Chapter 309: The Seat Was Already Hers

"Stonehowl put silver cuffs on my mate. Gagged her. Held a blade to her throat. Dragged her by her hair. Threatened to scar her face eleven times. Then killed me."

Nicholas delivered each item as a nail in a coffin Tharos didn’t know was being built.

"Permission to not stop you, Alpha," Reed said. "Damon agreed with Renwick’s justification. Stonehowl was working with Dark Fae, which means we have a mole."

His eyes moved to Guinevere, as if he just remembered Renwick was her father. He gave her a respectful nod.

Guinevere wanted to ask him if her father said anything after she vanished. If the situation was salvageable or if her father would look at her as a ruined asset that cost him seven hundred and fifty million gold and a dragon alliance.

She didn’t. He wasn’t her Gamma. Nicholas was getting debriefed. And if her father wanted to see her, Reed would have opened with, ’you should find your father’ or something of that sort.

None of the above happened.

She swallowed the lump in the back of her throat.

Nicholas gave Guinevere’s hand a squeeze that communicated ’you are going where I’m going,’ before they started walking again.

Reed continued updating Nicholas. Guinevere understood they could be doing this conversation over a mindlink. But they weren’t. It was out loud, which meant Nicholas wanted her to hear.

He was bringing her into his conversation like she was his Luna. She was beside him, hand in his, being updated in real-time on the same intelligence his Gamma was delivering.

She had spent her entire life earning the right to stand in rooms where decisions were made. Nicholas Shadowfell just handed her a seat at his table without being asked, without conditions, without a speech about what it cost him, and the ease of it cracked something open in her chest.

Every wolf they passed in the corridor did the same thing. Their eyes landed on Nicholas. Most did a bow or head dip. Then their eyes landed on Guinevere and they gave a knowing head nod.

That’s his Luna.

It didn’t click until they had passed a few.

Every wolf in this corridor was nodding at her like she was the goddamn Luna and she was standing there accepting it with a blush so aggressive it could be seen from two kingdoms away. Shit was spiraling.

She was not his Luna. She was a married woman with a treason charge, a criminal record in a kingdom made of light. A married woman holding Nicholas’s hand because for a moment she forgot herself. For a moment, she let her instincts take over and every instinct she possessed pointed at Nicholas.

For a moment she forgot that she had feelings for Kael while somehow being married to his brother. Everything had happened so quickly. She was in her chambers one second, then in a flash of light, she was running from Stonehowl and two demons.

Then Nicholas on the floor with open eyes that saw nothing. Then light. Then a tree. Then a pool. Then his mouth on hers and the absence of a single reason to stop it. And somewhere underneath all of it, Kael’s voice in her mind and Maddox’s eyes on her and the slow, sickening math that she was going to hurt two of them no matter what.

Three men. Three directions. One woman whose romantic life had gone from nonexistent to a goddamn three-carriage pileup in under a week and every carriage was on fire and she was somehow in all of them.

She should let go. She knew she should let go. But letting go of the man she had just pulled from the dead felt like putting him back.

Nicholas glanced down at her.

"Something wrong?"

Her voice came out steadier than she felt, a small mercy.

"You don’t have to bring me, Nicholas. I’m a fugitive in at least two kingdoms."

"I’m also a fugitive in one of those. Remember?"

He said it like shared felonies were a bonding experience. Date activities for the unhinged: run from cops, assault a fountain, commit light treason, hold hands. Nicholas Shadowfell’s idea of romance was a goddamn crime spree with eye contact.

"Nicholas."

"Guinevere."

"I probably need to check on my men if they are still here."

Nicholas flashed a grin. "Your men are fine. You asked me on a second date. This is the second date. You’re coming."

He weaponized the word "date" in front of his Gamma during a military debrief and did it with a grin that should have been fucking illegal in all the kingdoms she was wanted in.

Her mouth opened. Closed. The blush climbed past her cheeks and into her ears.

"They are still here," Reed piped in, looking straight ahead with the fixed determination of a man who was hearing his Alpha flirt.

"Also," Nicholas continued, "you keep disappearing in white light. If I leave you in a room, there’s a solid chance you flash back to that kingdom where you committed a string of felonies. And then you’ll be handing yourself over to the people who shot at you."

She opened her mouth to argue, then remembered something else.

"You said you knew King Solveil personally."

"I did."

"The whole time. You knew him."

"Yes." Nicholas grinned.

Guinevere blinked a few times. He knew the damn king of the Luminari all along.

"What?" he asked, face innocent.

"I wonder if he would be willing to waive the terrorism charges so I can return and get one of those glow-beverages some day."

Reed’s brows furrowed. The sincerity of her voice on the word ’terrorism’ was either the funniest or most fucked up thing he’d heard all night and the gap between those two was shrinking by the second.

"But please, don’t use your relationship with him to get me special treatment," she added quickly.

"I was already planning on speaking with him. But you’ll need to stay by my side for the foreseeable future. For your protection. Until we sort this out."