Page 25

Cain’s POV

I have to admit I kind of like Gregory. He doesn’t give a shit about anything, and treats me like I’m a friend or family. Somehow, in contrast to his sister, he always maintains full respect, even when he’s joking about something.

Oh, Asher will be the death of me.

I find myself looking at my sexy wife way more than I should. She’s laughing at something Ella says. The girl shoots me nervous looks every now and then. I stop registering what people around me are talking about anymore. Half of them are still teenagers, and I’m at least ten fucking years older than all of them—I couldn’t care less what they are saying.

And my little wolf couldn’t wear a tighter dress. Maybe it’s better she doesn’t have any panties on because they would show… fuck. Now I can’t stop thinking about yanking that dress up and fucking her hard—until she screams my name for everyone to hear.

The last working part of my brain registers someone talking directly to me.

I look back at the group I sit with. Sure enough, Gregory is looking at me with a smirk. I don’t apologize, just stare back at him.

“I was asking, what did you do to my sister, your Highness? She always swore she would never ever match any guy.”

“Is she matching?” I ask with a raised brow like I don’t care, but the truth is… I love that she has been trying to copy my style since that morning after my beta and officers beat her up .

If I had known, I would have asked them for that sooner.

Gregory laughs, and returns to the conversation with the guy who looks like the spitting image of their royal beta. It's something about bets, but I didn’t hear the beginning, so I don’t get it. Whatever.

I wonder if they serve any avocados for dinner. Maybe guacamole?

“Boys, dinner is ready.” My wife is suddenly standing by my chair.

“Oh, Asher, I thought you might like to know that we still keep up with your competitive traditions,” says a lanky teenager, who looks like another of her siblings. They have the same grey eyes. Maybe it’s the other gay one.

“Don’t act like I’ve been gone for years,” she pouts at him, and I can’t wait to taste her lips again.

Well, why should I wait? I grab her hand and pull her down to kiss her. I don’t care who looks. She’s surprised but lets my tongue in.

“Remember Greg? When Ash fed us all those false ideas, so she was the only one to bet for—”

She breaks away from me abruptly, and growls at them so loudly I can feel the vibrations.

“I said, dinner is ready!”

They all look sheepish and disperse quickly, acting like they are genuinely terrified of her.

Hmm, maybe they are. Adorable.

But now I’m curious what that bet was about.

“Why did you stop them from talking?” I ask with Alpha command.

“I didn’t want them to talk about your dead siblings in front of you,” she answers, compelled, and instantly covers her mouth, terrified.

“What was that bet about?” I ask through gritted teeth, already knowing the answer, and she squirms under my gaze .

They fucking treated our siblings-fighting-to-the-death, blood-sworn tradition, like some kind of a fun game. I didn’t have to kill my baby sister so this privileged band of mutts could make a bet out of it!

“No, you know what, don’t answer. At least you did bet for me to win, didn’t you?” I hiss sarcastically. “Let’s go eat.”

I stand up and instantly feel her hands on my chest, as if she wants to tame a beast. I smirk at her. It is cute that she thinks she can calm me with her touch. I steady my breath to let her believe that, and I actually do start to feel better. Hmm.

I stretch my hand to her, and she takes it with relief.

“Can I talk with Ella some more after dinner, Alpha?” she asks so timidly, that it makes me wonder how the hell she ever became an officer, let alone the General.

“Only if you leave me with grown-ups this time,” I say, making her chuckle charmingly—getting us some curious looks from the long dinner table where everyone is sitting down.

“Oh, and I didn’t make her apologize, because it’s not her fault that you are so handsome and that we didn’t tell her. Alpha.”

“Agree.”

There are two empty seats on the right of her father, the Alpha King, and that’s where we settle—me between her and her dad, with her sexy mom exactly opposite from me. I swear they look almost like twins.

I have a feeling you can’t say that about their characters, though. No, if I’m right, my Asher is exactly like her father.

Royal Beta is at the other end of the table. The rest of the chairs are filled with teenagers and twenty-year-olds; one paler than the other, except for Ella, who somehow is black. There is no visible hierarchy other than my sitting, but it is their family affair, so they probably don’t care.

I lean back comfortably in my chair—probably looking as if waiting for some harem of naked girls to feed me, which I wouldn’t mind, by the way; and I observe everything with a cold, unbothered look. This makes that Ella girl visibly nervous. And not only her, I notice.

I smirk at all of them knowingly, and the stress level of the room goes through the roof. Oh, it will be a fun night, after all.

Some omega servants bring trays of mouthwatering-smelling food, and everyone starts to talk. I take a sip of red wine from my glass.

