Page 59 of Grand Romantic Delusions and the Madness of Mirth, Part One

Bolan chooses that moment to climb over the edge of the stone railing and drop onto the balcony. He’s barefoot and wearing only a tight Blitz T-shirt and sweatpants. So he’s showered and changed since confronting me and Rian.

The sullen rock star takes us in with a sneering glower and narrowed bright-blue eyes that indicate his wolf is very much present. Then he snaps, “Put on some fucking clothes, Sully.”

Sully grins back just as edgily, running a hand down his chest across his abs to dip his fingers into the top of his tiny swim trunks. “Jealous, asshole? You should have been here when Mir kissed me.”

“Who hasn’t Mirth kissed?” Bolan says caustically .

All the warmth that had been simmering in my chest tightens into a hard clump.

Elias makes a soft noise. As if I’ve punched him.

Sully clutches at his chest.

Bolan’s insolent expression shifts into a low level of panic as he realizes what he’s implied. The clump of emotion in my chest only hardens, though, as if I’m walling myself off. Bolan’s eyes widen as he realizes what he’s reminded me of. When I kissed him, and he rejected me.

“I … I didn’t mean …”

“Why not?” I’m strangely pleased that although my tone is tight, I also pull off being a bit flippant.

“What?” Sully scrambles out of the hot tub, reaching for a large white towel draped over the nearest chair. “You kissed Bolan? When? Tonight?”

I scoff. Not looking away from Bolan, I settle back beside Elias as if I don’t give a shit. “I was barely fifteen when Bolan rejected me.”

Three sets of eyes target Bolan. He actually takes a step back, raising his hands as if warding off a physical attack. “That’s not … that’s not what I meant.”

“What did you mean, then?” Sully asks, roughly drying himself off.

Bolan just looks at me, something pained in his gaze. Then he shakes his head. “That’s between me and Mirth.”

“It wasn’t a moment ago,” Elias says. “A moment ago, it was an armored strike.”

“Not against Mirth,” Bolan insists, curling his hands into fists.

And just that easily, my chest unknots to ache again — for him. For everything he’s struggling with. Armin’s death, the discovery of his father’s … affair? Finding me having sex with a previously unknown half-brother .

Before I can redirect the conversation, though, Christoph speaks. “You had a good run?”

“A needed run.” Bolan slides down right where he’s standing, resting back against the stone railing. I’m surprised he doesn’t grab the bottle of whiskey on his way down.

Sully cinches the towel around his waist, then saunters over and flings himself into the seat next to me, stealing part of my blanket and snuggling up to me. This pushes me practically into Elias’s lap, but the earl’s arm simply tightens around me.

Bolan throws his head back, gazing up into the darkening sky. “Armin had this horse for most of our years together that didn’t mind me running as a wolf next to it. You remember, Mirth?”

I don’t give him an answer. He doesn’t really expect one.

“I always loved running here, around the lake.”

“Not many places to run in the city,” Christoph says quietly.

Bolan nods. “It’s more than that. There’s an energy here, embedded into the earth. Armin could feel it. Sully as well.” He lowers his gaze, looking at me now. “And you too, Mirth. Though you never talked about it.”

“I don’t reach for it.”

“That was always the difference between you and your brother. He always reached.”

I bristle at that, seriously tired of Bolan’s shit. But he continues before I can lash out.

“Armin was always reaching, wanting all the things, everything. And me, never reaching for what I actually want.”

Sully scoffs. “So says the most famous rock star in the world. ”

“He’s not that famous,” Christoph muses. “Not all that big in North America.”

Sully snorts, then cackles.

Even Bolan cracks a grin. “Thank the fuck for that.”

“So … Mirth. You grew up with Salvatore and Bolan, when he was still Oliver?” Elias asks.

The question sounds mostly rhetorical, but I answer anyway. “Bolan and Armin were close through school —”

“We were all tight through school,” Bolan mutters caustically.

I ignore him. “Sully had a … relationship with Armin …” I glance at Sully, not quite knowing the timeline of their attempt at an actual relationship rather than the fooling around they did earlier on. “When you were nineteen?”

“Or whenever Armin just felt like getting his cock sucked by a willing mouth,” Bolan adds.

“Fuck you, you jealous shit,” Sully says, only half serious.

Bolan smirks. “No worries. Armin was looking to replace your bratty ass anyway. Wasn’t he, Earl?”

Elias goes stiff beside me. I, along with Christoph and Sully, pivot to look at him.

“You … you and Armin were lovers?” I ask, completely shocked.

“No,” Elias says, glaring at the sullen rock star.

“The footage I had to get erased from the storage room at my last concert says differently, Lord Hereford,” Bolan says mockingly. “I’ve actually never seen Armin down on his knees for anyone. You must have been very —”

“Stop!” I shout.

Bolan flinches.

I take a shaky breath, slightly surprised at my own outburst. “You’re in pain right now, and you’re lashing out. But just stop. Just stop, Bolan. ”

His chest heaves as he takes a deep breath, then another. “This is not what I want.”

I gentle my tone. “Then just … take a moment … remember … remember what running around the lake felt like tonight.”

“Lonely,” Bolan says, his gaze intense on me.

“Might be a good thing to remember, then,” Sully says quietly.

I throw a look his way, though he wasn’t actually being caustic. But I let it drop because my mind is already whirling with too much, clicking pieces together that I didn’t have before. I turn back to Elias. “That was you in the back room with Armin. I’m sorry I interrupted.”

