Chapter 33
CHAPTER
THIRTY-THREE
Vesta stopped in front of the guards. “Captain Le Roy ordered Miss Warren be delivered to interrogation room three.”
One of the guards gave Cecilia a disinterested look. “We didn’t receive that order.”
“You’re not Fracture,” Vesta replied, robotic and yet somehow cutting.
There was a moment of silence. The guards shared a long look before they stepped aside. Vesta lifted her chin in what Cecilia supposed was a silent thank you and punched a complicated geometric code in the door’s locking mechanism.
A familiar hiss and thud brought her back to Sloane’s bedroom. Her heart jammed into her throat when Vesta grasped the handle and opened the door for her.
It took everything in her to stop herself from sprinting into the room. Keenly aware of the guards’ eyes on her, she moved stiffly, one foot in front of the other, toward her forever.
She didn’t hear the door slamming shut behind her, or the locks reengaging. Cecilia’s steps stuttered. She threw herself at the bloodied elf chained to the floor with a wordless cry.
Sloane’s head whipped toward her. Without his helmet, smeared with dark blue blood and a patchwork of bruises, he looked almost unrecognizable in that awful metal chair.
Except for his sad eyes that came to life the moment they caught sight of hers. Those she’d know anywhere.
“Cece,” he breathed. His pale brows bunched as a look like pain crossed his face. Chains clattered against his chair and the concrete floor with the force of his instinctive twist in her direction. “Cece?”
She nearly tripped on her own two feet in her haste to get to him. “Sloane, I’m so—”
In an instant, his expression dropped. “Cece, stop!”
She skidded to a stop a few feet away from him. His expression morphed into one of horror as he wrenched himself as far backward as he could. “Get out,” he hissed through his clenched teeth. “They took my helmet! Get out now, Cece!”
“I know,” she choked.
Sloane’s dark purple eyes looked like cut amethyst in the harsh light of the interrogation room. They were so bright that she could clearly make out the way his slit pupils expanded to swallow all that rich color.
His breathing stopped, so he didn’t say anything more. Instead, he shook his head vehemently and jerked his chin toward the door.
Please, his expression pleaded. Please go.
Her hands trembled violently by her sides. For a moment, she worried that she’d made an awful mistake. But that moment was fleeting.
Meeting his frantic gaze, she calmly informed him, “I’m not going anywhere, baby.”
She took a step. Then she took another one.
Sloane watched her like he couldn’t decide whether she was a calamity or a savior. The cords of his neck strained against his high collar, and despite the way he’d shifted as far back as he could, his shoulders curved toward her like something in him was desperate to reach her.
“It’s okay,” she soothed, coming to stand beside his chair. Her heart broke when he stared up at her with a look of defeat in that proud face.
Gently stroking an undamaged part of his cheek, she leaned down to whisper, “I chose this the minute I decided to run away with you, Sloane. And I’m choosing you again now.”
“Because you have to,” he gritted out.
Gripping his chin, she growled, “Because you’re my mate, and I’m gonna fight for you. Understood?”
Dark, glossy eyes stared up at her. Long, pale eyelashes turned spiky with tears she wondered if he’d ever been allowed to shed before. “Doe…”
She leaned down to press feather-soft kisses to his brow, cheeks, eyelids, and nose. “You chose me. I choose you.”
Cecilia didn’t think he had much room to move, but she was wrong. Or at least, she was wrong about his motivation. The sound of chains straining and metal creaking accompanied his sudden lunge upward.
She gasped, hands curling into his shoulders, as he slammed his split lips into hers. He kissed her with everything he had — lips, teeth, tongue, and soul.
Cecilia dug her nails into his dirty shirt, clinging to him as she gave as good as she got. His tongue swept past her lips. He tasted her without reservation, like it was the first and last time he’d get the chance.
It’s just the beginning, she silently promised him, one kiss at a time.
His shoulders vibrated under her hands with an almost violent purr. A bubble of laughter left her and pressed itself into him, slowing his frenzied pace down bit by bit.
