Chapter 22 #2
I was trying to pull up any scrap of information I might know about this man. I wasn’t in the same circles as Ace had been, but some did cross, yet I pulled up nothing from memory.
Roman was an Alpha. Now we were in the room I could properly catch his scent of elderberries. It had been lingering about these halls, though faint enough I hadn’t been able to name it until now.
“Disappointing?” Roman asked, still trying to keep the quiver from his voice. His hand was still on the gun, but he hadn’t drawn it. Again, his eyes slid nervously to the hallway, but there was no further movement from his security.
Of course there wasn’t.
And he knew, just like we did, that he was alone if he couldn’t convince this room that he was in charge.
Ace looked around, from him, to us, to the hallways, not speaking a word as he let the chips settle. There was a delighted smile edging onto his lips as he waited.
I felt the faintest chill down my spine, and I wondered if Rogue felt it, too. There was something masterful about the way Ace moved through this world. Something… absolute. I’d felt it as I’d been dragged by his guards into the ballroom the day he’d swapped mine and Rogue’s roles.
He’d been lounging on an armchair in another man’s home as if it were his. He had spun a new reality where in the blink of an eye, my fate, my life, was at his whim instead of Rogue’s.
Rogue hadn’t cowered like Roman was now, and still, I’d believed it. I’d felt it. I’d known, without the first shadow of a doubt that just like that, my fate was his.
I knew what Roman was feeling, and I was sure Rogue did, too.
The difference between me and Roman, though, was on that day, I had welcomed finality. I frowned, prodding at that feeling again. And as I did, I realised it wasn’t the only time I’d felt it.
It had been the first of two.
The second had been the moment I’d stepped from Thistle’s room after I’d won the bidding war for her. Even then, when I’d known her for the briefest flash of time, my centre of gravity had shifted.
I’d felt it when I’d left her, as if doing so was wrong. As if she’d already begun to tighten her grip upon my soul.
I needed to stop comparing the two of them, but it was all but impossible.
“How was the interest?” Ace asked, dropping onto the couch Roman had just vacated. It looked all the more arrogant because he was still in socks.
Roman took one look around at me and Rogue, at the shadows in the hall who hadn’t made a move, and dropped down to his knees before Ace.
“Please—I’ll give it all back, I had no idea you were still?—”
“How was the interest in the place?” Ace asked again, cocking his head, voice cold.
“There was a lot,” Roman stammered.
Ace was looking about the room absently, then glanced back at Roman, his eyes narrowing on his waist. Roman fumbled to grab his gun from his belt, and then, to my utter shock, shoved it into Ace’s hand.
“That,” Rogue muttered to me, “is one hell of a reputation.”
Ace peered at the gun curiously, then tossed it onto the couch beside him, not even out of Roman’s reach.
“Who wanted it?” he asked.
“Everyone, of course,” Roman blurted. “Juno. Beckett. Morrigan—she wanted it for the tunnels beneath, I don’t think it was personal. Elias Duvant, I think he was already planning the remodel?—”
“A remodel ?” Ace asked, expression hardening.
“After… after what you did to his castle in Marseille.”
Ace rolled his eyes. “So… what do you think? You’ve been to a good few of my parties, haven’t you? You were there when I discovered Jorden Ryland was embezzling, or Aaron Richards tried to put his hands on my security…”
Roman blanched further with each mention.
“What happened?” Ace tapped the sceptre against his temple. “Help me remember?”
“You… killed Richards on the spot.”
“I did, didn’t I? What about Ryland? That was fun.” He looked at us now, as if bragging. “Peeled his skin off and fed it to him.” Ace chuckled. “He threw up what… two or three times before he finally kicked it from blood loss.”
“Five…” Roman looked ready to pass out.
“Yeh… That was it.” Ace’s smile widened like the fond memory was returning. He glanced over to us again. “If I were a betting man, I’d guess… not your thing, Rogue?”
Rogue relaxed, eyes sweeping between them, holstering his gun and folding his arms. “Sounds foul.”
