Bad Boy Prince: A British Royal Stepbrother Romance (24 page)

L
aird Rhys Ian Bramford Macaulay
had made many difficult choices in his life, chosen the welfare of others over his own in nearly all those moments. He was a born ruler, the blood in his veins the result of generations upon generations of fierce Scottish chieftains. As such, he was used to both putting the interest of others first and to having his way in all matters of importance. A self-indulgent martyr, if such a thing existed.

At the moment that his future mate reappeared, returning to the human plane with a
pop
, Rhys had only just managed to contain his bear. Aeric and Gabriel had been forced to subdue him before Rhys started a citywide panic with reports of berserk bears rampaging through the 8
^th
Ward. The Guardians had only recently established themselves as a beneficial addition to the Kith community; the last thing they needed was Rhys blowing that by ending up on the evening news for mauling an animal control officer.

Luckily, his fellow Guardians had calmed him somewhat and dragged him back to where the girl had disappeared, insisting on the need to wait, should she return. Their words were mostly bluff, intended only to focus and soothe Rhys.

So when the gorgeous, curvy blonde threw herself at him, he was hard-put to restrain himself. His bear was already rearing and going wild, insisting that Rhys obey the intense and growing mating urges that bloomed deep in his chest. Unfortunately, far from being receptive to being stripped, fucked, and marked, Rhys’s future mate was bawling her pretty eyes out, clutching his shoulders as her body shuddered with the force of her sobs.

All he could do was try to comfort her, and hope that his newfound obsession with sinking his teeth into the tender skin of her shoulder would pass. He just wrapped his arms around her to return her embrace, marveling at the foot-plus difference in their heights. She wasn’t overly thin, her hourglass figure pleasingly substantial, but she still felt incredibly fragile in Rhys’s arms.

“You’re alright, lass,” Rhys said, trying to pretend that sucking in deep pulls of her scent wasn’t making him strangely elated. Rhys immediately identified her scent as that of wildflowers and sunshine, and the specificity of it baffled him.

Rhys gave Gabriel a helpless glance, uncertain how to proceed.

“Give me the keys, eh?” Gabriel asked.

Rhys fished the keys to the SUV out of his pocket with one hand and tossed them to Gabriel, then turned his attention to the girl.

“Echo?” he asked gently, feeling absurd about his tentativeness. “That’s your name, isn’t it? Echo Caballero?”

Echo sniffled and drew back a few inches, embarrassment staining her cheeks a delicate pink. Rhys understood her discomfort. The lure of the potential mate was strong, drawing them together like lightning arcing down to the waiting ground; the sensation had the intended effect of making one forget that the other person was a perfect stranger.

“Y-yes,” she said, swiping at her face with the back of her hand.

Rhys had never so wished for a handkerchief. The thought made him scowl, because comforting women certainly wasn’t his normal routine. The fact that he wanted to do so… well, he’d chalk that up to the mating magic.

“I’m Rhys Macaulay,” he blithered. “R-H-Y-S, but you say it like a Reece’s Cup. My… friends, here… are Gabriel and Aeric.”

Again, Rhys was struck by the complete loss of control over his desires. He didn’t explain himself to anyone, much less spell and pronounce his name, but he looked into those stunning violet eyes and he was just… undone. It was as unfair as it was immutable. There simply was no help for it, which frustrated him.

“Rhys,” Echo said, testing the word. “That’s a beautiful name.”

Gabriel pulled the SUV up to the curb, and Rhys gave Echo a soft squeeze.

“Echo, I know ye doon’t know me, but I think ye know that ye can trust me. Is that not so?” he asked.

He watched her parse his words, perhaps puzzling over the more heavily-accented bits of his speech. His Scottish brogue did seem to thicken whenever he looked at her face. After a moment, she nodded.

“Yes. I don’t know why, though,” she said, catching her bottom lip between teeth.

“I’ll explain that later. Right now, I’d like you to come with me. I live very close by, with these gentlemen,” Rhys gestured to Aeric and Gabriel. “I think you’re involved in something beyond your control, and I’d like to take you somewhere safe. Our house is heavily warded.”

Echo hesitated and pulled away from him entirely, giving herself a little space to think.

