Sunshine's Kiss (18 page)

He was really beginning to hate this place.

Seldic drew Sam to a stop in front a set of large double doors. Sam raised an eyebrow at the man when he didn’t immediately open the doors. “Is this where you give me the speech about not shaming the king?” Sam snorted. “Don’t worry, I’ve already heard it.”

“What is wrong with you?” Seldic snapped. “King Auryan has brought you to our country and named you his heir. He has given you the world. And yet, you spit at his feet.”

Sam turned and glared up at the tall man, poking his finger into Seldic’s chest. “He took me from my mate. He expects me to forget about Jesse, to put him in the past like it never happened.” Sam ground the words out between his teeth as he pointed to the set of double doors. “He wants to introduce me to a bunch of men that he has handpicked for me, men he finds suitable. He wants me to replace my mate. I won’t do that.”

“You have a mate?” Seldic’s astonishment seemed genuine, but what did Sam know?

Sam turned and tilted his head forward, baring the bite mark on his neck. He heard a swift inhale of breath and the hesitant touch of a finger across the mark. Sam shivered at the feeling of someone else touching him and quickly turned around, stepping back. He rubbed at the bite mark, trying to rid himself of the strange touch. It felt wrong for someone other than Jesse to be touching him, especially there.

“Does your father know of this?” Seldic asked in a controlled yet soft voice.

“He knows,” Sam spat out. “And yet your fair and just king keeps me here away from my mate.”

“You must be mistaken,” Seldic said, shaking his head. “King Auryan would never come between mates. He understands the bond they have. He would never keep you from this man if he was your true mate.”

“You are just like him,” Sam whispered as realization dawned on him. He was surrounded by people that wanted to keep him from returning to Jesse. Sam’s heart started aching again as he was once again reminded that he might never see Jesse again. It seemed that no one wanted Sam and Jesse to be together except them.

“Your father is waiting,” Seldic said as he reached for the doors and pulled them open.

“Yes, of course he is.”

Sam dismissed the captain the moment he stepped inside the crowded room. He shivered when he saw how many people were actually in the room. He counted over twenty, and those were just the people he could immediately see. He had no idea how many might be out on the patio just past the open doors on the far side of the room.

“Samuel.”

Sam started eagerly searching the crowd when he heard his mother’s voice. He spotted her coming through the crowd and hurried in her direction. He breathed his first sigh of contentment in days when his mother’s arms closed around him.

He felt tears prickle the corners of his eyes when Sarah grabbed his face between her hands and looked into his eyes.

“How are you, my son?”

“I want to go home, Mom. I miss Jesse.”

“Then go home.” Sarah’s forehead wrinkled as she frowned. “I’m sure your father can arrange it.”

“I can’t go home.” Sam’s eyes flittered around as he tried to figure out how to tell his mother that his father was an asshole. “Father won’t le—” Sam’s voice faded when he spotted King Auryan heading toward them.

“Ah, good, Samuel, you’re here,” the king said. “I have some friends I’d like you to meet.”

“Auryan—” Sarah began.

Sam cut her off with a small shake of his head. Now was not the time. He understood the need to keep things private, even if he didn’t like it. Making complaints in front of others wasn’t going to get him what he wanted.

Besides, he had something else up his sleeve.

Sort of.

His little surprise was actually located just a little further down his body than his sleeve. More like up his shirt. Sam plastered a smile on his face and smoothed his hands down over the baby-blue fabric over his stomach.

“Of course, Father. I’d be delighted to meet your friends.”

King Auryan looked cautious at Sam’s easy acceptance, and well he should be. Sam was happy to meet anyone the king wanted. He just wouldn’t be mating with any of them. He already had a mate. And he had proof of that union right under his hands.

Either that or it was a really huge tumor.

And it moved.

The first time he felt the bump move, Sam thought it was indigestion. After getting sick so easily for days on end, he had suddenly gotten his appetite back and was eating everything in sight. Indigestion would explain a lot.

But the movements seemed to increase even when he wasn’t eating. And the movements responded to his voice. That was when Sam started to put the clues together. The morning sickness, the food cravings, the tiredness, and the growing bump that moved.

Sam didn’t know how it had happened, and a part of him still suspected that he was crazy, but he was pretty damn sure he was pregnant. Maybe he was crazy. For all he knew, this could be a side effect of mating a Lycan.

But he could hope.

If he was pregnant, it gave him a link to Jesse, and maybe that was why he hoped so very much that what was impossible had become possible with the bite from his Lycan mate.

Sam followed his father to two men standing by the patio doors. He plastered a smile on his face and folded his hands over the bump under his shirt.

Let the games begin.

Sam almost smirked when the two men introduced themselves eagerly when they saw him. They smiled and started talking, their interest clear in their eyes until they saw Sam’s rounded stomach. And then they couldn’t excuse themselves fast enough.

King Auryan seemed confused at their hasty departure. He looked at Sam curiously, but only at his face. As he was led off to meet someone else, Sam wondered if his father had ever actually looked at him, really looked at him. Sam knew his father had been busy getting to know his mother again, but it seemed like he was just an afterthought.

Or a tool for the king to use to get what he wanted.

Sam just had to figure out what the king wanted. As he was led around from man to man and introduced to each of them, Sam started to get the feeling he was a bargaining chip. The king wanted an alliance of some sort, and he was using Sam to get it.

“Samuel, come.”

Samuel rolled his eyes. So he walked a little slow. Sue him. “You know I’ll never accept any of these men, right?” Sam was pretty sure his words would go unheard by his father, but he had to try.

“These are all good men, Samuel,” King Auryan said. “You could do much worse.”

Sam grabbed his father’s wrist and pulled him to a stop. When he saw several people stare at them, he pulled his father off to one side of the room. He wished they had somewhere quiet to talk. What he had to say was between the two of them.