I almost spit it out, and Asher is laughing lightly at me.

“Juice,” she says apologetically.

“Oh, what do you drink… over there?” Ella is more curious than nervous, apparently.

“Wine. Lots and lots of wine.” Ash answers. “They also spike other alcohol with wolfsbane. Oh, lemon pies!”

She enthusiastically grabs one of the yellow things from the latest tray.

“Well, fermenting fruits is a smart way with such long winters,” Alpha King comments quietly to his Queen.

“My Rogue Alpha Prince, you have to try this,” Ash brings the thing to my mouth, not a care in the world.

I look deep into her eyes, curious if she’ll want to feed it to me in front of her whole family. Me, their biggest enemy. I lean slightly, not breaking hot eye contact, and take a bite straight from her hand.

It is delicious, the perfect combination of sweet and sour. I nod at her and catch her wrist to eat more before she can take it away.

“I knew you’d love it, Alpha,” she says with satisfaction, her gaze lowering to my mouth devouring the dessert in her hand.

When I’m done, she licks her lemony fingers with a small moan and turns back to the table, probably to take one for herself.

Her hand freezes mid-air when she finally notices everyone is staring at our candid moment. That must be weird for them. We have known each other for just a little over a week, and she’s already licking her fucking fingers with delight after she fed me from those same fingers just seconds ago.

“What?” She asks, either oblivious or pretending to be, so I laugh.

Greg joins me with a couple of other teens. That’s when one of her sisters’ laugh grabs my attention. She looks around fifteen, and has her carbon copy next to her. Identical twins. Both look like a perfect mix of their parents, the King and Queen.

How many kids did they make, and why are they all so close in age?

Anyway, the twins remind me of someone. My baby sister—whose whole life I spent promising to find a way to cancel the morbid rogue tradition of the Heirs Tournament. Promising that we wouldn’t get commanded to fight each other… only to find out I had to kill my dad first. It’s literally impossible without fulfilling some prophecy on an ancient scroll no one seems to have, even years after I had to cut my baby sister's throat.

“Tell us about your wedding. Was it just a court thing or—?” I register Queen’s question, which Asher immediately answers.

“Oh, guys, you have to listen to this!”

But I don’t listen. I just look at her. All her smiles, and sparkling eyes, and dreamy faces while she is recounting what our wedding looked like.

“It does sound so romantic!” Queen says, and there is a lot of agreement around the table. “Do all of your weddings look like that or only the royal ones, Your Highness?”

I imagine cutting off all of their heads. It would be more on-brand for me than what I‘m about to say.

“All of them. I have been at every wedding, of all werewolves in our land, since I was born, so I can attest to that. But normally, as the Alpha, I am the one who weds the couples, not the King.”

As suspected, I get some curious glances at that, even from Asher. I guess it’s hard to imagine me marrying people when all they know is my ruthless side. Well, that’s all they ever let me be .

I made sure I am damn good at it.

“I wish we could adapt it to our lands as well. But we usually have some human friends attending,” Queen starts explaining, as if I was interested. I am not. “So, we do the first shift as a married couple on the wedding night, only with the closest family. It’s a lovely and intimate tradition, but I must admit this running in wolf forms sounds truly magical!”

I nod.

“I heard you can feel your mate. Who is it?” Ella asks, her eyes boring into Asher. I can sense I am still stressing her with my existence, but also… something tells me her question was not as innocent as she tries to make it sound.

“Some ripped alpha prick,” I answer her on impulse; to show I don’t care about Asher having anyone else.

But I do. I’m so fucking jealous that I barely recognize myself. If I really didn’t care, I would completely ignore the question, and we all know it. Fuck.

“So, you then? Your Highness,” Ella shoots back at me with feistiness, and Asher’s mom gasps.

Asher immediately grabs my right hand under the table, where, sure enough, I already hold a knife. She knows me well already.

I lean over and whisper in her ear, “You don’t think I have one in the other hand?”

She squeezes my arm and smiles at everyone. Well… she did warn me I would want to kill Ella and asked me not to do that.

I put my knife back into the holder on my pants, and the poor girl swallows a lump in her throat—not even realizing how close she was to getting it cut.

“Goddess, I remember so vividly when I first smelled my mate—” says the girl on the left of Ella. It’s obvious she wants to defuse the situation.

“—Mangoes!” She finishes at the same time as the teenager, who looks like no one from the adult group here, except for being pale white .

“Is it always a fruit you both love, or is it sometimes something else?” I can see that Ella gets easily distracted.

