Chapter 17
Kane
Blair’s first full day of not being locked in my bedroom has gone smooth for the most part. She ate breakfast, helped Kylie make soup, and even ate said soup for dinner with Kylie.
Now, night is upon us, and the clouds rumble with a thunderstorm that’s been threatening for the past hour.
Blair stands at the edge of the clearing with her arms folded tight across her chest. The wind lifts her hair and drops it again. The cabin light spills behind us in a soft rectangle, warm against the dark forest.
She hasn’t looked at me once since we stepped outside, but after a long moment of silence, she turns to face me. Her expression isn’t angry, but it’s not exactly neutral either.
“Why did you kidnap me?” she asks. “I want to know the truth, Kane.”
She is hanging by an emotional thread at the moment, and I know I have to choose my words carefully. I know that the truth of the situation—our reality—contradicts everything she’s ever been told. If I have to keep answering the same questions over and over to help her believe, I’ll do it.
“I have been telling you the truth. They were going to take you,” I say finally. “New York wasn’t what you thought it was.”
“How in the hell could they take me if I was going willingly?” she retorts. “I packed my own bags, for fuck’s sake.”
“No,” I say calmly. “You thought you were going willingly, but nothing can be willing, Blair, if all you’re being told are lies.
Damien Snow isn’t who you think he is. None of the elites are.
And what he invited you to is expressly forbidden by the Elite Council.
If he touched you, used you, you’d have been ineligible for the auction altogether.
And if he hadn’t? You’d have been sold to the next vampire who would have treated you the exact same. ”
The wind shifts, carrying the scent of rain.
“I was raised around the elites,” she snaps. “Pretty sure I know them better than you.”
“You only know what they wanted you to know. You only saw what they wanted you to see.”
She laughs, but it’s brittle. “Well, I know I saw you kill two men in my driveway.”
“Yeah. I did. Because their plans for you were worse,” I answer without hesitation. “They’d have used and abused you before discarding you entirely. So, I preempted. Did to them before they could do to you. And I’d do it again.”
Her breath stutters slightly at how easily I admit it. “You say that like it doesn’t matter.”
“It mattered.”
“Then why aren’t you acting like it?”
“Because if I hadn’t killed them,” I respond, “they would’ve delivered you to a man who sees you as property. He had zero good intentions, Blair. You weren’t going to come back from New York, one way or another. Your mom and dad? Your sister Bonnie? All a fading memory of the past.”
“Shut up.” A little gasp escapes her throat. “You don’t know that.”
“But I do, Blair. I’m not lying to you. But everyone else has been.”
Her composure cracks just a little. “My parents would never—”
“They raised you to believe being chosen is an honor because they probably think it is.”
“Because it is,” she retorts, but even I can feel her emotions waver over it. At this point, she’s starting to question everything—including her parents.
“Is it, though?” I ask quietly. “Is it an honor to have men pay to own you? To treat you like property or a possession? To give you no choice when you’re drawn from or your body used otherwise? Because that’s how it would be, Blair. You, at their beck and call.”
Her face goes pale. “That’s not what it is.”
“It’s an auction, Blair. It’s a fucking auction, and you were going to be sold to the highest bidder,” I tell her the truth, even though I know it’s impossibly hard for her to hear.
“You think they’re choosing wives? They’re choosing bloodlines.
It has absolutely nothing to do with love or romance or marriage.
It has to do with the power your blood will bring them and because they want to breed you. That’s all they want from you.”
Her breathing gets faster. “You’re lying.”
“I wish I were.”
“Do you even realize what you’re saying right now?” She swallows hard. “You’re basically telling me that my parents groomed me to believe a lie that ends with me being trafficked.”
“I’m not saying they were grooming you intentionally, Blair. Honestly, I don’t think they know the truth.”
The first drop of rain hits our shoulders and then another and then another. We’re both starting to get soaked, Blair’s hair is already dripping wet, but she doesn’t move.
So, I don’t move either.
“Your parents think it’s status,” I say. “They probably even think they’re providing you with a secure life, maybe accepting the dowry and squiring it away to maintain your lifestyle. But that’s not the reality.”
Her eyes shine with tears, and her bottom lip trembles.
But I have to keep going. I have to keep telling her the reality. “When was the last time any Windsor woman went to a Selection, Blair?”
“I don’t know,” she spits.
“You do know. But you don’t want to think about the reality of it.”
“Think about the reality of it?” she questions, and a deep exhale leaves her lungs. “Pretty sure my great-aunt Estelle is doing just fine in Rome. Because that’s where she ended up with her vampire elite husband.”
“So, you keep in touch with her?” I question, and she shakes her head.
“I don’t want to talk about this anymore.”
And there it is. The crack in her foundation.