Ace’s eyes drifted to me.
I shrugged.
I’d do it.
I’d done worse on trips to visit trafficking members when I could get away with it. Ace was right, though. I’d taken Rogue sometimes to help him get the rage out of his system, but there was always a point where he’d make his way outside for a smoke.
When it was just me and them…
My only issue was that I didn’t know if Roman Vane was the kind of Alpha who truly deserved it.
Still, he wasn’t a fucking cherub, that much was clear, and I was interested enough in what we were watching that I wouldn’t interfere.
Ace looked back down at Roman. “How strong is your stomach, do you think?”
“Please…” Roman begged. “I preserved everything. Kept it the way you’d like it. The others would have wrecked the place—you know that.”
Ace was grinning, his eyes flashing dangerously, and I was watching the way he turned the sceptre in his hand. It was impossible, with Ace, not to be acutely aware that the clawed end of it was inches from Roman’s eyes.
“Run, little weasel…” Ace’s voice was quiet enough I barely caught it.
There was silence for a moment, then Roman choked out an indistinguishable word, looking from Ace to us. I still had my gun trained on him.
“Wh-what?” he finally managed.
Ace’s sceptre brushed beneath his chin. “You have one minute.”
“What?”
“Run.”
“I…” Roman staggered to his feet, looking between us, clearly unsure if this was a trick.
“Fifty-nine… fifty-eight… fifty-seven?—”
Roman didn’t need another push. He launched toward the far hallway, where Ace’s old guards were waiting for a verdict, vanishing from sight and left us with nothing but the distant sound of rapid footfalls on marble.
Ace picked up the gun on the couch at last, then strolled toward a balcony window.
I hated that I was curious.
Curious enough to follow him to find out what, exactly, he was doing. He waited, and as he did, two security guards edged around the corner, peering into the room, looking as if they weren’t sure exactly how to proceed.
At my side, Ace perked up.
Ah.
From our vantage we could see Roman fleeing down the driveway, so terrified he tripped on his own feet part way down.
Ace hummed to himself quietly, aiming the gun and then, when Roman rocketed into the closed gate, he pulled the trigger, not aiming in any particular direction.
It didn’t hit Roman, and I don’t think it was meant to, but the Alpha’s squeal pierced my ears from here.
Roman gave up trying to find the gate’s latch and threw himself at the bars. Driven by pure terror he managed to fling himself over the thick barbs at the top without any hesitation.
Oof…
“I take it you don’t like that guy,” Rogue said.
Ace turned back to us, disgust in his eyes. “He thought this place was his,” he said, like that explained everything. “Anyone else here?” Ace asked the guards, as me and Rogue tucked our guns away.
“No, Sir. He was a loner. Didn’t even have many visitors.”
Ace nodded. “Alright. Strouse,” he said, talking to the taller of the two guards with greying hair, and a neatly trimmed beard. “I want half your men in a new location.”
“We have enough security,” I growled.
“For you, maybe, Knox.” Ace gave me a smug smile. “Not for me. And certainly not for her.”
I scowled. “They can stay on the perimeter only.”
They were clearly loyal to him, which boded well for Thistle, but I was barely confident Ace had provisioned for her safety, let alone me and Rogue. I wasn’t giving him more control. That said, if I didn’t take his performance today seriously I would be a fool.
Conquered by Thistle or not, he was still a dangerous Alpha. So I’d give him that, and make sure my security knew to keep an eye.
“Why did you let him go?” Rogue asked, looking back at Ace.
“It was necessary.”
I frowned. “Necessary?”
“Yes,” Ace said. “There’s a party coming up, isn’t there? Best that the rumour gets out.”
“A party?” Rogue asked.
“In the Ring.”
I froze. “So what if there is?”
“Oh. Yeh. That’s the plan.”
“What?” I demanded.
Those were the people we were trying to avoid .
“Hope you have nicer clothes than that, Knox,” Ace said, patting my chest as he strolled by me. “I’m going, and you’re my special guest, so you’d better look your best.”