Auctioned to the Cruel King - Chapter 64: Chapter 64

Lance’s POV
She was still asleep when I opened my eyes.
Her body was warm against mine, her breath steady and slow, fanning across my chest, soft even, her lashes casting faint shadows over her cheeks. One of her legs was tangled with mine, and the scent of her skin still clung to me.
I stared at the ceiling for a moment.
Slowly, carefully, I slid my arm out from beneath her and sat up. She shifted but didn’t stir. I took a moment, too long, probably, to watch her. Not just her body, but her. The way her lips parted slightly in sleep. The tiny blemish at her temple I hadn’t noticed before.
I dressed without a word, pulling on the black shirt I’d discarded the night before, then slid my arms into my coat.
I opened the door.
And Vivian was standing there.
Arms crossed, lips curved—but it wasn’t a smile. Vivian’s smiles were never just smiles. Alaric stood beside her, stiff-backed, a hand tucked into his coat pocket, looking like he’d been dragged here against his will and regretted every second of it.
Vivian’s voice, as always, broke the silence first.
“Well,” she drawled, “what a fun night you had, am I right?” Her voice dripped with delight. “Nothing like good old-fashioned, soul-rattling sex to take the edge off after a battle.”
I stared at her. “Why are you both standing here?”
Ric cleared his throat, trying to look anywhere but at me.
“I was—”
Vivian cut him off. “Waiting for you, of course. What else would make me waste my beauty sleep outside this door?” She tilted her head toward Alaric. “But in the eternal minutes you took to roll out of bed, we had time to catch up.”
She leaned her hand against Alaric’s shoulder.
He stiffened. I saw it in the way his jaw clenched. He had never approved of Vivian. Probably never would.
I looked between them. “I really don’t want to know what that means.”
Vivian rolled her eyes dramatically as we started down the hall together.
“So,” she said airily, “did you ask her?”
I frowned. “Ask her what?”
She scoffed, disappointed. “You’re really going to make me say it?”
I kept walking. “I understand your suspicion,” I muttered, “but if we give her space… if we wait, she might open up on her own.”
Vivian snorted. “So all your doubts have vanished? Just like that? One overnight fuck and suddenly she’s a clean slate?”
Her crude words hit me wrong.
I stopped walking and turned my head slowly, my voice flat. “You know, for a second, I almost mistook you for someone decent when you called it sex. But that illusion’s already gone.” She raised her eyebrows but didn't back down. “And let’s not forget—it was you who planted that seed of doubt in the first place.”
I shifted my gaze to Alaric. “You were with her most of yesterday. What do you think?”
Alaric gave a slow, reluctant nod. “My king—”
I cut him off. “No. Enough with the titles,” I said a bit tired of hearing him be all that. “We’ve all known each other since we were toddlers pissing in corners.”
Vivian grinned. “Finally. He gets off his marble throne.”
We resumed walking.
“We’re friends,” I continued, “and you’ve both made it painfully clear that no matter what I become, I’ll always be that old Lance from the back of the barracks to you. So drop the formalities.”
I looked at Alaric again. “Well? What do you think?"
He was quiet for a moment. "We didn't talk much yesterday. But yes, I think she's holding something back. Conflicted about something, maybe.”
“See?” Vivian pounced on that like a hound with blood on the wind. “He agrees. And the only reason I’m even pressing this is because you’re our Alpha, and…”
She paused.
“…because I actually think she’s good for you.”
That made me stop walking again. I stared at her now. “You? Saying that?”
She and Kayla had never gotten along. Not truly. Vivian wasn’t the trusting type. She liked to pull wings off flies and watch how long they crawled before dying. She didn’t give praise. Not to forget, she hates to share, and the only reason she didn't straight up kill Kayla was not to fall on my wrong side.
Vivian raised a brow and turned to Alaric. “You didn’t tell him?”
“Tell me what?” I asked.
Alaric sighed. Deep. Weighted.
“That night—during the full moon. In the Den. She never told you how she found you down there, did she?”
“No.” The word came out flat.
We’d stopped walking entirely. The golden railings of the stairwell glinted in the morning light as it filtered through the arched windows. Alaric rested a hand on the banister.
“It wasn’t random,” he said. “It felt…more like a desire call from you than just senseless growling and howling."
My brows pulled together.
"What? You asked that I be frank and drop the honorifics,” he said, unapologetic. “So I will. I first tried to talk her out of wanting to see you, tried to make her see the danger…fear it even. But when she came down there herself, seeing the look in her eyes. We let her enter. Oddly, you’d stopped growling then…”
"What do you mean 'we'?"
“Me of course…” Vivian nodded, utterly unashamed. “Have I ever missed one of your shifts? Really?”
Alaric continued, voice even. “At first, it was quiet. You weren’t hurting her. You weren’t even touching her. It almost looked like she was speaking to something inside you. Like she wasn’t afraid of the wolf. Like she knew it.”
A tightness pulled across my chest. I said nothing.
“But then something changed. Something spooked you—or it. You snapped. You lunged. Well, you already heard how the rest went.”
I did know the rest.
But what I hadn't known was that she'd been able to calm the beast, even temporarily.
"And you waited this long to tell me? How long has it been now? Two weeks?"
“Don't blame him,” Vivian said. “You were preoccupied because I was still kind of hating on you, and you were being your gloomy, pathetic self."
I leveled a look at her. “I’ll pretend I didn’t hear that.”
I turned back to Alaric. “And when did this start?” I gestured vaguely between them. “You two. The strange looks. The freakishly domestic tension.”
Alaric looked personally offended that I’d thought something was happening. “What are you talking about?”
“Fuck. Never mind.”
I started walking, jaw locked. Their voices followed. If what they were saying was true… If she’d sought me out, not out of fear or chance but by the bond—
“So,” Vivian said, “what now?”
I didn’t stop. “We let the marble roll. Wherever it lands, we’ll know who’s leading it.”
Vivian’s tone was amused. “Poetic.”
“And you, Ric?” I asked, without turning. “What’s your take?”
“I say ask her,” he replied. “But I also think Vivian’s plan has merit. It’ll bring the truth to light, one way or another.”
I stopped at the turn in the hall. “What’s her schedule for today?”
“I’ll check in with Moira,” Alaric replied.
I gave a single nod. “Do it. And Viv…”
“Yes, oh terrifying one?”
“You know what to do.”
She gave a mock bow. “Don’t I always?”