We both know there’s no one in the Windsor family who has had contact with Estelle Windsor since she was bought and sold to the elite in Rome at the ripe age of twenty-two.
It’s not information I should have, but I have it.
Because I’ll do anything I can to protect Blair. Even if she hates me for it.
Though, I can imagine her family has filled her head with all kinds of fantasies about what happened to her great-aunt.
Hell, the elites have probably fed them the fucking lies.
Those bastards probably let the Windsors believe Estelle lives this rich Italian life and simply doesn’t have time to see or talk to anyone.
She’s too busy being wealthy and pampered and wonderful.
In reality, Estelle Windsor is dead. And she’s been dead for a very long time. I almost open my mouth to tell her that, but I know it would be too much. I know it would be beyond cruel.
“Blair, I’m not trying to hurt you,” I whisper. “In fact, hurting you feels akin to lighting myself on fire. It goes against everything inside me. I’m just trying to protect you. I’m just trying to keep you safe. That’s it. That’s all I’m doing.”
Tears stream down her cheeks, and silence stretches between us.
And it takes everything inside me not to go to her and wrap her up in my arms. But I know she needs a moment. She needs space. And I refuse to bulldoze over that necessity.
Eventually, as the rain picks up, she takes one slow step toward me. “W-why?” she asks, but her voice is softer now. “Why do you feel like you need to protect me?”
Because you’re mine. Because I am yours.
“You know why,” I say quietly.
Her brows pull together. “No, I don’t.”
“You can feel it.”
She just stands there, looking up at me while the rain runs down her temples and over her lashes. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Yes, you do.”
Her pulse jumps, and I move closer until there’s barely any space between us.
“When I’m near you,” I say, “your breathing changes.”
She swallows.
“When I touch you, your body relaxes. When you’re sleeping, your body seeks out mine.”
Her fingers curl at her sides.
“When I pull away, your body tries to close the distance. Blair, you don’t belong to anyone,” I say quietly. “But you belong with me.”
Her eyes flash. “You don’t get to decide who I belong with.”
“I would never decide for you.”
She steps into me then, but it’s not in anger. It’s in frustration and confusion.
And then she kisses me.
There’s no strategy in it. This isn’t a test or manipulation. This is the bond. This is her trying to understand why she’s so drawn to me. This is her not fighting against herself.
The kiss is slow and deep and not at all frantic like I’d expect. I can taste the salt of the rain on her lips, and when our tongues dance against each other, a small moan escapes her throat.
She slides her hands into my hair like she’s trying to hold on to something solid, and I wrap my arms around her waist without thought.
The world narrows. The rain fades. And an arc of electricity flows from her chest and into mine.
I feel the exact second she stops resisting altogether. Her body softens, and her mouth doesn’t hold back as she kisses me hard and deep and with every ounce of need and want and desire that flows inside her veins.
And I kiss her back. Because I can’t not kiss her back. I can’t not hold her body tight against mine. My cock grows hard as moans start to spill from her lips, and she presses her breasts against my chest.
When I finally pull back, she chases my mouth before she realizes I’ve stopped.
Her eyes open slowly.
“Why does it feel like this?” she whispers.
Because we’re fated.
Because I would burn down the world to keep you safe.
Because I belong to you just as much as you belong to me.
“Because you’re not fighting it right now,” I say instead.
She tightens her fingers in my hair. “That’s not it.”
“I know.”
She studies my face like she’s looking for proof I’m lying. “You’re telling me my whole life is a lie,” she says quietly.
“I’m telling you it might not be what you think.”
“And if you’re wrong?”
“I’m a lot of things, Blair, but I’m not wrong. Not about this.”
The rain intensifies. Her body presses closer again, and I wrap my arms around her and pull her tight against my chest.
She feels safe here with me. Not owned. Not controlled. Not trapped. Safe.
Her breath catches, and she pulls back like she’s been burned. “This isn’t real,” she says.
“It’s real, Blair.”
Her eyes narrow. “Stop looking at me like that.”
“Like what?”
“Like I’m yours.”
You are. The truth sits heavy on my tongue, but I try to hold it back. I hold it back until I can’t. “You are mine, Blair. You are mine, and I am yours.”
“You can’t know that,” she whispers.
“I do. And so do you.”
She stares at me like she’s standing at the edge of something enormous. If she accepts it, everything changes. Her entire life, everything she was raised to believe, gets flipped on its head.
The rain soaks through her shirt, and she steps back slowly.
“You don’t get to decide my destiny,” she says.
“I’m not,” I reply. “I just want you to see where she’s trying to point you clearly.”
She doesn’t respond, but with tears streaming down her face, she turns and runs back toward the cabin. There’s no anger or hatred or even fear pulsing through her veins. Just something dangerously close to recognition.
She doesn’t have the term for it—fated mates.
But her body does.
And her heart does too.