Chapter 16 Alexander
Alexander
Leaving Quinn to her friends was harder than I expected.
She was discovering her magic, and I wanted nothing more than to be beside her.
But I wouldn’t press or go where I wasn’t welcome.
At least I had eyes on her. My people kept me updated on her progress and with whom she interacted.
I spared a single thought for Rowan, the other man in her life, who had none of the information I did, but could freely interact with her.
I still didn’t know how to respond to Rowan’s new behavior, especially now that he was exiting his contract with the Moores.
Part of me wanted to murder him for tethering her without consent.
But I’d done the same. While I slept, he’d kept her safe.
Even now, he showed his loyalty by keeping my true identity to himself.
It was a mess I wasn’t ready to touch. My lover already weighed on my heart. I didn’t need to add people I couldn’t control.
Time marched forward.
While I wasn’t watching, she dumped her magic into the Grierson’s forge, almost breaking it.
The sheer amount of raw power confirmed every rumor about her potential.
Her first Intentions arrived at my walls and now sat in a pile in my office.
She wasn’t ready; she needed to understand the world before diving headfirst into it.
Days later, she slipped past my enforcers, disguised as a trainee. The only reason I knew she was outside my walls was our connection, and I hated how grateful I was for it.
Ezra slipped into the shadows around her before she exited The Mile and became her silent watcher. I donned the rich colors befitting the Architect and followed him with a small team of my own.
I should have guessed she’d want to see her friend fight. I should have reached out and offered to take her, but I hadn’t. I’d watched from a distance, contemplating the right and wrong of my actions.
I’d never been this indecisive in my entire life. It was destroying me.
Quinn’s emotions fluctuated while I waited outside the old train station. I honestly hoped she and her friends would leave without any issues, and my confused strike force and I would journey home.
That’s not what happened. Fear filled my bond.
Our connection made it easy to isolate her thoughts among the sea of people.
Someone named Brody rendered her unconscious, forcing me to abandon her mind.
The single-minded surface thoughts of two unknown men caught my attention.
They easily overpowered Brody before heading to a side door with my unconscious girl.
I moved my strike force around and waited. When the men emerged with Quinn limp across one shoulder, there was hell to pay.
Breaking my own rules, I invaded their minds and extracted the information I needed. Body snatchers. Slavers who prowled every pit fight, looking for anyone too drunk to defend themselves. I left them for Ezra to finish off. Their screams only added to the roar of the pit fight inside.
I pulled Quinn tight to my chest. The darkness couldn’t obscure the fake beard, which was half falling off her face. Her chest rose and fell in steady breaths. An oily olive-green paralytic kept her asleep.
My tether violated her free will, something I hated as much as I depended on. We had to walk a line. I wasn’t her keeper. She needed to live her life and make her own choices, but I also needed her to be safe.
With my officers watching, I forced myself to relax my grip, though I couldn’t put her down.
Three of my remaining team fanned out around me while the other two positioned themselves on either side of Ezra, just in case my lover lost one of his slavers before he could finish his art.
“Body snatchers,” I said, turning to Jamie Abernathy, Ezra’s and, by extension, my information officer. “May I?”
To his credit, Abernathy didn’t act on the fear behind his eyes. “You may.”
I simplified everything I’d gotten from the slavers into facts and forced the memory into my information officer, as if shoving a piece of laundry into an already overstuffed pile.
The man winced and pressed on his narrow temples. I’m sure a headache ripped into his skull, but this wasn’t his first dance. He swayed on his feet as my memories settled into his to call on when needed.
“Find the Lawson and the twins,” I commanded. “Make sure they return to my castle unharmed. Their only crimes are youth and stupidity.”
“And Brody?” Abernathy asked.
“Leave him.” Cold fury made me want to do more, but I held it in check. “If he lives, he’s never to enter my walls again.”
Abernathy nodded. I couldn’t tell if he thought my punishment was harsh or not, and I had to remind myself it didn’t matter. Right now, I wasn’t Xan; I was the Architect. To run a family, I needed people to obey me, not praise me.
“And when her friends ask about her?” Abernathy asked.
“Tell them the truth.” I didn’t smile. “They failed to protect her, and for now, she’ll remain with me.”
The final scream of the second man cut off, and Ezra returned without a drop of blood on his blacks. I didn’t have to ask what he’d done. These weren’t our first slavers. Their kin would find them right here, their shredded dicks braided like a schoolgirl’s hair.
I squeezed Quinn to my chest and double-checked our surroundings.
The Westwaters controlled the old train station.
They were a rough, unorganized bunch who fought among themselves more than the other families.
I’d brought a force through one of their gates, and they’d see me leaving with another body in my arms. I was asking for trouble, but for the last seven years, I’d kept my head down and played nice. That had to count for something.
The uphill climb to my castle left our horses gasping, and my nerves frayed. I stepped into my apartment with Quinn still in my arms. Ezra closed the door behind us, and a moment of awkward silence filled a room growing too used to tension.
“Can you wake her?” Ezra asked.
I glanced at my lover.
It wasn’t until we retrieved her TB that either of us realized someone had taken it from her.
In addition, once she had magic, the pangs in her stomach stopped.
She hadn’t had access to food. Our system wasn’t meant for this many trainees, and she’d slipped through the cracks.
Anger and guilt ate at me. No one in my castle went hungry.
Ezra and I both remembered a time when our empty stomachs constantly twisted.
Not once through everything she’d gone through had she reached out for help, from us at least.
My glance turned into an unfocused stare. My lover’s ego, his very soul, must hurt like mine, but he hadn’t said a word.
The rift between us breathed softly in my arms.
“Yes, I can wake her,” I answered my lover’s question so late I was surprised I even remembered it.
Ezra grunted, and his shoulders tensed.
I found a rag and carefully cleaned the fake beard off Quinn’s chin. I wanted the oily magic out of her, but if she woke, she would leave. Quinn was drowning. And I, surrounded by lifelines, hadn’t thrown her a single one, afraid she’d see it as a cage.
This maddening, precious woman unraveled every justification I’d ever clung to.
Tonight, I’d let her sleep, safe between Ezra and me.
Tomorrow, I’d tell her everything. She had to know who I was and what I’d done, even if it drove her away.
In the sunlight, she could storm out of my world and into the arms of her friends, who, if I knew nothing else, truly loved her, even if they made a bad call.
Rash? Thoughtful? Cautionary? I didn’t know which word fit this choice, but I pushed the oily magic out of Quinn and replaced it with my own.
Cradling her in my arms, I made sure her dreams were only good.
She smiled and tucked her head deeper into my chest. My heart cracked as the sound of the shower began.
Ezra and I had barely spoken.
And now she was here.
Our time was up.