14. He’s a Gentleman #2
“Shit, Luna.” He hurriedly places the plates aside to reach for me, but I stop him with a raised hand as I breathe through it.
“I’m fine,” I lie, shifting to investigate the sprain.
My swollen ankle is as big as the massage balls we use after grueling rehearsals and bound in a makeshift wrap made of tulle, courtesy of Orion. Who would’ve guessed my kidnapper would use the same material he tied me up with to treat my sprain. How fucking thoughtful.
I grimace as I rotate one way then the other, the throb sharpening to knives between the joints. Yup. Definitely a sprain. Which blows, because even though I’ve danced on worse, any harebrained scheme to escape is shot.
“I did what I could to minimize the swelling.” Worry carves Orion’s brows, his jaw hard, and firelight sculpts his muscles into marble. “Of all the things I found here, a first aid kit wasn’t one of them.”
“Ain’t that just the way it goes,” I grumble, copying his speech pattern and looking around again. “Where is ‘here’ anyway?”
He twirls his fork, indicating the cabin. “A shine shack, if I had to guess.”
“What the hell’s a shine shack?” Parched, I grab the chipped mug of water beside him and sip.
“No, you don’t want to?—”
Fire explodes down my throat, and I cough, almost spitting it back out. He pats my back, chuckling as I catch my breath.
“A shine shack, aka a moonshine shack. Generations of bootleggers have run up and down these mountains since before Prohibition. You took the moonshine better than I thought you would.”
“Moonshine, huh?” I rasp. “Benoit and I would’ve both lost our liquor poker faces. What do they make that stuff with? It’s worse than the knockoff Hurricanes on Bourbon Street.”
He nods to a green chalkboard that says Po’s Revenge??? in chicken-scratch chalk writing, a mix of crossed-out recipes and ingredients underneath, like that’s supposed to mean something to me.
“I failed Chemistry 101,” I deadpan.
He snorts. “No, you didn’t.”
“It’s so creepy that you know that.” I groan, then smack my tongue against the roof of my mouth. “It tastes like corn and copper pennies had a three way with”—I cough again—“rubbing alcohol.”
“Yeahhh, I suspect there’s no first aid kit because they were banking on this ‘cure-all.’ Drink at your own risk.”
He sips the mug, sucking in a satisfied breath through his teeth as he places it beside him again.
Show-off.
Challenge makes my lips purse, and I snatch the mug. This time when I drink, I hold his smirking gaze through squinting eyes. The taste is awful, but the warmth filling my veins isn’t unpleasant.
When I set the cup down again, my body shivers like a cold chill came over it, but my ankle doesn’t hurt at the movement. I frown, twist it gingerly, and shrug.
“Huh, gotta hand it to them. It does feel better.” I tilt my head, testing how far I can point my toes. “I barely feel anything at all, actually.”
“Annnd that’s when you stop.” He snorts and slides the mug behind him. Then he hands me a blue glass bottle.
“Try this instead.”
I sip warily, but it’s pure, delicious water.
“Jesus, that’s refreshing.”
He laughs again, scooping more fish from the tin foil to set it on my plate.
“That’s spring water for you. Water ’round here’s ’bout as fresh as it gets, but I boiled it and strained it just in case.” He places my plate in front of me. “Here you go. Got the fish out for you.”
“Oh, um, thanks,” I mumble, my cheeks heating at his kindness.
His grunt must be his version of “you’re welcome,” and we settle into a comfortable silence. Forks lightly scrape ceramic, the fire crackles, and the storm rumbles overhead. The ambience allows my mind to drift, and with Orion so intent on his meal, I inspect my kidnapper.
The last time I saw Orion Fury, I was sixteen.
I’d walked into my parents’ study to find Momma staring in horror at the TV with Dad beside her trying to comfort her in French.
The documentary was titled Wildes and Furys: The Appalachian Capulets and Montagues.
The headline was dramatic, but Momma’s teary voice stopped any joke I might’ve made.
“The Wildes did this to them? How… oh my God, how awful. The oldest is hardly a year older than our babies.”
The exposé on the Wilde-Fury feud focused on the “King” branch, complete with their crimes and mugshots, then scanned a graveyard burned to a crisp with blackened headstones.
The program skipped to a blurry panning shot, taken by a nosy photographer, and paused on the three King Fury boys leaving a hospital.
Two looked like mirror images, flanking a younger one with black hair streaked white at the front. He walked stiffly, like he had steel for a spine, and the boys helped him, one with hands wrapped in bandages. Two wore sunglasses, but I could still see the rage and anguish filling their faces.