“Don’t be,” he says stiffly. “I was … taken … unaware.”

Sully snorts. “One does not say no to His Royal Highness —”

I swivel to look at him.

His words dry up. He licks his lips, grimacing. “That’s not … I didn’t mean …”

Bolan chuckles darkly.

But I’m already thinking beyond these unwanted revelations. I already know these men are only here because they’ve been summoned by my father. Summoned by the list I jotted down. A list I thought I hallucinated.

“And you?” I ask Christoph, needing the answer but not really wanting it. “Did you know Armin?”

He nods. “I was seeking investors for my winery.”

I stand up abruptly, almost stumbling as I get tangled in the blanket. The warmth in my chest has contracted again, knotting into an even tighter, more painful lump lodged next to my heart.

I’m fairly certain it’s going to stay that way now.

Possibly forever. But maybe it will fade …

If I …

If I put distance between us.

An unbidden sob at losing … losing all of them streaks from that painful lump in my chest up my neck. I have to press my hand over my mouth harshly to stop it from erupting.

“Mir?” Sully asks, concerned.

Christoph rubs his chest.

Bolan squeezes his eyes shut as if weathering some sort of emotional onslaught.

I glance to Elias. Cheeks flushed, presumably from confessing his entanglement with my brother, he doesn’t quite meet my gaze.

“That’s all five of you.”

Elias’s head snaps up. “Five?”

I’m talking out loud now, restlessly pacing as I finally understand the list. That fucking list.

“The night that my father proposed the matching event —”

“Demanded, more like,” Sully mutters.

I barely hear him. “That night, I wrote a list of names. I honestly thought … the energy at Waterfell Castle is acute, and I was already overwhelmed.”

“The intersection point,” Elias says matter-of-factly. The existence of the intersection point is common enough knowledge— even if not scientifically verified or generally believed.

“I wrote a list of six names.”

“Six?” Sully is now almost as confused as I am.

“Six names, including you four and Rian.”

“Rian?” Sully interjects again, sounding slightly panicked now.

“The stable boy she’s fucking,” Bolan helpfully supplies.

“Six names,” I murmur. “Including Armin’s …” Then I st op pacing as I fully realize what I’ve likely already known subconsciously for so long now. “Armin and his soul-bound mates …”

Armin’s soul bonded.

Not mine.

Because my name wasn’t on that list.

“We’re not following you, Mir,” Sully says.

His voice pulls me back into the moment. My energy settles. My mind settles.

I know now. I know why I feel this … pull to them, each connection different from another.

They all belong to Armin.

Belonged to Armin.

Because Armin is dead.

They belong with Armin. Not with me.

So … I know what I have to do.

I have to let them go, to live their lives.

It was cruel to have inadvertently invited them, to have forced them to gather together.

Maybe they can find their way into each other’s lives without Armin, without their crux.

Even though most bond groups splinter and fade when they lose their central bond.

I stifle another sob, struggling to breathe.

“We don’t understand, Mirth,” Bolan says gently. He’s standing now, and I barely manage to avoid being drawn into his arms when he reaches for me.

I want to be in his arms, no matter our history.

Instead, I move as steadily as I can toward the balcony door and my suite beyond. I don’t hurry, but I’m focused now that I clearly understand the choice I need to make. Must make.

My chest hurts. My heart hurts. It’s a struggle not to shake under the onslaught. To maintain my facade.

It’s time to end this silly charade of a matching event. If I were stronger willed, I would never have agreed to it in the first place.

I understand the why of it, but the how wasn’t necessary.

It never really was my choice.

It’s so odd, though.

“What, Mirth?” Sully asks gently. “What is odd?”

I realize I spoke that last bit out loud. But when I try to articulate what I’m thinking and feeling, the words get caught in my mouth, the thoughts tangled in my head.

I finally manage to speak. “We were so close, Armin and me. After he died … I felt like I was missing a chunk of my own soul, and I thought … I thought …” Hot tears spike at the edge of my eyes, but I keep my face turned away from the pity that I’m sure is etched across all their faces.

I was wrong.

That was just what love felt like. What losing someone you love feels like. There was no mystical connection between Armin and me. And … I’ve been tapping into some sort of energy, maybe the same energy that drew Armin to each of these men …

That’s why it feels so easy between us. I’m siphoning from the soul connection between these —

I’m dangerous. Mentally coercive. I always have been. I just thought I had it all under control. Under better control.

I lay my hand on the door handle, shore up my facade, and turn back with a polite smile. They’re all on their feet now, various degrees of confusion etched across their faces. I can’t look at any of them directly. I don’t want to see any underlying pity.

I feel like an utterly pathetic fool. Sniffing around my brother’s bond mates. Aching for Armin’s soul-bound mates .

“Thank you so much for being here for me,” I say politely. “I’m so sorry if I’ve wasted your time.”

“Mirth!” Bolan snarls.

I step through into my suite, shutting and locking the door behind me.

I leave them behind.

I walk away.

Because … even if they somehow accept me, allow me to choose them, bond with them … for whatever reason … I’ll always know they were Armin’s.

I’m not certain any bond we forced between us would be functional. Though I … I actually don’t know. I don’t know that for certain.

Feeling like I’m somehow standing outside my own body, yet understanding the next steps I must take, I move toward my closet for a change of clothing, and to prepare myself for a journey to the very last place I want to go.

Waterfell Castle. To talk to my father.

My father might be a total asshole, but he’ll have answers. If I ask the right questions.