Something is not right, but I can’t pinpoint it. Is Asher a bit stiffer than a few minutes ago, or is it just me? I keep her fingers in my right hand. Why is she so nervous? I don’t like it.

“No, right, Dad?” she asks, obviously knowing the story of her parents.

The Alpha King looks unamused by the whole situation. Or maybe a little bit angry. Hard to tell.

“Usually you both smell different scents, but they are something you both adore.”

“What does Aunt smell like?”

His eyes lit up at Ella’s truly innocent question.

“Oh, that was a tough one. I couldn’t figure it out for the longest time… petrichor. Rain.”

“And the king smells like sandalwood. At first, I swear he tried to throw me off by using some human perfumes,” Asher’s mom laughs.

“What scent do you smell, Ash?” Ella plays oblivious to my raging jealousy.

I realize she led this whole conversation exactly where she wanted. It was petty and very teenage-girl-like, but I am impressed, nonetheless.

She knows how to fight without drawing blood. A true princess, after all.

“Lemon,” I answer her again before Asher can.

“Can you feel your mate, Rogue Alpha Prince?” Ella looks straight into my eyes for the first time since knowing who I am.

Well, I won’t give her the satisfaction of pointing out my age, with the fact that I’m not mature enough for true mates—or whatever they believe is happening when you don’t feel a thing.

“I don’t need to,” I say, pulling closer to my wife, “I already have everything I’ve ever wanted.”

I roughly kiss Ash in the spot where her true mate’s mark should be—I can feel her whole body heating up under my touch.

Ella laughs lightly, again—true princess—and turns everyone's attention back to the ‘mango pair’.

Thanks to the gods.

“So, aren’t you always hungry with this mango smell?”

“No, it’s subtle, more like a beacon than a real thing.”

Everyone with the mate bonds, I assume, nods their heads.

“Why do you eat with your left hand, your Highness?” Ella asks me after a while, when most of the plates are almost empty.

I swear I can still smell her fear, but it doesn’t stop her from ruffling my feathers. I can see why she’s friends with Ash.

I pull my right hand up from under the table, so she can see my wife holding my hand with hers, our fingers interlocked.

Ash blushes, and I chuckle at her. I’m sure she forgot she’s holding it until I brought it to everyone's attention just now. She’s embarrassed, and I love it.

“What is the Rogue King like?” Ella suddenly asks about my father, probably to save Asher. The whole table goes silent, waiting for her answer.

Except for the Alpha King. He doesn’t wait. He tries to calm himself down and not meddle. I look at him with a knowing smile, and he just shakes his head with resignation. I guess you have to have some patience when you make yourself twenty heirs—or however many kids are here—and don’t make them all kill each other at some point; like my father and all his predecessors did.

I’m starting to understand this sweet Royal Rogue tradition a little bit.

“He is… joyful. Just like my Rogue Alpha Prince here, but thirty years older. ”

I look back at Asher. My Beta always tells me I laugh too much, but he’s a grumpy bastard, and it’s the first time anyone has called us joyful, for sure.

“Thirty years? Aren’t you the oldest?” Alpha King asks me, probably being too occupied last time, with securing the alliance, to notice how much older my dad really is.

“Yes, and yes. But to bear a child to the Rogue King, you must pass a test. It took some time to find anyone willing to try, and I’m already older than he was then, so it’s nothing uncommon.”

Asher looks at me, surprised and maybe even scared. She doesn’t know that’s what the hunt in the forest was for. I knew I shouldn’t have done that without any explanation, but it was so exhilaratingly fun for me that I couldn’t stop myself.

“Oooooh, are you getting prepared to pass it, too?” Ella asks Asher with unhealthy excitement, oblivious to her reaction.

“Oh, she already did—breaking my wolf’s jaw with her bare human hands in the process.”

I notice Asher’s mom gives Ash a puzzled look, but I don’t have time to dwell on it.

Asher ignores my comment, probably furious at me just from the mere memory of the situation, and stands up. I instantly regret that I didn’t slide my hand between her thighs under the table, while I still had a chance to make this dinner more exciting—get her all wet and bothered for me.

“If you excuse me, Your Highness, I will take Ella for that alone time now. To the balcony.” She nods and bows like a princess, definitely mocking me.

But I love it when she’s bratty like that, so as always, I pretend I don’t catch that and nod my permission. I’m tired of Ella’s constant questions anyway.

They both go to the bar first and then disappear behind one of the white curtains in the middle.

I feel my mother-in-law’s gaze on me, but when I look back at her, she conveniently looks down at her bitten lemon pie.

She knows something about Ash. Something I don’t.

What is my wife hiding from me?