Page 62 of Wedlock (Vampire Bachelor Games #3)

“You know, this castle does seem bereft of life without Mother, Jag, Viper, Asumpta, and Angie. It seems the Princess was right in this respect, at least.”

“Bullshit,” Wolf snorts as he reclines on the couch near my fire. “It’s all perspective. My castle is empty of all but the servants, and I couldn’t be happier. Of course, unlike you, I don’t regularly perform a pogrom and kill every staff member…”

“There was a spy somewhere,” I shrug. “How else could the Princess know that Angie’s run again?”

“Yes,” Wolf sighs, shaking his head, “so you say. And as for your list of lost, you know it's within your power to get them all back. Well, not Asumpta, obviously, she’s truly fucked, and Viper’s rotting along with all your servants, but the rest are all recoverable.”

I shake my head at his humour.

Yes, Asumpta was fucked. She’d been dragged to court and had given her evidence in a dull monotone, her eyes never leaving Jag’s throughout the ordeal.

There had been no need for Attracta to give any evidence.

The Queen had made the determination that I was innocent in consultation with The Families mid-way through the trial, saying she had no wish to waste any more of her precious time.

She’d added that she fervently hoped not to have to hear my name for at least a century, and anyone who mentioned it to her would be eviscerated.

I couldn’t help but think that the revelation that Spider had rigged The Games, and the subsequent uproar from the gallery, had hit a little too close to home for her liking.

The whole case, and its ending, had been an anticlimax for all involved.

Princess Revna had left the court looking livid. Jag had simply nodded to me as the court emptied and been swirled out amid the crowd. Wolf had waited to give me a lift home.

We’d returned directly, only to find the castle, as the Princess had predicted, bereft of virtually all life save one small vampire and his wetnurse — the only staff member I hadn’t ordered eliminated. My son needs her now more than ever, since he no longer has a mother.

I frown at Wolf.

“If you’re referring to my wife as being recoverable, Wolf. She’s not. Angie left our baby. She’s not the woman I thought she was.”

“ Thought being the operative word,” Wolf shrugs, “you hardly knew her, to be fair.”

“I believe I did.”

“Let’s think this through,” he chuckles.

“You met her on a reality television show where everyone was essentially acting, or at the very least not being totally themselves. You married her and she went on the tour of the contestants by herself for a month or more. When she returned you locked her up for months. She was under a thrall for another few months and sleeping with someone else.”

Seeing my dark expression, he hurries on.

“But we won’t go there. After that she ran away for the best part of a year, only to be returned against her will and locked up again. Now she’s run again . Have I missed anything?”

“No,” I reply gruffly.

“So, my point is, you hardly knew the wench. Don’t get me wrong, she’s comely enough, and intelligent, and obviously still has enough feelings for you to not want to see you dead. But other than that, you don’t know her, she doesn’t know you, and you’re both probably much better off apart.”

“But to have left the child, Wolf…”

“How else could she be assured you wouldn’t chase her down and lock her back up again?

Not to mention the fact that you were contemplating having to marry the Princess to free yourself.

If that eventuated Angie would have been eliminated.

Her thought process was probably that the baby would survive if she left it.

You could claim she’d killed herself, or some such thing, freeing you to marry the Princess and freeing her to live out her life.

After all, you’d successfully spread the word that she was suicidal. It makes sense.”

I shake my head and sigh. He’s right, of course, in every way. I’d driven her to the point that she had no choice but to leave her baby. A baby who would now grow up without a guiding hand, a loving and protective hand. All he has is me, the monster who drove his mother away.

‘I had a mother to shield me from my father, but who will protect this child from me?’

“I think I’ll invite Mother back home,” I murmur, pouring us both another drink.

Wolf raises his glass to toast my announcement.

“That’s a start.”