“You don’t have to stay,” Rhys said, knowing his words for a lie the second they left his lips. He felt a strange burning in his gut, the knowledge of his lie singeing his lips. “But you can’t just walk around in the open, lass. That man is coming back for you, make no mistake.”

Her gaze jumped back up to meet his, making his heart race like a lovestruck lad’s. Rhys nearly groaned aloud, but he was afraid of frightening Echo away. She gave him another measuring glance, and he could sense that she felt every bit as out of control as he.

“Alright,” she said. “Just until I have a plan, okay?”

Rhys gave her a jerky nod, because he was suddenly unable to lie to her. His brain thought it, his lips tried to form the sounds, but his tongue went leaden and the words
of course
simply would not leave his mouth.

“Fucking hell,” he said, astounded.

Echo glanced up at him, startled.

“It’s nothing,” he assured her with a sigh. “Just… adjusting.”

Echo’s expression shifted to one of precise understanding. She allowed Rhys to lead her to the SUV and help her into the back seat. He went around and slid into the back seat beside her, his mouth curling into a frown when his fingers started itching with the need to touch her, to be in some kind of contact. Rhys’s glance slid to the front, where Gabriel and Aeric seemed to be doing everything in their power to look anywhere but at Rhys and Echo.

Mate bonding was much-feared among most shifters, and Rhys was an instant walking illustration of the reasons why. As Gabriel navigated back to the garage behind the Manor, Rhys was left in silence to ponder the fact that his instincts had overtaken his rationality for the time being. For the foreseeable future, at least until he was able to seal the mating bond by marking Echo, it seemed that Rhys would be ruled by his desire and concern for his mate.

Frustrated by this bizarre twist of fate, Rhys clenched his fists and forced himself to stare out the window, trying to tamp down the wildness ruling his heart. By the time they got out of the car, Rhys had better control of himself. He still nearly growled at Aeric when the other Guardian tried to open Echo’s car door, but managed to repress the sound, if not the nasty glare.

“Uh…” Echo said as they walked through the breezeway and into the gymnasium. She looked around with evident trepidation, and Rhys chuckled when he realized that Echo thought they lived in the gym.

“The house is this way,” he said, putting a hand on the small of her back and guiding her across the gym. He couldn’t miss her shiver at the contact, although he wasn’t certain of the cause. Nerves, most likely, though if his own level of arousal was any indication…

“Whoa,” Echo said as they stepped into the Manor’s backyard. Her chin tilted up as she took in the massive gray slate mansion, eyes traveling up to take in all four stories. “This is where you
live
?”

“If you’d believe it,” Rhys said. “Gabriel bought it for the Guardians.”

“Wait,” Echo said, stopping and grabbing his hand to get his attention. Even that small amount of contact thrilled Rhys, which in turn made him even angrier at himself. “You’re one of the Guardians?”

She looked him up and down, her eyes settling on his sword and guns, and she seemed to piece things together before Rhys replied.

“For the last year, yes.”

“I’ve heard of you guys, obviously, but I sort of thought you were like… an urban legend,” Echo admitted, brushing her blonde mane back from her face.

“We’re quite real,” Rhys said. His lips curled up at the corners of their own volition. Just another strange sensation in a long string of bizarre happenings — Rhys didn’t smile much, preferring to focus on his duty to the Guardians in the wake of the sudden loss of his clan.

Echo looked up at him with no little wonder, a tiny smile appearing on her lush mouth. Rhys felt his tongue move before he realized that he was licking his lips, subconsciously preparing himself to kiss her. The need to taste her was palpable, a growing tension in his muscles, a frisson of hunger low in his body.

Echo stepped back, shattering the spell.

“Uh, cool,” she said, her words coming out a little too fast. “I bet the inside’s even nicer.”

Rhys took the hint and steered her through the back door, nodding patiently as she ogled the living area and kitchen. Being from 18
^th
century Scotland meant that every house he walked into seemed relatively nice. The Manor’s high-end gadgets and posh decor didn’t impress him much more than any other place, but he vaguely understood that it was all rather lavish.

“Wow. You could fit my apartment in this room like… three times,” Echo calculated.

Rhys raised a brow, his lips twitching.

“You should see the rest of it,” he said.