“I am not going to accept any of these men,” Sam said. “I already have a mate. When are you going to understand that?”

“If you already have a mate, then where is he?”

Sam’s eyes bugged. “You took me from him.”

“I took you from a house full of shifters.”

Sam cocked his head to one side. There was so much disdain in those words that Sam was surprised his father didn’t spit on the ground afterward. “Do you have something against Lycan?”

“We are Fey, Samuel.” King Auryan straightened his shoulders and seemed to try and look down his nose at Sam. “We do not associate with shifters.”

“Is that how you really feel, Auryan?” The words were softly spoken from just behind Sam. He spun around to see his mother standing there. The sorrow on her face was clearly shown in the tears glistening in her eyes.

“Sarah, you do not understand,” King Auryan began.

“No, I think I do,” Sarah replied. “I wondered for years why you never came after me, after us.” Sarah’s eyes flickered to Sam for a moment. “I guess now I know why.”

“Sarah, please.” Auryan reached for Sarah, but she stepped back. Sam stepped back with her, putting his arm around his mother’s shoulders. “It’s not what it looks like.”

“Actually, I think it’s exactly what it looks like.” Sarah sniffled softly. “It’s time to go, Samuel.”

Sam could feel his mother’s hand tremble as she grabbed his. He gave her a small squeeze and turned to leave with her when she turned and started walking away. Only the man standing in his path stopped him. Sam felt an instant of sheer terror invade his senses at the sneer on the man’s face.

“Hello, Samuel, I’ve been waiting for you.”

Jesse rubbed his thumb over the small golden earring held between his fingers. He didn’t know why he was so fascinated by the simple gold piece, but he was. He certainly hadn’t been able to put it down over the last two months. If he wasn’t holding it in his hand, he had it in his pocket. He was a little worried that he would become as obsessed with the earring as his father seemed to be.

It seemed to be the only thing that brought him comfort since Sam was kidnapped. It had been an agonizing two months, and Jesse was starting to wonder if he would ever find his mate again.

He knew Sam was alive. He could feel him through their bond. But he couldn’t find him. No one could. It was like Sam had fallen off the face of the Earth. There was no sign of Sam or Sarah anywhere that he could find.

His father wasn’t talking. As obsessed as Andrew McCaffrey had seemed to be over the earring, Jesse couldn’t figure out why the man hadn’t said a single word about it. He hadn’t said anything. Not one word.

And Jesse couldn’t figure out why.

The earring held some significance, he knew that. He just didn’t know why it was so important to his father. It was just an earring. It wasn’t even a set of earrings. Jesse knew it had belonged to his mother, but he didn’t remember his father ever being so obsessed over anything belonging to his mother before or since her death.

Jesse curled his fingers around the earring until he felt the small circle dig into the palm of his hand. There was some mystery here. He just had to figure it out.

“Open,” Jesse said when he heard a knock at his office door.

The door opened, and Cort and Rocky walked in.

Jesse’s heart stuttered in his chest as a flicker of apprehension coursed through him. “Did you find him?”

“No,” Rocky said as he set a stack of books and papers down on the desk, “but I may have found something else.”

As casually as he could manage, Jesse asked, “What?”

“I tracked Desmond Kent down like you asked. I’ve had someone watching him.”

“And?” Jesse could barely stand to hear the answer. Did Desmond Kent have Sam? Was his precious little mate being tortured night and day by the sick monster? Just the thought of what Sam could be suffering at this very moment made Jesse’s stomach threaten to rebel.

“For the last two months, ever since Sam and Sarah were taken, he’s been going about his business like normal. But yesterday, there was a lot of activity on his estate. When Desmond left in his limo, I had our scout follow him.” Rocky licked his lips, his eyes darting to Cort for a moment before he looked back at Jesse. “Jesse, I think I know where Sam is.”

“What?” Jesse jumped out of his seat, nearly knocking it over. “Where?”

“What do you know about the Fey?”

Jesse hesitated to answer, blinking in bafflement. “The who?”

“The Fey,” Rocky said. “They are a race of paranormals, what you would call the ‘nobler race.’ While they are mostly human, they have amazing talents as scribes and metalworkers, especially their king. He has the unique magical ability to blip in and out wherever he wants.”

“That’s exactly what he did!” Jesse shouted as he slammed his hands down onto the desktop. “He blipped in, grabbed Sam and Sarah, and blipped right back out.”

“From what I’ve been able to find out, there are two factions in the Fey world, the Light Court and the Dark Court. And I’m really praying that Sam was taken by someone in the Light Court because what I found out about the Dark Court would curl your hair.”

Jesse swallowed hard. “Tell me.”

“The Light Court is what everyone reads about in their fairy tales.” Rocky waved his hand in the air. “It’s all light and goodness and harmony and that kind of crap.”

“And the Dark Court?”

Rocky’s head tilted slightly as he looked at Jesse, a curious look on his face, one Jesse couldn’t decipher. “Ever wonder where vampires come from?”

Jesse’s jaw dropped. “Va–vampires?”

Even Cort looked shocked.

“Are you serious?” Jesse whispered, almost afraid to ask his words in a louder tone. That might make Rocky’s outlandish words true.

“Oh yes.” Rocky nodded. “I didn’t believe it at first either. I’ve never even heard of something like this. But the more I investigated, the more I started to believe it.”

Jesse plopped back down in his chair and rubbed his hands down his face before folding them together and resting them on the top of his desk. He was afraid to ask but he had to know… “What all did you find out?”

“All of the Fey are blood drinkers. What makes them different is how they get that blood. The Light Court has rules that must be followed. They do not believe in taking blood from unwilling donors nor do they kill. The Dark Court is just the opposite. They take blood where they want, and they often kill their prey while doing it.”