Chapter 54 A Frank Discussion
~ brEN ~
I circled the ballroom in Hanson’s arms, sweating slightly.
He’d been utterly polite, and a gentleman.
He’d touched me nowhere but my hand and hip, as required by the dance.
And he hadn’t said anything even the least suggestive.
But I didn’t trust him. And yet, I couldn’t risk turning him away, either.
He was precisely the kind of Lord who’d be entrusted with the deeper strategies of the kingdom.
And if he liked me, I needed to use that.
“You dance very… sweetly,” he said with a small, half-smile.
I snorted. “I am very unpracticed. And you’re very good with words, Sir.”
“I told you, when we’re alone you should simply call me Hanson.”
I looked around the ballroom pointedly. “Alone?”
“No one else can overhear us, that is enough.”
“You’re very kind, my Lord,” I said pointedly.
He rolled his eyes. “Dear God, woman, stop watching your words. I’d far rather dance with a brutally honest dragon rider, than the demure debutante.”
I took a breath, then raised my eyes to meet his boldly. “In my experience, Hanson, many men would make that statement, but few would actually mean it.”
He arched one brow. “You must have a great deal of experience with men, to say so with such authority.”
My cheeks heated. I remained silent and pretended I was embarrassed rather than offended.
He sighed and shook his head. “Forgive me. It is reflex. In the jungle of high society, a cutting remark is a hunter’s sharp arrow.”
I didn’t speak, curious to see how he would react to thinking he’d offended me.
We danced two more turns before he tipped his chin down, his eyes bright and open, and met mine frankly. “Brennan, will you accept my apologies for my crass innuendo? I didn’t mean it, truly. I was a brute, and I’m sorry.”
It wasn’t the response I’d expected.
“Of c-course,” I said uncertainly.
He nodded, and when he spoke again his voice was low, but intent.
“Perhaps it will help if I offer what I ask of you?” he said.
“No games, simple truth: I find you fascinating. I want you, and I have the resources to make you a very wealthy woman—I would pay handsomely for both your pleasure and your skill. While we work together, I will be your patron in these circles,” he said tipping his head to the room around us.
“But when we mutually agree to part, you will have accumulated wealth that provides you independence, with no more need to gather further experience with any man than one you would choose for reasons of your own.”
I was stunned at his frank proposal. After the queen’s training, I’d assumed the men here would only flirt—or as Donavyn feared, if they were tested, perhaps attempt to take what they wanted.
“I am not particularly skilled—” I started, but Hanson frowned and cut me off.
“I thought we weren’t playing games,” he said in a low, dark voice.
I eyed him and raised my chin. “You want a frank conversation?”
“I do.”
“Very well… I have a powerful man at my side who protects and provides for me. He strengthens and trains me, offers me a life I could never achieve on my own, and he isn’t a brute. Why would I risk that?”
Then Hanson smiled as if he’d thrown bait and I’d finally taken it. “Because I can give you a dragon of your own,” he said.
I stiffened in his arms and almost tripped on his toes. A dragon? “Wh-what?!”
“I believe you heard me, Lady Brennan.”
“I’m not a Lady.”
“You would be by the time I was done with you,” he said, smiling smugly over my shoulder.
Something caught his gaze, and he held that small grin, his eyes locked on whatever it was, even when we turned.
“Hanson, please explain. The dragons are part of a herd, but they’re sentient. How could you possibly—”
“I must beg your forgiveness, Lord Hanson, but there is a message from the king.” The pompous voice of one of the king’s men grated.
I wanted to turn and shriek at him that he couldn’t interrupt now!
But Hanson had already pulled me to a halt right there at the edge of the dance floor, and taken a small piece of paper, flipping it open to scan it quickly, his face grim.
Then he turned to me, his jaw tight, and whatever it was that he’d seen, he didn’t like it. “Please, forgive me, Lady Brennan,” he said tightly. “I must go.”
He took my hand and lifted my fingers, kissing the air above them—while I hurriedly remembered the curtsey. But he’d already let me go and turned, marching from the room, muttering to the man who’d come for him.
Shocked, and pissed off, I instinctively started after him, weaving between the dancing couples, pretending that I’d merely lost my place and was walking from the floor. But I received several disapproving glances.
I didn’t care. I needed to continue that conversation. He liked a brutally honest woman? Well, I would show him one.