Mere Marie appeared, but to Rhys’s relief Aeric managed to divert her attention, drawing her to the side for a recap of the day's events. If Rhys was lucky, Aeric would leave out the part where he’d rage-shifted into his bear and took off down the street in broad daylight. Lucky for Rhys, the shifter magic was such that his clothes were intact when he’d returned to his human form. If he’d wound up naked, the other two Guardians would never have let him live it down. When Gabriel threw Rhys an impatient glance, Rhys picked up his cue and guided Echo toward the foyer.

“How about we take that tour right now?” he suggested even as he practically pushed her out of the room and toward the stairs.

Echo let him hustle her up the stairs without any questions, for which Rhys was grateful.

“So the first floor is Aeric’s. The second is mine, the third Gabriel’s. The fourth floor belongs to Mere Marie and Duverjay, both of whom I’m certain you will meet soon enough.”

“Who are they?” Echo asked as they climbed to the second floor landing.

“Mere Marie is the boss, for lack of a better term. Duverjay is our butler, after a fashion.”

Echo nodded but didn’t comment, apparently reserving her judgments. When they left the staircase, Rhys realized that he should lay some ground rules for Echo’s stay.

“The fourth floor is off limits at all times,” he told her. After a moment’s pause, he added, “Actually, the only floor you should enter is the second. Aeric and Gabriel will not welcome your presence in their rooms.”

Whether or not that was true was debatable, but Rhys couldn’t stand the idea of Echo in another man’s bedroom, even a man as harsh and disinterested as Aeric.

“All right,”Echo said with a frown. “So… I guess that limits me to your room then?”

“Rooms, plural. And the entire first floor, of course.” Rhys cocked a brow. “That’s only about… Three thousand square feet? Plenty of room to move about.”

Echo shot him a look but didn’t respond as she followed him to the first door on the second floor landing. Rhys opened the door and waved her inside his personal living area. The left side of the room was occupied by side an antique fireplace with towering bookshelves lining the walls. A pair of leather wingback chairs sat before the fireplace, and next to them was a small side table that held a couple of leather bound volumes, several bottles of scotch, and a single rocks glass.

The library was completed by a large, heavy oak table with two stiff backed chairs. A pile of papers, pens, and books lay on the table, evidence that Rhys used the table often. The table sat before a massive picture window, making it a beautiful spot to work.

The right side of the room was divided evenly between a tidy workout area and a more technical workspace, a desk set up with a bank of computer screens and a number of high-end gadgets. The right side was divided in the middle by a door, and Rhys opened it for Echo.

He led her through to his bedroom, a brusque and simple affair featuring a fourposter bed, a massive armoire, and a brace of bedside tables. This room also had a spectacular picture window, complete with a chaise lounge so that one could sit and look out onto the bustling pedestrian traffic of Esplanade Avenue. The chaise was the only soft touch in an otherwise near barren room.

“Come through this way,” Rhys said, taking Echo by the elbow.

He guided her through another connecting door and into a lavish bathroom with both a spa tub and a fantastically large shower. It was Rhys’s favorite feature of his private rooms, especially since unending hot showers were a uniquely modern convenience that he loved.

Heading through the last adjoining door and the other side the bathroom, Rhys showed Echo into the guest room. The guest bedroom consisted of a comfortable looking queen size bed, a small wardrobe, and a bedside table. It also had a single bookshelf filled with books, none of which Rhys himself had selected; they'd simply come as part of the decor. Beside the bookshelf were a very nice overstuffed chair and a reading lamp, two more pieces that had already existed when Rhys moved in.

Echo look around with some interest, nodding her head. She looked at Rhys and gave a sort of satisfied shrug.

"It's nice," she said, her expression giving way nothing.

"Well, it sort of… came this way," Rhys admitted sheepishly. "If you can imagine, I'm not much of an interior designer."

His words made Echo smile, and the magnetic tug in Rhys’s chest drew him to her once more. Rhys’s eyes skated over her figure, from her mane of blond hair down to her generous breasts and hips, then back up to her blush-pink lips.

Just now, Rhys found resisting her nearly impossible. He wasn't sure if it was the mating bond or just chemistry, plain and simple, but when Echo looked up at him, their eyes met and Rhys couldn’t look away. Amethyst clashed with emerald. His fingers itched to touch her. His mouth suddenly felt parched as he thought of the way that she might taste, his body tensed in anticipation at the very possibility of her skin brushing up against his own.