Chapter 26
TWENTY-SIX
Rorrick
The four of us smooth our clothes, pulling on our hunting shirts as we go. It’s a rush of us trying to feel normal in a situation that is the furthest thing from it. I hate to even leave the room after everything we just shared but I can’t stop time from continuing on. I never have been able to.
And so, despite the lingering touches and heated glances, we lead her from the safety of the bedroom and out into the dimly lit castle halls.
Christian stands from where he was leaning within the shadows.
His hands are casually in his pockets like he’s out for a Sunday stroll.
He steps in without a word but I feel his rage radiating off of him.
His watchful attention appraises every inch of the emerald gown that’s fitted tightly across Crymson’s sinful body. He lingers with heavy attention on her. Before cutting to me with a narrowed, accusing look.
He knows.
I just don’t fucking care any more. If I die for caring about this girl, then all I have to say is, it’s about fucking time.
The four of us walk in silence. The only sound is Crymson’s heels clicking across the brick and the hard slamming of her heart against her delicate rib cage.
It’s a slow pace though. One none of us seems to acknowledge but all of us feel. We just fucked and now I’m marching her to her death.
My chest hurts with every step we take. It’s like my heavy, anxious thoughts hang in the air around us, pressing down with a weight that threatens to smother me out.
If only I were so lucky.
We trail through the bustling kitchen then, and the frantic nature of the room tells me the Thorn King has nearly arrived. Every move someone makes has me on edge. I hover over her from behind while Seven watches discreetly through thick, dark lashes, his gaze calculating every step the chefs make.
I don’t even know where they came from. The empty cabinets and counters Seven and I had searched earlier today, are now piled high with plates full of the one thing we would have killed for: Food .
Fresh fruitcakes and blood red cherry tarts are piled artistically onto golden plates: a strange presentation for the Thorn King that never happens otherwise.
Where the hell was this shit this morning when we needed it?
I wish it all smelled as good as they looked.
The only delectable smell filling my existence is hers.
Her pretty eyes linger on the tarts and I swipe one off the counter without a thought. Her attention flicks to me fast and the sweetest smile kisses her lips. It’s so easy to make her happy it confuses me. All it takes is a snack to please this woman?
Fuck it. I grab the whole damn plate of food and no one says a fucking word about it. Her smiles grows a bit more and I’m tempted to just lay her out right on the table and feed her snacks and be her bitch boy for the rest of my fucking life.
Sounds delightful. Sign me the fuck up.
A vampire with a broom swishes by too quickly, and I step even closer to her slender frame. She looks back at me and my protective stance once more. When our eyes meet, the softest smile tilts her cherry-red lips all over again.
The place my soul rests spasms. It startles me with a warmth that spreads all through my chest. That has—never fucking happened before. Probably just heartburn from eating too fast... Fuck, I could be dying for all I know.
Her body goes down hard then. It happens so fast. A chef with a cutting knife stumbles over her, knocking her fully to the floor in her pretty gown. His shining black shoe tears the hem of the fabric in his fucking atrocity of fumbling limbs.
“I—” His wide eyes look immediately to Christian. “I am so sorry, my prince.” He flings himself to the ground immediately.
Every muscle in my body is tense and hard. My teeth grind one by one, and all I see is this fucker’s stupidity.
And then I hear her soft voice.
“Ow,” she whispers.
My gaze slides to her fast. Seven is helping her up, but there, on the delicate length of her pinky finger... is a drop of blood.
“You fucking cut her!” The plate I’m holding shatters forgotten to the floor. On booming steps, I’m on him in less than half a second.
“I—I...” He scatters back from me, but the knife in his right hand is all I can see.
He fucking cut her! He could have killed her so easily.
My fingers wrap fully around his scrawny wrist, the edge of the knife slicing through my own skin when I twist. And then I keep on twisting.
Cracking and screams claw through the suddenly silent kitchen.
With a heave of a frustrated breath, I break it clean off.
A meager amount of blood dots the kitchen floors where he lies crying, clutching the blunt end of his wrist. I stand stiffly, tearing myself away from him.
The knife clatters to the floor at my feet.
And his right hand is crumpled in my palm.
I’m still fuming over his incompetence when I’m struck by big green eyes boring into me. It’s a strange emotion I’ve never seen in her. Not even when she was thrown to the floor at Boris’s feet.
She’s afraid. Of me.
Fuck.
I toss the cold hand to the floor. It rolls until it hits his foot.
“Clean yourself up. And watch where you’re fucking going next time.”
A smirk lines Christian’s lips.
I ignore him.
Seven’s hand is at her lower back, and he guides her away from the kitchen and into the hall.
Did I fuck that up? Was I just supposed to let that prick hurt her?
Why are my thoughts so jumbled and polarizing? One second, I’m thinking about murdering anyone who so much as brushes against her, and the next, I’m wanting to kneel down right here and now and taste what Seven got to taste earlier.
And then more dark thoughts of our king doing just that slam through my mind.
Among the bustling of the chefs, the kitchen knife is picked up from the floor and laid on the edge of the shining black countertop. My fingers curl around the cold hilt of it, and I slip it quietly into my jacket.
I’ll be seeing Boris soon. And perhaps it’s time for our king to find himself in the same position my father was in decades ago...
More fanatic thoughts lash through me until I want to scream out and bury myself between her thighs and just fucking hide there.
“Fuck,” I hiss out as I shake my head ever so slowly at my fucked-up mental breakdown I’m currently drowning in.
It takes several minutes to reach the garden doors. We travel at a slow human pace. It shouldn’t bother me, but it just gives me even more time to dwell on the fuckhole we’ve thrown ourselves in.
And Christian, he’s so far down in that fuckhole, he’s starting to decorate it like it’s our new home we’ll be living in for the rest of our fucking relentless lives.
The change in him is subtle, but I notice it. He’s too tolerant with her. He doesn’t drag her through the castle like that first night. He’s careful and thoughtful, even if his features remain impassive and vacant.
I never thought I’d see the day this fucker actually cares. But I know he’s also thinking the same thing I am: our Pretty Pet is in deadly trouble when our king sees her. Because of us.
And then the doors open.