Total pages in book: 105
Estimated words: 99485 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 497(@200wpm)___ 398(@250wpm)___ 332(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 99485 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 497(@200wpm)___ 398(@250wpm)___ 332(@300wpm)
“He insulted Aurora!” Slade exclaimed. “He offered to ‘buy’ her for an hour. He’s lucky I didn’t cut off his fucking dick and shove it down his throat!”
“I don’t expect you to tolerate insults against your wife,” his father said. “But you must be aware that when you punish someone like Duke Hornsby, there may be repercussions—even assassins sent to hurt those who are close to you, son.”
“He’s a human—he wouldn’t dare,” Slade growled.
“Human or not, he’s wealthy enough to hire someone to come after you if he wants to.” His father sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. “Look, son—I’m not asking you to come home just because I want you here for my own selfish reasons. I need you and your heir to be safe. You have to carry on our Clan’s bloodline. If something happened to you, Clan Cruel would be in chaos!”
Slade sighed deeply and I saw his broad shoulders sag.
“All right—Aurora and I will move to the mansion. But I’d like it known that this is on a trial basis. If Lyrah starts giving us trouble—”
“Your mother is delighted you’re coming,” his father interrupted. “Why, she’s already getting the East Wing guest suite ready for you. She says she wants to make the ‘perfect love nest’ for the two of you.”
“Yeah, I’ll bet,” Slade muttered. “And she’s my stepmother.”
“Lyrah is trying to be kind and welcoming—I would hope you’ll treat her with respect,” his father said stiffly.
“I’ll do my best,” Slade promised.
“Good—then we’ll see you tomorrow morning,” his father said.
“Make it later than that—we need time to pack,” Slade pointed out.
“Very well. As long as you’re here for family dinner—which I expect you and your wife to attend at least four times a week—that will be fine.”
And before Slade could protest, his father signed off and his hologram disappeared abruptly.
This time I decided not to try and hide that I’d been eavesdropping—we clearly needed to talk about this. I cleared my throat and waited until he turned around.
“So we’re going to move to your family’s mansion after all?” I asked.
“Oh, you heard that, did you?” he asked. His face was like a thundercloud.
“Yes, sorry. I heard raised voices and I came to see what was happening,” I admitted.
“What’s happening is we’re moving tomorrow,” he growled.
I raised my eyebrows.
“Should I start packing?”
Slade shook his head.
“Just take a few things—I really don’t think we’ll be there for long. Once my Sire sees how badly Lyrah and I get along, he should be willing to let us come back here.”
“I’ll bring enough for a week, then,” I said. “Er, is she really that bad?”
“You have no fucking idea, Princess.” He sighed and ran a hand over his horns. “Fuck—this is going to be one hell of a fucking week. Just hope it doesn’t last longer than that.”
“Should I bring more clothes just in case?” I asked.
He shook his head.
“No. I’ll buy you more if we need more. It’ll give us an excuse to get out of the house. I’ll probably be going into the office more too,” he added.
I was surprised.
“You have an office? I mean, do mobsters have offices?”
Slade barked a laugh.
“Yes, we have offices. And the Four Families or Clans aren’t just mobsters you know. We do offer genuine protection to the people who pay us.”
“Right—protection from getting attacked by your own forces,” I said, getting irritated.
Slade shook his head.
“No, Princess. Think about this—have you ever stopped and asked yourself why your tiny little planet of L’Crist that really has no defenses to speak of never gets raided by pirates?”
“You mean like the Canaboids or the Skinners?” I shivered. I had heard awful stories of the space faring marauders who boarded unprotected ships or smaller moons and enslaved everyone. Or, in the case of the Skinners, they actually skinned their victims alive and sold them as meat at the Flesh Market.
“That’s exactly what I mean,” Slade rumbled. “Why do you think it is that none of those bastards has ever bothered your tidy little kingdom?”
“I…I don’t know,” I faltered. “I guess I just thought they wouldn’t bother with a planet.”
“L’Crist isn’t really a proper planet—it’s barely a planetoid,” he pointed out. “It’s too small to even have an atmosphere—if your people hadn’t teraformed it, you never could have lived there.”
“So you’re saying that Clan Cruel protects us from pirates?” I asked, raising my eyebrows.
Slade nodded.
“Among other things. There are some pretty nasty space-faring species out there, Princess and plenty of them would be happy to feast on a few defenseless humans.”
“We’re not completely defenseless!” I exclaimed, stung by his derision. “We have an army, you know.”
Slade snorted.
“Right. An army that any ship with a halfway decent torpedo array could blast out of existence with one shot.”
“Well, but physically—” I began.
“Physically, your species is remarkably weak,” Slade growled. “No horns or fangs or wings—not even any kind of inner entities like the Darkness we of Clan Cruel have. Your little kingdom is safe from all of the scary space pirates and monsters because of our ships.”