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“Of course.” I try not to show my disappointment. Or the exhaustion.

He dusts crumbs from his hands. “Despite the limitations of the covenants, there are expectations beyond performing. You understand that, do you not?”

My balls shrivel up a little. “Yes, sir.”

“Good.” He clears his throat. “Trudie Stein has requested you come for a private concert tonight.”

My stomach sinks. “Tonight.”

He looks at me over his glasses. “Is that a problem?”

There’s just practice and studying and making sure Lex didn’t do any long term damage to Verity. And beyond that there’s just the way my gut feels thinking about it. “Of course not. No. Not a problem.”

“Excellent.” The smile he gives me is wooden. “Do make sure Trudie is satisfied to the best of your abilities.”

The smile I give him is steel. “I always do.”

When I leave, the dismay bangs around in my chest like a sack of rocks banging against my rib cage. It’s why I abandon any hope of a run, heading through the kitchen instead. It’s where Danner stops me, holding out a slick, well-designed gardening catalog.

Flipping through it, he asks, “Is there something in here that you’d like me to procure?”

Staring numbly at the pictures of roses and green things, I snatch it right out of his hands, dumping it into the garbage can at my side. “Forget it.”

Danner frowns, halfway to grabbing it back. “But, sir…”

Turning, I give him a hard look. “I said forget it, Danner.”

I’ve already given Verity the only gift worth having in this place: the knowledge that my father isn’t to be trusted. Not with her child.

Anything else that’s left of me has already been taken.

24

Lex

For the secondtime in a week, I wake to a glaring stream of light coming through the windows, the scent of roses wafting in through my twitching nostrils.

Fuck.

Even in the soft bed, my body aches, like I’m the one who went three rounds at the Fury a couple days ago. Lifting my hand to rub my eyes, I feel the warm press of flesh against my side and pause. It’s not the lack of snoring or smooth, hairless legs that tips me off that I’m not in the bed with my brothers. This body is small, soft.

Shifting, I glance down to find Verity curled into me, her head nestled into the crook of my neck. Her hand is limp against my belly, and slung over my hips is a silky, bare thigh. Unlike last time, the two of us are in the middle of the massive bed, sheets twisted around us. My skin heats, taking in her exposed flesh. Against my side, I see her tits pressed together. They’re soft-looking and perfect, round and frustratingly fuckable. What I’d give to slot my cock between them and coat them in cum. Another world, one where my spunk didn’t carry the weight of gold.

And where I could actually get hard.

Nudging the sheet down, I hold my breath as my eyes skim over her lax body, taking an inventory of her injuries. There’s dried semen between her legs, and the healing bite mark on her breast is still red and tender-looking, but doesn’t seem to have gained a twin. I spot a hickey on her collarbone though, the skin prickled pink. Her other hand is tucked beneath her cheek, but it’s easy to see the blue and red marks circling her wrists. Ghosting my fingers over the discoloration, I find that they match.

Brow knitting up, I wonder if she fought me. Is that why I held her down? In that split moment between sleep and total wakefulness, I try desperately to put the pieces together. Not just to connect the dots, but to remember the feeling of taking a woman again. Of pounding into her with absolute abandon. The sound of her labored breaths as she clutched me. The rush of semen pulsing out of me as I fulfill my duty as Prince.

It’s pointless, nothing comes back. It’s a void. Empty and lost, from the moment I went to bed down the hall, to now.

What makes it worse is the dull ache between my legs, the slight heaviness of a half erect cock. It happens sometimes. Morning wood. An automatic biological response. As much as I want to give it a hard tug, see if I can muster it to life, I don’t. I already know what will happen.

Nothing.

The first time I noticed the problem was at a Nu Zoo party in the fall. I’d been off the Scratch for a few weeks and my libido was understandably low. My days were spent vomiting in the bushes between classes. My nights, restless and sweating. Textbook withdrawal symptoms. Nothing special or out of the ordinary. But after a month, Wicker got tired of the lethargy and self-pity, andfuck, so was I. He figured a good time—and a little pussy—would do me good. It came in the form of a threesome with some Phi Chi chick he’d boned a few times who wanted to experience an Ashby double-dicking.

And it all seemed pretty hot. I wanted her. Even more so after watching her ride Wick. The desire was there, but the minute I saddled behind her, slotting my cock between her cheeks, my pecker deflated like a goddamn balloon in the rain.