Free Web NovelChapter 44: Chapter FORTY FOUR — INSECURE DIDI
Ragnor
The dining hall felt tense than usual tonight, and that was an understatement. I sat at the head of the long table, cutting into my venison steak that might as well have been cardboard for all I tasted of it.
Every nerve in my body was tracking one thing — Candace, seven seats away on my right, sitting upright with her spine ramrod straight.
She had chosen the chair. There were five empty seats between her and Reign, and she had picked the farthest one on purpose.
The wine-red dress did not help.
It was the same dress we had given her on her fifteenth birthday — Reign had picked the silk, Ryker had thrown in the ribbon at the last minute, and I had been the one to wrap it. She couldn’t possibly have forgotten that.
She was wearing it tonight on the first dinner after our coronation, the first dinner where she sat at this table as Luna, and she was wearing the one piece of clothing in the world that could gut all three of us at once.
Terror sighed needily in my chest every time the silk shifted against her skin.
She’s punishing us, he murmured. Good.
I cut another piece of meat I wasn’t going to eat. I didn’t have any appetite particularly because she also wasn’t eating for whatever reason. My brows furrowed and I was about to break the awkward silence when Reign beat me to it.
"How was the meeting with the ladies of the council?" Reign asked. His question was aimed at Deidre, but his eyes made a short, involuntary trip down the length of the table.
Deidre offered a thin smile. "It was lovely."
Candace set her fork down with a soft, deliberate click. ƒrēewebnovel.com
"Was it?" she said, not looking up from her plate. "I’m surprised. I had to chase it down to Andrea Gardens to find out it had been moved."
Deidre’s spine stiffened. The temperature at the table dropped ten degrees in a single breath.
Ryker froze with his wineglass halfway to his mouth. Reign’s eyebrows lifted slightly, a frown grazing his features. Now, I understood.
Deidre had moved the meeting on Candace, on the first day of her Luna duties, and hadn’t told her. And Candace had just put it on the table in front of all of us.
"Oh, cousin." Deidre recovered fast, her smile turning sweet and practiced. "There must have been a miscommunication with the maids. I was sure someone had told you."
Candace lifted her gaze for the first time. Her eyes were calm, unblinking, giving nothing away.
"Maybe." A small lift of her shoulder. "Funny how these miscommunications always seem to flow in one direction."
A short giggle escaped Reign, quickly muffled by his wine gulp. Ryker’s jaw locked, his eyes darting between them while Deidre’s red-coated nails curled slowly around her fork.
I leaned back in my chair and watched it play out. Whatever had happened between them today, Candace had handled it herself like a true Luna.
She hadn’t come running to us to whine.
She’d managed her first day as Luna on her own. A swell of pride burst through my chest, catching me off guard.
Before I could stop it, a faint smile tugged at my mouth. I was proud of her more than I wanted to admit.
"I’m not very hungry tonight," Deidre announced, rising from her chair. "I think I’ll retire early. It’s been a long day."
Ryker’s brows creased with worry. "You barely ate, baby girl."
"I’ll have something light later." She leaned in and pressed a lingering kiss to his lips. He growled against her mouth, kissing her deeply, and she pulled back with a soft giggle, swatting his chest.
Then she crossed to me. Her fingers curled around the back of my neck. She tilted my head up and dropped a tender kiss against my jaw. My arm went around her waist on instinct — three years of muscle memory.
I felt Candace’s gaze boring into the side of my face like a slap, it took every willpower I had to not look at her.
Deidre moved on to Reign, gave him a slower kiss, and then floated out of the dining hall like she had won something.
The moment the door closed behind her, the air in the room changed again and now it was just us four — three Alphas at one end of the table and a Luna at the other, in a wine-red dress none of us could stop seeing.
Candace reached for the water pitcher. She filled her cup and brought it to her lips, and it was only then that I caught it — the faint tremor in her fingers as she lifted the glass. So faint I almost missed it. She drank, set it down, and pushed back from her chair.
"Candy."
She paused half risen from her chair. "Yes?"
For a moment, he seemed to lose whatever he’d planned to say.
"You barely ate."
A faint smile grazed the corner of her mouth without reaching her eyes. "I’m fine, Reign."
"That’s not what I —"
"I know what you meant." She rose fully, smoothing the silk over her hips with both hands. "Good night, Alphas."
She walked out, closing the door softly behind her.
Ryker exhaled sharply. "What the hell was that?"
"Something happened today."
Reign slowly rotated his glass against the tabletop.
"Between her and Deidre."
"Deidre would’ve told us."
"Would she?"
Ryker shot him a look.
"Drop it," I said.
I rose to my feet, my chair scraping softly against the marble floor.
"I’ll do one last patrol before turning in. Victor mentioned movement near the eastern boundary earlier."
Ryker didn’t believe me and judging by the look on his face, he wasn’t even pretending to.
The air outside was cool. I walked the perimeter of the estate at half pace, hands shoved into my pockets, Terror prowling restlessly inside me.
The wine-red dress would not leave my head. The way Candace had handled herself like a Luna today considering the fact that there were no claw marks. Truthfully, she’d handled herself better than Deidre had.
She is ours, Terror said again, quieter this time, almost tired. Stop fighting it. Can’t you feel it? She’s hurting.
I walked the eastern boundary. I walked the western. There was no movement near anything. There never had been.
Victor had not flagged anything. I was looking for a reason to stay outside in the dark, and I was running out of paths to walk.
I was about to peel out of my clothes and shift, to give Terror the run he had been begging for, when the mindlink opened.
Come to your quarters, my Alpha. I need to tell you something urgently.
I stopped at the edge of the tree line. I turned and walked back to the packhouse. The corridor was dim, the night guards bowed as I strode by. I pushed open the door to my quarters and stopped short in my tracks.
Deidre lay sprawled across my bed, dressed in sheer pink lingerie that left very little to the imagination.
A tiny strip of fabric sat between her thighs, one knee bent to display her cunt. Her dark hair cascaded over my pillows. On the bedside table were an array of sex toys.
She smiled when she saw me. Then slowly crawled toward the edge of the mattress while I covered the distance between us.
"Hi, Big Daddy," she purred.
"I thought you might need a little stress relief after today."
"I think—" I started to say when she reached for me as I approached, her fingers sliding under my shirt, nails dragging lightly across my abs.
"It’s time to mark your Luna, my Alpha."
But instead of desire, I felt something else.
Something unsettling. For the first time in years, looking at Deidre wasn’t enough to make me forget Candace.