“Breathe, baby,” she whispered between kisses, a grin pulling at the corners of her lips. “Breathe for me now.”
Sloane nudged her cheek with the tip of his nose. Pulling back a little, she found him looking up at her with an expression so fierce, it made her danger sense tingle. She watched closely as he took one deep breath. Then another. And another.
In a rough voice, he said, “My gloves. Take them off. Please.”
Cecilia let out a soft noise of understanding.
Kneeling quickly, she reached around the back of his chair to where his bound hands stuck out the back.
There was no chance of picking the evil-looking, super advanced lock on his cuffs, but she was able to wiggle and slide and pick at his gloves until they peeled away from the tips of his claws.
And before her eyes, the deadly tips retracted.
“It happened!” she cried, crouching low to press kisses to those strange claws.
Popping back up, she was astonished to find Sloane was smiling. A true, huge, fanged grin made his cheeks round and his eyes sparkle. He looked young. So much younger than the hardened soldier she’d only gotten to see once.
He looked happy. Truly, really happy.
“Oh,” she breathed, nose stinging. Cecilia squeezed herself between the table and the chair to plant herself on his lap. Cupping his jaw with both hands, she told him, “Yeah, you make loving you easy, Sloane. All you have to do is keep looking at me like that.”
Unable to wrap his arms around her, he seemed to settle for burying his face in her throat.
The feeling of razor-sharp fangs gently pressing into the fragile skin of her neck was a shock that made her shiver.
He held her there for several seconds, that earth-shaking purr rattling his chest against hers, before he dragged those fangs over her skin in a deadly caress.
Whispering into her pounding pulse, he asked, “How did you get in here?”
“Your family helped me. They came up with the plan, and Vesta and Arjun got me inside.”
Sloane was silent for a beat. In a strange, halting voice, he said, “My family?”
“Your family,” she murmured. “Who love you. Who aren’t gonna let you leave them or let themselves be taken from you. Who aren’t gonna make you choose. That family.”
“My family always dies,” he choked out.
Cecilia stroked his skin. It was to comfort him as much as it was to comfort herself. “Not this time, and never again. I promise.”
He nodded shakily into her neck. “Are you injured?”
She stroked the back of his neck with the tips of her fingers before taking the opportunity to explore his nearly white, cornsilk soft hair. “I’m totally fine. Might’ve busted a toe or two kicking some elves, but otherwise I’m fit as a fiddle.”
A husky laugh tickled her skin. “You kicked someone?”
“Amongst other things.”
“Why? They were rescuing you.”
She gave the tip of his pointed ear a tiny pinch. “They were beating up my man. And it was twelve on fucking one! That isn’t fair,” she argued. “Look at you! How could I just sit and do nothing when they were doing this to you?”
Sloane drew in a deep and painful-sounding breath. She was no doctor, but she did not like the sound his lungs made. “I am… very proud to be your man.”
“And I’m proud to be your consort,” she replied, hugging him as close as she dared.
Resting his head on her shoulder, he whispered, “Cece…”
Hiss. Thud. Thud.
Eyes stinging, adrenaline surging, and rage searing her veins, Cecilia leapt up from Sloane’s lap.
Teeth bared, she put herself in front of him and yanked the knife out of her pocket.
Her elf said something, some order she was too furious to hear, when she unsheathed the blade and held it with both hands before her — pointed directly at the big, green orc who made the terrible mistake of stepping into the room.
“You can’t take him,” she cried, a furious tear spiraling down her cheek.
The orc, dressed in a leather jacket and dark jeans, stopped short in the doorway. From behind him, a much smaller, golden-skinned woman poked her head out.
“Oh,” the woman huffed, “you must be Cecilia.”
Raising the knife, she barked, “My name is Cece and I’m Sloane’s consort. It’s too late. You can’t take him away from me!”
The orc put his kohl-dark hands on his lean hips. Letting out a very put-upon sigh, he said to the woman, “This is what you wanted to talk about, isn’t it?”