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Fuck, he was going to kiss her.Worse, some stupid part of him was seriously considering taking it back.Undoing her marriage so they could be together.Truly together.He wanted to wake up beside her and sneak out of bed to make her coffee, before they put their heads together and solved whatever ridiculous mystery or crisis plagued the society that day.He wanted to sit on the couch beside her and fold laundry, then take her walking along the cliffs while the sky raged and the sea churned.

And after a few months or years of that, however long fate gave them, he’d stand over her dead body and mourn her after an assassin’s bullet or a killer’s blade ended her life.

Eric lifted his head from hers, leaning back, though he kept her pinned to the wall.

The soft hope in Nikolett’s eyes died as she studied his expression.For a moment, her face crumpled in terrible sadness, and Eric’s chest lurched as he fought his own need to howl out his grief for what could have been.

“Please, Eric,” she whispered.“Please.I lo?—”

“No, Nikolett.”

The finality in his words hardened her expression.

“Coward,” she repeated.

He released her, not denying her claim.“I’m the fleet admiral?—”

“You’re—”

“—and I don’t have to justify myself to you.”He pinned her with a stare, letting his anger with himself and the world show on his face.“And you do have to obey.You’re married.”

Anyone else would have crumbled under the force of his anger and command.Nikolett wasn’t even fazed.She was so fucking perfect for him.

“There was no ceremony,” she said immediately.“And I won’t do it.Admirals have the right to choose their own trinity.”

“The ceremony isn’t necessary, and all trinities, even those admirals choose for themselves, are subject to my approval.”Eric had to pause to swallow.Each word hurt.“The stipulation on the archivist for the Trinity Archive needs him married to an admiral.You’re the only unmarried admiral.This isn’t a direct attack on you?—”

“Bullshit.If you hadn’t already planned to marry me off, or if I’d already been married, you would have had to find another way to make the new archive work.But you’re a lazy fucking coward.”

The venom in her voice was almost a relief because it was easier than the hint of tears that had been there before.

“As of half an hour ago, you’re married.”Eric swallowed hard against the knot of emotion that was trying to choke him.

“Married to your brother!”Nikolett threw an arm out.“You can’t stand the idea of another man touching me any more than I can bear the idea of another woman with her hands on you.So you married me to your brother, knowing I won’t fuck him.”

“He isn’t technically my brother.”

“Technically,” she sneered.“You want to talk about technically?Technically, he’s the archivist and has to stay in Dublin.I’m the admiral of Hungary.That man you just made my husband?I’ll barely see him, certainly never live with him.”

Damn her, she was right.When Hande insisted Colum be married to balance the power of the new archive, he’d seen it as fate forcing his hand to do what he’d sworn to do months ago—marry Nikolett to someone else.

He wanted to say she was wrong.That he had only noble reasons for creating this trinity.But she was right.He didn’t expect her to be a true spouse to Colum, and he couldn’t imagine introverted Colum developing any kind of real relationship with in-everyone’s-business-all-the-time Nikolett.

“And Sarah?”Nikolett went on.“She’ll end up as my bodyguard more than my wife.Which you know.”Nikolett’s smile turned cruel.“It never works for a knight to be married to an admiral, does it?The knight ends up trying, and maybe failing, to protect their spouse.Their admiral.”

It was a cruel low blow.Both Eric’s wives from his first trinity had been murdered.He hadn’t been able to protect Dahlia from being appointed admiral—a job that had pushed her into a constant state of near panic.And then, he hadn’t been able to stop her from being murdered by someone not even associated with the Masters’ Admiralty.He’d been reeling, forced to step into the role of admiral of Kalmar after Dahlia’s death.Then Trina was assassinated by someone who didn’t agree with her politically.

As a knight, he should have been able to protect his admiral.As the admiral, he should have been able to protect a member of his territory.He’d failed both times.

Becoming the fleet admiral hadn’t made him any better.Everyone he loved still died.

Josephine.Merely thinking her name pierced him more painfully than being shredded by a million shards of glass.

The only ones he had left to protect were Colum and Nikolett.

The fact Nikolett—who knew the depths of his guilt and grief—had thrown that in his face told him exactly how deeply he’d hurt her.

“Is that your plan, Eric?”Nikolett’s voice was a cruel purr, but there was a slight catch to it.“To make sure I end up alone, because you refuse to be anything but alone?”