Gleam (The Plated Prisoner 3)

Okay, now they’re kissing.

The petite, pixie-looking saddle named Gia—rolls her eyes and gets to her feet. She steps over the two women on the floor before plopping in Rosh’s lap, and then she starts to kiss him.

There’s a lot of kissing going on all of a sudden.

Polly takes one look at Gia and shoves her face away. “Go fuck someone else.”

The girl pouts but begins to pepper kisses on Rosh’s neck instead of sucking his mouth off. “Aw, come on, Polly. Let’s all join. I feel so nice right now.”

I stare wide-eyed as she starts to stroke Rosh’s groin, who tips his head back with a g

roan.

Polly’s mouth presses into a hard line, making her usual pink, plush lips go thin and white. An irritated sigh strangles through the tightly cinched gap of her lips. “I knew you bitches couldn’t handle that much dew.”

I frown. “Dew?”

Polly looks about as impressed with me as ever. “Yes, dew,” she says with an exaggerated eye roll. “You’re not that stupid, are you?” When I just continue to look at her with confusion, she sighs. “You know, painted petal, the rouged maiden, dewdrops, cherry dew...”

A snort comes from Isis, still straddling the other saddle on the floor. “Cherry dew, because one lick and it makes even the most prudish maidens want to pop their cherries.” She starts to laugh again until the girl beneath her gyrates, and then her amusement turns into a moan.

“Dew is...a drug?” I ask incredulously. Now, I’m looking at their glassy eyes and flushed faces in a different light, their lusty, languid behavior making me uneasy. “Won’t you get in trouble?”

“From whom?” Polly asks with an arch of her brow.

“The king.”

“Well, that would be strange, since he’s the one who gave it to me.”

My mind churns with a clunk. “What? Midas gave it to you?”

“Well, the mender gave it to us first. To help us cope after everything we endured with the Red Raids and the army. But Midas gave me my very own box because I pleased him,” Polly replies proudly, shooting a vindictive smile my way, though she’s still slouched against the cushions. “I pleased him immensely.”

I swallow hard. “Recently?”

It’s obvious she’s enjoying this, because her eyes sparkle and an impish smile curves her lips. “Just last night.”

There should be a dagger that goes through my heart at her words, but I’m not hurt—not like that. Or if I am, it’s an echo of past knee-jerk reactions to Midas’s sexual exploits. I always had to suppress my jealousies. He made me think I was the one who was being unreasonable, unfair. But hearing that he left my bed to visit hers doesn’t make me feel jealous right now. Instead, I’m just disgusted by him.

I was obviously very good at lying to myself, because there’s no other way I could’ve convinced myself that he loved me.

We tell ourselves twisted lies to tangle around our wicked truths, all so that we can get caught up in the bind and not have to face bare regrets.

There were too many times that Midas had been with me, just to leave and visit one of them. Or make me watch him with them, like he got some perverse pleasure from the extent of his complete control over me. I should’ve busted his balls years ago, the saddle-riding snake.

And now, he’s giving the saddles whatever this dew is to affect their behavior. The whole thing leaves a bad taste in my mouth.

“Maybe you shouldn’t be taking that…” I say cautiously.

Polly stiffens. “There you go with your superiority complex. You just can’t help yourself from thinking that you’re better than us, can you?” she challenges.

“That’s not—”

“King Fulke’s saddles have been taking it every day for years. They love the stuff. It makes everything so much more...enjoyable,” she says, leaning over to drag a finger down Rosh’s bare bicep as the man nuzzles into Gia’s neck.

My brows fall down. “Fulke’s saddles?”

Rosh lifts his head long enough to answer me. “Yep.” He looks me up and down in a lust-fogged haze, his eyes more intense from the kohl that lines them. “Those ones over there,” he says, gesturing behind me.