Chapter 22 #7
Her voice is a sultry threat, perfectly crafted with barbs designed to dig into the softest flesh until they’re impossible to fully dig out. “I, for one, am very happy to see you two together. North has done too much for our people to be left behind by an unruly child.”
What happens next can only be described as glorious.
Eliza stares my Bond down with every inch of scathing contempt her pathetic frame can muster, but Oleander doesn’t falter for a second.
My Bond doesn’t just hold that venomous gaze, she returns it with her own filled with unrelenting rage and violence just waiting to be unleashed.
I’ve grown accustomed to being on the receiving end of her ire, but this is something else entirely.
I’m practically giddy as I watch her all but devour this pathetic, weak woman.
Eliza walked in here expecting a teenage girl and has instead been burned by my irreverently indignant Bond.
It’s enough to have me chuckling, warmth flooding my chest cavity as my bond revels in her defiant acts, and I move our clasped hands to rest on my thigh instinctively.
Eliza glances down at the gesture, but there’s nothing calculated about my Bond’s hand in mine, and her gaze feels like a violation.
I don’t even attempt to rein in the pulse of warning my bond lets out, the shadows writhing in my blood until the entire table is faltering under its dark threat.
Only my Bond is unaffected
Eliza jolts as the brunt of it hits her, the blood draining from her face as she shies away from us both.
It’s this reaction that catches my Bond’s attention, but it’s not with fear or curiosity. She falters for a moment, an emotion flashing over her face too quickly for me to decipher before she recovers with a smile that’s only a little bit forced.
Her voice is harder than it was before, a sharpened edge now revealed. “I’m aware of just how great my Bond is, thank you."
There’s an exchange of hasty and incredulous looks across the table at her lack of concern. When my Bond only smiles warmly at the server, I can see them all shift their concerns to mark this down as a slip. A small infraction after a perceived threat.
In short, they’re all fucking idiots.
There’s almost a decade between my Bond and I, but there’s at least two separating her from the next youngest council member.
If they can’t see her efforts tonight for what they are, or the inhuman strength it’s taking to stop myself from killing them all on her behalf, then the situation is worse than I first thought.
The moment the intensity of their scrutiny moves away from us both, the change in my Bond is abrupt, instant, and chilling.
Without uttering a word, moving a muscle, or even looking my way, she ices me out.
It’s as tangible as a bucket of ice poured over my head and as jarring.
I have no clue what I’ve done wrong or if something has happened to her under my nose, but there’s no denying something has changed in the blink of an eye.
Gently squeezing her fingers, an offering of reassurance for her and a comfort to myself, but she pulls away from me.
Her hand flips over so the back rests against my knee for another brief moment, only long enough that Vittorio won’t be tipped off to the change, but then she moves it back to her own lap and away from me.
The loss of her touch hits me like a physical blow, only instead of anger or frustration, a lump lodges itself into the back of my throat.
What the hell is going on with me tonight?
Is it that carefree and affectionate smile that rearranged my heart in my chest the moment I first saw it on her face, blushing and giggling with her friends?
Or was it Vivian’s impression of her, the way his voice had gotten gravelly as he gave me his suspicions of what her true motives for running from her Bond Group?
Maybe it’s the fact that she’s handled every part of tonight with a maturity and grace that can’t be denied.
She’s bitten her tongue and endured the petty jabs that have come from snakes and allies alike, and danced around the ugly truths like the most seasoned politician.
With subtle touches, soft murmurs, and longing gazes through her lashes, I’ve watched her rewrite the story of our Bond Group from a dangerously volatile warning into a charming tale.
She’s breathed life into the image I’ve been piecing together at a painstakingly slow pace, the colors now vivid and impenetrable enough that our standing within the community won’t just be restored but taken to new heights.
Then she pulled away from me for no apparent reason.
I wait until Eliza’s eyes cut away from us both as she picks up her menu before I look over at my Bond.
I’m not sure what I was expecting, but the mask held carefully over her own features sends a shot of ice through my own blood.
In the darkest recesses of my mind, I can’t hide my suspicions that this sudden urge to possess every inch of her and bind her to me no matter what it takes is really just a trauma response to that pit of bones and the dark glee of my bond at the sight of it.
The way that, in that moment, there was no hiding the fact that there’s a monster inside of me that saw indescribable death and felt elated.
Maybe I can no longer find it within myself to punish my Bond for the crime of leaving me when everything that’s ever been snarled, spat, and whispered about me is actually true?
Maybe the villain really is me, and facing that truth means giving her up, so, selfishly, I’m now desperate not to.
With my bond still resting peacefully in my chest, I push that shameful realization aside to figure out exactly what happened for my Bond to pull away from me.
Whether or not she should do so is something to agonize over later, preferably with a bottomless glass of single malt in my hand and a locked door between me and the world.
The restaurant is noisy, but in that refined way of old money, where no one is speaking loudly or intoxicated and there’s a Julliard-trained pianist playing in the corner and dozens of tables dining on thousand-dollar plates.
Conflict and abductions feel a lifetime away from the genteel patrons, as though it’s something discussed and analyzed but not a part of their real lives.