The tallest scowled at the camera, jaw clenched even in the blur, a threat in his eyes. If the photographer got any closer, the boy would’ve no doubt murdered him where he stood. The hate in his expression was way too much for someone his age and left me shuddering.
It was like he was glaring straight at me, and I’d stared back like I knew him. Because… I did.
The fever dream from the Troisgarde family meeting when I was twelve flitted through my brain. My parents never talked about it, I certainly couldn’t admit I’d eavesdropped, and the Furys never returned to New Orleans. So I forgot, wiping it from memory like only children can.
But with the boy staring back at me through the screen, I remembered the curiosity and determination in those eyes as he flicked his knife open and closed, open and closed, before leading his mother out of the auditorium, protecting her.
“That’s him, isn’t it? Orion?” Momma whispered, pointing to the hate-filled boy. She shook her head. “It can’t happen, Sol. They can’t take her into that life. Use her as leverage. She can’t be their hostage.”
“They’ll take her over my dead body, ma muse . You can count on that.”
Finally understanding, I gasped. They turned, both their eyes wide, and Momma broke down.
They confirmed the pact was no fever dream, but Dad assured me it wasn’t something to worry about.
Even though the Wildes and Furys were dangers to themselves, no one could touch me in New Orleans.
He was the most dangerous man in the South, the Phantom of the French Quarter, dead set on protecting his princess.
I believed him. My father could do no wrong in my eyes.
And yet, here I am now. Alone in the stormy wilderness with the very man I was told wasn’t a threat.
But as I eat the food Orion cooked for me, drink the water he gathered for me, and wear the shirt he used to cover me, I can’t help but wonder if he’s a threat at all.
Don’t let him fool you. He kidnapped you, for God’s sake.
I blink away from him, and a flash of silver under a net near the stove catches my gaze.
My eyes flick to Orion, who’s still focused on eating every last tender piece of fish.
I slowly, casually , stretch my arms down my legs to hold my healthy ankle with one hand and sneak my other under the net, inching toward the knife handle?—
It’s snatched away from me, and my body snaps up like a rubber band. “Hey!”
He smirks, effortlessly rolling the knife between his fingers. “You thought I’d let you steal my knife right under my nose?” He tsks. “Come on, you’re smarter than that.”
I grumble, “A girl’s gotta try. I’m Sol Bordeaux’s daughter. If you think I’m gonna skip down the aisle over a little fish and some water, you’ve got another think coming.”
“Good.” His lips quirk. “I love your willful side.”
Wings flutter in my belly, and I use that willfulness to squash them.
“You won’t love it when my dad finds me.
He’s going to kill you. If not him, then my brother will.
” I smile gleefully. “If not him , then my friends. Hell, my momma might even get in on the action. There’s no way I’m marrying you, so whatever your plan is, call it off.
Take me back to my dad now and maybe I can convince him to make it painless. ”
He nods thoughtfully, unfazed, as he points at me with the knife handle, the blade in his palm like it’s no big deal.
“See, that right there? That’s exactly why my father arranged this marriage. Our families need one another to defeat the Wildes and the fucked-up branches of the Fury family tree once and for all.”
My breath stalls in my lungs. Why his family needs me.
I’m leverage, like Momma said. Everything he’s doing is to force me to be their hostage so my father will fight by their side.
My chest aches at the thought, but I harness the reality. It’s easier to remember he’s the enemy and why I’m here in the first place.
I shake my head. “My mom told me the Wildes and Furys have feuded for generations. Why now? Why are the ‘Troisgarde daughters’ so special?” I ask, putting air quotes on the ridiculous name other families and societies call Brylie, Lucy, and me.
His lips thin as he sets the knife behind him and continues eating, answering between bites.
“Things have escalated again. It’s been quiet for six years, but a Fury murdered a Wilde mother unprovoked.
The victim’s son killed her murderer, rightfully so.
It should’ve ended there. The Wildes had exiled the boy’s family years ago for other reasons, but we’re all the same when it comes to grudges.
The Fury he killed belonged to a northern branch that’s got their hands in every government pot they can.
The rest of us wouldn’t take a dirty cop’s hand if it was saving us, but they slip cash inside instead.
Even though the Wildes didn’t claim the boy, they still got all up in arms when he got sentenced to life.
That’s when the feud sparked up worse than ever. ”
“Jesus. No wonder they’re after you.”