Hoping the servant would leave and I’d catch him alone in the hallway, I followed at a safe distance, but before I’d reached the end of the room and passed between the refreshment tables, a tall, heavy, tense shadow appeared at my shoulder, and a calloused hand cupped my elbow, steering me aside.
‘Are you well? Did he hurt you?’
‘No. No. He just… Donavyn it has to be a lie but—’
‘Why do you look pale? What did he say to you?’ Donavyn led me beyond the tables of refreshments, nodding to acknowledge a greeting from an older woman seated nearby, but he didn’t slow his pace, tugging me with him.
‘He propositioned me.’
‘I fucking knew it.’
‘That’s not what made me pale.’ I felt him flinch, but he gathered himself as we passed through the doors and back to the grand corridor outside the ballroom. I turned to the left. Ahead of us, Hanson walked briskly up the corridor, the servant still at his side.
I cursed. ‘I need to distract him, get him to talk. The bastard knows he just set a hook. He grinned. But we were interrupted and whatever message he got, he dropped me like a hot coal.’
Donavyn grunted, and I felt the wrestling in his chest—his pride on my behalf offended that I’d been left so unceremoniously, battling his relief that a man who’d expressed interest in me hadn’t gone any further in his proposal.
Ahead of us, Hanson turned right up one of the adjoining corridors.
‘That’s the direction of the royal wing,’ Donavyn growled in my head.
I picked up the pace, uneasy with losing sight of the man—but the moment the intersecting hallway opened before us, Donavyn cursed under his breath at the sight of the men standing guard—who’d just let Hanson pass and were now turning to look at us.
Donavyn nodded to them, but continued pushing me further down the main corridor, storming towards the end where light dimmed and there were no wandering nobles.
‘If it wasn’t the proposition, what upset you?’ he asked darkly. ‘What did he offer you? Tell me everything.’
I sighed, but followed him, craning my head back to look over my shoulder, cursing when it was clear we wouldn’t be able to follow Hanson discreetly.
I was nearly trotting next to him as we passed out of the main corridor and into one of the side halls, where most of the lanterns and sconces had been left unlit.
But there were no moving bodies. We were alone. Thank God.
‘He offered to take me on, both as a companion, and for my skill with the dragons.’
‘It’s bullshit. He’s just—’
‘He told me he can give me a dragon of my own.’
Donavyn stared at me, his face painted in shock.
I nodded. ‘That’s why I paled. What could he possibly mean?’
His eyes flicked over my shoulder, then without warning, Donavyn moved so quickly I barely registered that the dim light behind us had flickered with shadows.
He grabbed me up and whipped us both sideways, turning into a curtained alcove at the side of the corridor that housed a bust of one of the royal family, and would normally be lit with its own lantern.
But the lights had already been doused for the night, so we were draped in shadow, and obscured by the depth of the curtains swept up to each side of the opening
Donavyn pressed me against the wall and covered me with his body, and he hissed at me through the link. ‘Be very specific, Bren. What precisely did he tell you he wanted, and what did he offer you?’
I opened my mouth, but Donavyn, tense and dark eyed, clapped a hand over my mouth, as if he wasn’t certain we were alone yet.
Glaring, I spoke in the bond. ‘He said he wanted me—and that he wanted my skill. He’d pay me for both, and when he was done with me, I’d be rich enough to not need a man again.’
I immediately regretted the baldness of my words. Donavyn flinched like I’d stuck him.
‘Donavyn, I was following him because of the dragons, not—’
‘It’s not your motives I’m worried about,’ he snarled, glancing over his shoulder, but not moving to give me space yet.
And then I felt the fear in him—not the simple jealousy. But actual fear.
‘Donavyn, what’s wrong?’
He shivered and stared down at me, his eyes darkening. ‘He wants you, and he’s powerful enough to force me to step aside. The King of Fyrehold might back him if he pressed. If they wanted to make a point to Alexi.’
I went still. ‘I would never—’
‘I know—but we’ve painted you as a woman who would. Even reluctantly. This is precisely what I was worried about.’
But that wasn’t all of it, because that was too distant. Something brimmed in him.
‘You were already tense before I told you that—what happened over cards?’
His jaw rolled and his eyes flickered to the side again, checking the alcove. But there was nothing out there, no one in the hall.
‘I was faced with my own limitations,’ he graveled.
I swallowed and put a hand to his chest. ‘What limitations?’
He huffed, then dropped his chin to stare at me, his gaze black. ‘Turns out, I don’t like to share,’ he sent.
Then he descended on me.