Their Hidden Princess (Zora) novel Chapter 83

**Kairos**

“Did you catch wind of that ridiculousness at the café the other morning?” one of the guys asked, breaking the dim hum of the party atmosphere.

“Naw, what went down?” came the curious reply.

“Wolfham and Blythwitch got into it. It was like watching two wild animals go at it—shifting and all.”

“Gods be damned,” another voice chimed in, clearly intrigued. “Moonraiser, you heard about this?”

Kairos rubbed his temples, feeling the weight of their words settle heavily on him. He was aware of the chaos but had no inclination to dive into the details, especially not in his current state of inebriation. He took a long, slow sip of his beer, hoping to drown out the noise.

“It’s nothing,” he muttered dismissively. “Just lads being lads.”

“Naw, mate,” Petyr interjected, shaking his head with a knowing look. “I heard it was all about Zora Smith.”

“I don’t get what’s so special about her,” Alexei, another one of Kairos’s friends, chimed in, his tone laced with disdain. “She lost to Moonraiser by slamming her head into his so hard that she passed out. Kind of pathetic if you ask me.”

Petyr let out a snort of laughter. “Doesn’t stop Wolfham and Blythwitch from drooling over her, though.”

Kairos felt a surge of irritation rise within him. He shot up from his seat, his glare piercing through the haze of the party. “I’ve had enough of this Zora Smith nonsense!” he snapped, his voice rising above the chatter. “I don’t want to hear her name. I don’t want to think about her. I don’t want to acknowledge that she even exists!”

In a fit of frustration, he hurled his empty beer can against the wall. It smashed into a crumpled mess before ricocheting off and landing somewhere in the room. Petyr and Alexei flinched at the sudden outburst, exchanging glances filled with concern as they turned back to see Kairos seething. His chest heaved, heart pounding like a war drum.

“Fucking going downstairs,” he grunted, grabbing another beer and storming off into the thrumming heart of the party on the first floor of his house.

Zora Smith had become the focal point of every conversation for the past week, and it was driving Kairos to the brink of madness. He felt trapped in a web of her name and the incessant chatter surrounding her. Between the debacle at Basics on Tuesday and the fight that had erupted yesterday, she was the hot topic on everyone’s lips, except for Kairos.

He wanted nothing to do with Zora Smith—her fiery red hair, her white wolf, or the chaos she seemed to bring wherever she went. At that moment, she was the bane of his existence. His dreams had become a twisted reflection of his waking life, filled with visions of her wrapping her jaw around his neck and shattering his leg. He’d experienced nightmares where she’d broken both of his legs, leaving him bloodied and alone in the forest while mocking laughter echoed from the trees.

Then there were the dreams that made him both thrill and dread. Dreams where she stood before him, naked and radiant, her red hair cascading like a waterfall, her lips parted in a silent plea for something he couldn’t quite grasp. In the throes of those dreams, she tossed her head back, her body moving rhythmically, and he found himself waking up, heart racing, twice that week with a raging desire he hadn’t felt since he was thirteen.

The dreams seemed to come from nowhere, and yet they haunted him relentlessly. He still thought of her as weak, still felt the urge to throttle her and make her feel insignificant. But why, in the middle of a mundane class, was he envisioning what her lips would feel like wrapped around him? And why did he even care if she was ruining her reputation by attacking the Princess?

The stupid Princess, who had tried at least ten times that week to corner him, pushing for a reinstatement of their marriage pact. Each time, he had politely declined, but maintaining that cordiality was becoming increasingly difficult.

As he descended into the party, the chaos enveloped him, and there she was again. Zora was perched on the lap of the same Alpha she had brought into his room during the last party. Her movements were provocative, her body gyrating in a way that made Kairos scoff in disdain. He downed the remainder of his beer and made his way to the kitchen in search of another.

As he walked, several female Alphas greeted him, their eyes sparkling with interest. Normally, he would have found one of them appealing enough to pursue by the end of the night. But tonight, none of them sparked any desire within him. They were all too much—too much makeup, too much perfume, too much of everything. Did no one possess any grace anymore?

He chuckled to himself, finishing off his second beer, which was actually his eighth if he was counting. Perhaps even his ninth? Who cared at this point?

Just as he reached for another beer, a hand with long, overly painted nails wrapped around his wrist. He turned to find Amara, her eyes glinting with mischief. He shut the fridge door behind him, leaning against it as he regarded her with heavily lidded eyes.

“What do you want?” he bit out, irritation lacing his tone.

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