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“What’s wrong?”
His hand settled in the small of her back, pressing her forward toward the ballroom doors.
“Hell if I know,” he muttered. “He’s not saying.”
The panic intensified. Ria couldn’t explain it; she couldn’t force him not to go to that office, but every feminine instinct she possessed was screaming out at her, demanding that she run, that she escape.
That instinct was a part of her. She always heeded it. The few times she hadn’t
had seen her heart broken, her pride in shambles. And she had seen the pity for her weakness in Leo and Dane’s eyes. Always the sad, poor little orphan.
“Ria?” Mercury questioned her as they entered the foyer and moved to the back of the hall. “Are you okay?”
“Fine.” She sent him a smile she hoped wasn’t as brittle as she felt. “I think the shoes are pinching my feet or something.”
Or something. The closer they moved to that office, the more she had to restrain herself not to turn and run.
“I hate it when you lie to me,” he snarled softly.
“I hate it when you ask me questions I don’t know how to answer,” she hissed back. “I’ve had a bad feeling all day.”
She clutched the side of her dress, lifting the long skirt as they moved closer to their destination. She could run now, she told herself.
Like hell. She wasn’t a coward. And it wasn’t physical danger she could feel awaiting her. She couldn’t explain the premonition. She had never been able to explain them.
“Jonas, Callan and Dane are waiting in Jonas’s office,” he told her. “Dane wouldn’t allow you to walk into danger.”
She shook her head. “It’s not danger.”
She could see the door. It was closed. They moved closer and she wanted to scream. She licked her lips nervously, ignored her sweating palms and waited as Mercury knocked on the door.
It opened, but only partially. Dane stepped outside.
“Mercury, I’ll stand outside with Ria.” His expression was livid.
“The hell you will.” Mercury tugged her closer to his side. “She doesn’t need a babysitter.”
The door swung open.
“Mercury.” The soft, feminine sigh shattered her as she stared back at the other woman in horror.
Shoulder-length golden hair, hazel brown eyes shadowed with a light dusting of bronze over the lids. High cheekbones, exotic eyes and a smile that trembled. And a face Ria had seen in her nightmares over the past weeks. Except that face had been younger, softer—and death had taken her years ago. Or it was supposed to have.
“Alaiya?” Shock filled Mercury’s voice, and seared Ria’s heart.
She stood still. Frozen.
Another woman’s arms touched his face, caressed it, though he almost pulled back. Another woman’s arms wrapped around his neck, and another woman snuggled against his chest.
“Oh, Mercury. It’s been so long.”
Those eyes blinked back at Ria, and for a moment she could have sworn she glimpsed malicious pleasure in the eyes of Mercury’s mate.
CHAPTER 18
She was going to disintegrate into a million pieces. Shards and fragments of her soul would be found on worlds light-years from Earth before the pain completed its journey.
She had been so certain she was his. So certain she had finally found a place to belong, because he owned her soul, and no one else ever had.
