Total pages in book: 192
Estimated words: 192810 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 964(@200wpm)___ 771(@250wpm)___ 643(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 192810 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 964(@200wpm)___ 771(@250wpm)___ 643(@300wpm)
At thirteen years old, it became known Prince Aleksei Knightstar of Night's Fall was the True Heir. The next king, the fiercest warrior, the mightiest beast in all the realm.
The Fall rejoiced at having the first True Heir in over a century.
But Aleksei is private, no nonsense, and worried about why The Fall, in a time of peace, would need a True Heir.
Laura Makepeace is a talented costume designer and everywoman who's recovering from a recent random and traumatic attack where she lost something vital. She barely has it in her to put on a pretty frock and go drinking with her girlfriends.
She certainly isn't prepared to be summoned to the True Heir's table in the VIP section of a club.
The prince is not a male easily put off, not to mention, like every other female in the Four Realms, Laura has been crushing on him since she first saw him.
Thus, Laura finds herself suddenly being courted by Prince Aleksei and thrown into a whirl of public and press attention, royal family dysfunction...
And a plot that threatens lives and the peace of the Four Realms
*************FULL BOOK START HERE*************
Chapter 1
The Pink and Black Club
“You can pay me back whenever,” Catla announced graciously.
Sitting across from Catla in the back of her father’s LuxeCraft (or…one of them), Gayliliel and I could do nothing but stare at our friend in shock.
I should have expected something like this the minute Cat started pressing for a night out.
She’d couched it in the whole “I know what happened to you was awful, but you can’t hide away from life forever” routine.
However expected something like this was, this particular something was very un-Cat-like.
That being, spring it on us at the definition of the last minute and think we’d pay for it.
On this thought, the cab filled with Gayle’s fae energy, which meant I had no choice.
I had to take control of this burgeoning situation and speak first.
“Cat, entry into the Black Room is very expensive.”
I communicated this in as reasonable a tone as I could muster, considering everyone knew entry into the hyper-exclusive, VIP Black Room of the ridiculously famous and trendy Pink and Black Club wasn’t expensive. It was cripplingly steep. Cat knew it most of all, since she’d paid for it.
Gayle’s family had wealth, like Cat’s. Not as much, but she came from money.
That said, Gayle made her own way like most human children did when the time came, and considering her father was human (it was Gayle’s mom who was fae), that was the expectation.
Regardless, Gayle would have struck out on her own anyway. It was just who she was. Case in point, Gayle had started working at age fifteen, intent to get a head start. As such, now, she didn’t do too badly.
But she couldn’t afford the Black Room of the P&B Club.
Very few could.
This unlike Cat, whose mother was human, but her father was demon, and they were loaded. They not only had money, they had status. So much, they even hobnobbed with royalty.
Demons did things differently, especially for their daughters. Although Catla worked, she also received an additional allowance (a hefty one) from her family, which afforded her the opportunity to live the high life and dress to impress.
Not to mention, a monthly line of credit that was more than I’d ever made in an entire year.
My family, straight shifters on both sides, came from modest means.
Even if we didn’t, I’d escaped their dysfunction years ago. There had been no support from that quarter since, well…
I was born.
They’d kept me clothed and fed with a roof over my head, I’d give them that.
However, I’d gone no contact the minute I could. That being at seventeen, the age of majority for a shifter. But even before, I was as no contact as I could get still living in the same house with them.
“And we didn’t agree to it,” Gayle cut in, not speaking reasonably but instead, heatedly.
“And it’s really not in my budget,” I continued. Ever, I did not say.
“You can pay me back in installments or something,” Cat allowed.
I could feel Gayliliel bristling, not a good thing for a dark fae, and before I could intervene, she asked, “So, if you go out and buy me a pair of Eduardo Navasco shoes I don’t want and can’t afford, and give them to me, you’d expect me to pay you back for them?” Gayle asked.
“That’s hardly the same.” Cat flicked out an elegant hand. “You’re here, aren’t you? No one forced this on you.”
“Yes, I’m here because I thought we were going to the Pink Room,” Gayle shot back. “Or, at most, the Blue Room.”
The Pink Room was where everyone could get in, if you were chosen by the doorman. The cover charge was more expensive than most, but it wasn’t outlandish.
The Blue Room was one room deeper into the club. It required a charge that was not nominal. As such, although I’d been to the Pink Room, I’d never been in there.
The Black Room required a charge that, as noted, was astronomical. It also required connections. But since Cat’s people, the Truelocks, were The Truelocks, all she undoubtedly had to do was say her name, give her credit code, and we were in.
Cat crinkled her adorable snub nose at the very idea of mingling in the Pink Room, and when Gayle mentioned Blue, she didn’t look any happier.
Gayle didn’t miss it, nor did she like it.
“The little people can be fun. You should know,”—she flapped a hand between herself and me—“since you hang out with us.”
She wasn’t the “little people.”
But I was.
“No demon would be caught dead in the Pink Room,” Cat retorted.
She was very correct. When I’d been there before, I’d gone with Gayle, or one of our other friends, Monique. Never Cat.
And there it was.
Recently, Catla had been husband hunting at the decree of her father.
And Cat was hunting for a demon, or at least a half one, also at the decree of her father.