest. “Besides, maybe you should be worried about me hurting you, Captain Devane,” he continued arrogantly, practically spitting out the name. “I won’t just let you abuse me, you know. I’m not the person you once knew. And I’m not sixteen anymore.”
I’m sure he thought that would put me off. It didn’t. I could easily see he was now a man fully grown, and no longer a boy. It only made me want him more, and my victory over him when it came would be all the sweeter.
I shrugged and answered, “I’m not worried. Now come on. You’ve allowed your dinner to get cold, but you need to eat it anyway. To keep up your strength. It’s a long time until breakfast.” I laughed as I got off the bed and swaggered back to the desk. I felt his gaze on me all the way.
“I’m not eating that swill.”
“Suit yourself. But you have to eat something.” I tossed a packet of ship’s biscuit over to him along with a half bottle of wine. “Eat something and drink the wine. It’s a light one and very nice. Come to think of it, I really should have you on bread and water. I guess I’m just too good to you.”
He glared at me and picked up the biscuit off the end of the bed as if to throw it at me. “Pick out the weevils in it and eat it. It will show you how most of the world lives.”
“Disgusting. I will not.”
“Yes, you will,” I said, “Unless you want me to come over there and feed it to you, you better put it in your mouth and swallow. You have to eat. Think of the weevils as extra protein.”
“Like I said, I’m not the boy you used to know. If you come over here, you’ll get more than you bargained for.” He spit the words at me, but he didn’t throw the biscuit, and instead he picked over a piece and took a bite of it. It was a big, vicious bite, and he chewed it with mocking exaggeration, but I decided to let it pass. I could be kind when I wanted to. Besides he was doing just what I wanted him to do.
I worked on my captain’s log for the next hour or so, then pulled out the navigation maps to refresh my memory about the healer I was planning to take him to. Grimora lived on the northeastern coast of Igella, and we’d pass near there on my way back to port. He—at least I think Grimora was he—lived deep inside a mountain in Banshira’s Cave, near the Lumian Sea. Grimora was a powerful witch, of the dark variety, and he always said he shared his cave with a monster named Banshira. I’d never seen the monster, and he’d never specified what kind it was, but I just took his word for it. I figured we could get there in maybe a week to ten days, if the winds were with us, and the sea remained calm.
I would use some of Harrison’s gold to pay for Grimora’s services, the way Harrison himself should have done long before now. It would take me a while to line up a buyer for the cargo we’d stolen.
“I need you to be in good shape before we reach my home on the isle of Gilead,” I told him. “I hope you’ll like it there, because now that I’d seen you again, I have no intentions of letting you go until I’m through with you.”
And I might never be through with him.
