Weird Taste In Men

Melindana’s POV

I was in the middle of a perfectly good dream that I was not ready to leave when something pulled me out of it, a presence in the room that did not belong there, standing entirely too close to my bed for this hour of the morning.

I opened my eyes slowly and the first thing I saw was my nightmare of a husband, just as Julie told me yesterday. Luca was standing at my bedside with his arms crossed and an expression on his face that sat somewhere between concern and irritation.

On his face those two things were essentially indistinguishable from each other and from his regular resting expression so I wasn’t entirely sure which one this was supposed to be.

I sat up and pulled the sheets immediately with me. “What are you doing in here.”

“What am I doing here?” He repeated it back to me like he found the question ridiculously beneath him. “I heard you hit your head yesterday. I didn’t know it would make you go a little cuckoo though.” He used his index finger to tap the side of his head twice.

He tilted his head slightly. “You had the whole house confused last night apparently. Asking maids to get up off their knees, saying please and thank you to the kitchen staff. Julie thought you had lost your mind.”

I filed that away quietly. Apparently the woman whose body this was had a reputation for being difficult and last night I had already started cracking it without realising. I would have to be more careful.

“What do you want, Luca.” I said it flatly, pulling my robe from the bedside and shrugging it on.

He watched me for a moment and then moved closer, reaching out to touch me like I’m his wife, well technically this body was. I rolled away from his hand before it landed and put the width of the bed between us in one smooth motion.

He stopped and looked at the empty space where I had just been. Then looked at me. “I thought this is what you wanted.”

“Excuse me?”

“Don’t play confused.” He walked around the foot of the bed slowly. “If you didn’t want this, explain the lingerie and the aphrodisiacs you had put in my room last night. What exactly was that supposed to be.”

I pulled my robe straight and looked at him with the most patient expression I could arrange on this face. “I asked them to put it there because I wanted to help strengthen the relationship between you and your mate.” I said it simply, the way you explain something obvious to someone who is struggling to keep up. “She is new here. I thought it would help you both settle in.”

Luca looked at me like I had just said something in a language he didn’t speak.

“Hailey,” he said slowly, like I had said something offensive about her, “is not that kind of she-wolf you seem to think she is. She is not like you. She doesn’t need tricks and schemes to get a man’s attention and she certainly doesn’t need your help in my bedroom.” He crossed his arms again and gestured vaguely in my direction with his jaw. “Is this a new angle? Acting unbothered and generous so I start paying attention to you again? Because I want you to know right now that it will not work.”

I genuinely had nothing to say to that so I kept quiet, which seemed to irritate him more than anything I could have actually responded with.

“I am not trying to get your attention, I told him.”

“You have never once in three years not been trying to get my attention.”

“Then consider this a historic moment, I could not care less about you and your mate, Luca.” I walked back to my side of the bed and sat down on the edge of it. “Do whatever you want. As a matter of fact, since we are having this conversation, I want to file for a divorce. Give Hailey the Luna title, let her have it properly. There is no point pretending this marriage is anything at this stage.”

That landed differently than he expected. I could see it in the way he went very still for just a second before his expression rearranged itself back into that flat unbothered look he wore like a uniform.

You’re unbelievable,” he said, shaking his head. “

“Divorce??” He said the word like it was the punchline of a joke he had heard before. “You were so desperate to marry me that you cried to your father every day for a month to get this marriage.

Your father went to the Lycan King himself on your behalf, and now you want a divorce.” He looked at me steadily. “What are you scheming?”

“I am not scheming anything. I just want out.”

“Impossible.” He picked up his jacket from the chair near the door, which meant he had been in my room long enough at some point to set things down and make himself at home, which was its own category of audacity. “Get up and get dressed. There is a banquet at the palace tonight, we are expected to attend. Be ready before seven.” He paused at the door. “And whatever this new personality is, drop it before we get there. I don’t need the King thinking something is wrong with my Luna.”

He walked out without waiting for a response and banged the door loudly behind him.

I sat there for a moment looking at the empty space.

Then I lay back down flat on the bed and stared up at the ceiling and thought about what Luca had just said, about how the woman whose body I was currently occupying had cried to her father every single day for a month. Had gone to him daily, begged him, worn him down until he took it all the way to the Lycan King just to make the marriage happen.

For Luca?

That Luca, specifically. The one who had just walked out of my room having decided that my wanting a divorce was obviously some kind of manipulation tactic.

I turned my head and looked at the door he had just walked out of, then back at the ceiling.

The person who had been in this body before me must have had a very weird taste in men.