Our table of council members and Bonds are all conversing happily, gossiping and wheedling and cutting remarks disguised with silk bows, totally unaware of the monumental shift within my Bond.
But I’m not.
That mask of ice is calm and beautiful and utterly enraged by something. There are Neuros at the table, but none strong enough to get into her mind, certainly not without my bond noticing and taking control to deal with them.
There’s nothing.
There’s also no way to question her about it, so instead, I do whatever I can to make the rest of the night tolerable for us both.
The desire to provide for her, to cater to her every whim and desire, is so deeply ingrained in me that it’s almost impossible to shake.
It’s also amusing to watch how indignant she gets when I fill her plate, all while my bond gloats at the act.
I realize it’s my own line in the sand. When Gryphon claimed that using his Gift against her would compromise his values, I wanted to strangle him, but only because it meant there were parts of her that he could claim that I couldn’t, and it grated on me.
Now, watching her smile at the snakes that surround us as she plays the manipulation game on the side of our Bond Group for once, I know exactly what Gryphon meant.
I never wanted to be the type of Bond who disrespected his Central Bond—I honestly never thought it was even a possibility.
Yet here I am, without a single positive interaction with the Gifted I’m bound to.
Even the instances that I’ve defended her, helped her, manipulated every circumstance around us both for her benefit, still she’s practically snarled back at me.
Feeding her is my line in the sand.
It might dig under her skin, but at the very core of our practices as Gifted, it’s an act of deep respect that I won’t allow myself, or any other, to eat before her—that my very last scrap of life itself would be placed willingly in her hands, regardless of any other.
Whether she likes it or not.
Whether our acting is that good, or the trauma of my warnings are still fresh, I can’t say, but the entire table seems well aware of my expectations. While my bond seethed under my skin until the salmon en papillote was placed in front of her, none of the table dared to lift a fork until she did.
The rest of the meal passes the same—the council all tiptoeing around my Bond as she plays her role perfectly, though with far less input than before, while I spend the entire night in a verbal sparring match with Sharpe and Vittorio to stop them from pulling her back into the conversation.
I’m also baiting them both, making sure they walk themselves into our trap so this entire circus wasn’t for nothing.
When the night is finally over and we walk out of the restaurant together with her arm tucked in mine, there is a slight pause as I deviate from their expectations again by foregoing the cheek-kissing goodbyes to the women and the handshakes to the men.
Exactly one councilman attempts to step closer to us both only for Eversong to blanch and hastily step back at my dark look of warning.
The dress is stunning on her, and I never want them to see her in it again.
Rafe opens the car door for us both, and as I tuck my Bond into the backseat before me, I lock eyes with Vittorio one last time across the valet line. His eyes are white as he calls on his Gift, but the furrow in his brow has a smirk stretching across my lips as my own eyes void out.
He can’t get into my head.
Apparently my Bond’s mind is also a fortified haven, a curious but very welcome discovery for me. Even if his son leads their entire family to their demise tonight, there are others with the same abilities, and knowing she’s safe from them is a great relief.
I’m distracted by these thoughts as I slide into the car beside my Bond, then by the onslaught of messages from Gryphon, Nox, Gabe, and the rest of the TacTeams in place as Vittorio sends a car after us.
Rafe doesn’t miss a beat, driving through the traffic with ease as though it’s business as usual for him.
“I suppose you won’t stop in at the drugstore for a minute so I can run in, will you?”
My Bond’s petulant tone throws me off. It’s clear she hasn’t noticed we’re being tailed right now, but the wall she threw up between us is still holding firm. She won’t even look in my direction, her arms crossed over her chest and her mouth a sullen line.
My response is short and colder than I intend. “We’re not stopping. Tell me what you need, and I’ll have it delivered to your dorm room.”
She huffs and rolls her eyes, the refined and compliant act she was putting on clearly over with. “Why not? I’ll be quick, and with your stupid tracker, it’s not like I can run away.”
My jaw clenches at the confirmation that it’s the only thing stopping her from fleeing, irritation crawling down my spine until I have to physically stop myself from clawing at my skin to dig it out. “We’re not stopping. I already provide for you, why are you being difficult about it now?”
Her cheeks immediately heat as she hisses back to me, “I never asked for your fucking money!”
For some ridiculous reason, the image of her flushed face and wide grin flashes in my mind; the soft and affectionate expression on her face that made me weak at the knees, all while driving a knife directly into my heart because it was directed at someone else.
There’s nothing to be proud about putting the color in her cheeks now, not when misery and shame radiates out of her.
Arms crossed as she turns her entire body away from me, she murmurs under her breath about finding a job and being free of my controlling, asshole ways, but my focus stays on the car behind us. Our lives both depend on it, so it shouldn’t be as difficult as it’s becoming.
She doesn’t like me, she certainly hasn’t hesitated in making that clear, but the act she put on at that restaurant, even as briefly as she’d played along, now feels like the cruelest thing she could ever do to me because every inch of my soul wants more.
As angry as I am, as hurt, as much as my pride is torn to pieces by it all, I’m a Bond and she’s my Central Bond.
There’s no changing the fact that Oleander Fallows is the missing piece of my soul who I’ll long for until my last breath.