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“You’re not my boss, you know. You can’t tell me what to do.”
“I can tell you not to marry somebody else, damn it.”
I smiled and kissed him again. “Yes, I suppose you can tell me that.” We spent a few more enjoyable minutes in each other’s arms, but after a while, I tugged on his sleeve, because it was getting way too intense between us. “Come on. We can finish this later, but we need to go to Lex’s office, and we won’t make it if we keep this up any longer. Asher and Wyatt should be there by now. Maybe we can come up with some ideas and figure out what the hell is going on.”
****
Roxbury
“Are you sure he’s not a demonic spirit, Lex?” Wyatt asked. “I mean, just look at him.”
He meant me, of course, so I sent him a hard glare and only the fact that he was Brandon’s cousin kept me from trying to fight him. I’d be willing to if I didn’t know it would piss Brandon off royally. I contented myself with a dark look…or two.
Brandon frowned. “I thought you’d be happy for me, Wyatt. You know how I was feeling when we thought Roxbury was gone. How would you like to lose your mate?”
“You know the answer to that. And I’d be glad for you, if I thought Roxbury could make you happy, but I don’t think he can.”
I started out of my chair to go after him, but Brandon pulled me back down beside him. “Not another word, Wyatt. I’m warning you.”
Wyatt rolled his eyes at both of us, but he shut up, which was all I wanted anyway. That and to just take Brandon and leave. I had decided before I came that I would go to the docks after I found Brandon and try to find a ship to take us to my home in Gilead. I could work my passage and Brandon’s, or we could both work as long as the captain had something my mate could do that wasn’t too dangerous. I didn’t tell him that, of course, because I liked my face right where it was. He’d probably tell me he had money to book both our passages, but that didn’t set well with me either. Maybe he could pay his way and I’d work mine, if Brandon didn’t get totally unreasonable about it.
Which he no doubt would.
The thing was, we needed to go before word got around to the other pirates that I wasn’t coming back to claim my house and goods. But first I needed to neutralize the threat against us. We didn’t need another ship capsizing in the middle of the Lumian Sea, so I had convinced myself to stay and get this done first. We had a dark witch after us and apparently a powerful one. At least here, we had Lex and Asher to back us up. So that meant working with his cousins, despite all the animosity. I resolved to try a little harder. Brandon smiled at me, probably sensing my thoughts—we were starting to do that, which was freaky.
“I still don’t understand how we didn’t notice dark magic at that extreme level working around us all this time,” Asher said. “Only a few wizards still have that much power, and I know all of them. Or I thought I did.”
“What about among the Sudfarmans?”
“There is definitely some serious talent there. It’s outlawed except for the priests though. That Kellman is strong in his magic, and even the queen has some.”
Lex looked surprised. “The queen? I never knew she had any magic. I guess I should have noticed, but every time I’m around her, I can’t stop clenching my teeth.”
“She tries to suppress her magic. Her father was extremely strong too, in his day. But he hated it and refused to use it. I think his mind is really unclear.”
Brandon nodded. “That’s what everyone says.”
“What do we do now?” I asked. “Gather all the suspects in one room and see if any of them feel like confessing? How many suspects do we have anyway? Everybody on all three ships? That narrows it down to around a hundred or two hundred men.”
Lex rolled his eyes at me. “I think we should concentrate on who would benefit most from the sinking of Roxbury’s ship.”
“Maybe they just hated the fucking pirates,” Wyatt offered again. “I can certainly understand that. Or maybe they only really hated Roxbury. Although the number of people who did might be an unmanageable number.”
“Go fuck yourself, Wyatt.”
Wyatt turned around and growled, like the dumbass he was.
“All right, enough,” Lex said. “Wyatt, settle down, because this isn’t helping.”
Brandon spoke up. “Obviously, they wanted to stop me from being with Roxbury.”
“Yes,” Asher said, “but who would guess you’d ever be thinking of being with a pirate? Let alone marry one? Not to mention the fact that he’s another Alpha?”
“That’s just it. They wouldn’t have to guess. Have you forgotten that I announced it to Prince Chandler just before the storm hit? And he said he already knew because they’d heard us arguing about it onboard the Lady. The prince said our voices carried over the water.”
Asher looked startled. “I guess I did forget that. Did you? But how is it possible I forgot it?”
“I don’t know, but I did too,” Lex said, looking puzzled and Wyatt nodded. “Are you sure you told Chandler?”
