Page 86 of Lies That Blemish
‘Don’t worry, we are.’
Maxim snapped his fingers and then his wolf was there. I’d forgotten about the creature since he rarely had them around, not like others who stuck close to their bonded. “Walk this perimeter all night long and warn me if you suspect anything,” he told the wolf, and it took off.
He peered up into the sky at his firebird and obviously gave her some instructions because she flew off as well.
“They think they are going to take you from me?” he asked me. “Your people are my people now.Youare mine now,” he growled.
I thought he might call a strategy meeting with all of his leaders. That’s what I would do, but no, he rushed us inside the house while the guests left the “wedding” and then he locked all the doors and told the staff to not allow anyone in. He wasn’t a leader. His generals were leading without his direct command. He was a coward. A boyplayingat being a leader.
We ate dinner together in absolute silence as I watched his nervous tics play out. Eyes darting from the window to the door. Pursing lips. Picking nails.
When someone finally knocked, he actually jumped up, and I laughed. Suddenly, my hand grasped the steak knife beside me unbidden, and I held it to my own throat. Maxim held my gaze.
Go ahead and kill me, bastard.I’ll come back in three days and make you wish you were never born,I wanted to say. But thought better of it. The truth was Maxim was unhinged, and that scared me.
At the door, the soldier whispered something in his ear. The entire time, the knife was pressed to my throat. When the soldier left, he shut the door and walked over to me. I finally releasedthe knife, dropping it to the floor. He had me stand, knocking the chair over with how fast I’d moved, and then I was pressing my body up against his, leaning into his mouth.
“Don’t,” I growled, and then his lips were on mine.
Bile rose in my throat as I fought the kiss, fought the control. I hated myself for not being able to move, hated myself for kissing him back with my body but not with my heart.
After a moment, he pulled back, grinning.
“I am ready to consummate our marriage now. In the morning, we will go stay in my country house while all of this blows over.”
I opened my mouth to speak, to tell him to eat razor blades and die, but he clamped my jaw shut.
He walked from the room, and I followed him, one leg in front of the other while I was screaming inside.
‘Liana! I—’I didn’t know what to say.‘I’m losing hope,’I told her honestly.‘I need good news.’
Liana’s energy washed over me, strong and motherly then.‘We just got back. Victory is here with the defectors. She made it. Victory is safe!’
Tears built in my eyes, and joy flooded my heart. She was safe. It was all worth it because Victory got out and was safe.
Okay. I could endure anything if it meant my sisters were safe. Even the unthinkable.
‘I love you,’I told her.‘I’m going to close the bond now.’
‘Aisling, wait. Kohen is?—’
I shut the bond, not wanting her to witness what I was about to go through, and then Maxim opened his bedroom door. He walked inside, and I followed, shutting the door behind me as he commanded. I walked past him and over to the bed as he forced my limbs to move. His back was still to the door as he watched me take off my clothes.
“Get on your knees,” he commanded, and I fell to my knees before him, tears streaming down my face. I looked up. And when I did, I nearly screamed. Above his head, hiding in the rafters, were a pair of striking blue eyes.
Kohen.
I saw Kohen at the same time Maxim must have sensed him because he craned his neck to look up just as the ear-splitting bang of the gun went off.
One second, Maxim was standing before me, looming over me, and the next, he was tipping over like a falling tree, his head blown open. For the first time in days, my body was my own. My hands shook as adrenaline rushed through me, and the door flew open.
Another shot. And another. Kohen killed two guards in rapid succession and then leaped from the ceiling and landed before me, placing his body in front of mine like a shield. Three more people came to the doorway and one to the window. Kohen shot them all with deadly precision. They blinked out like lights, going from standing to completely without life within a second.
I was in shock. Everything happened very fast then. Kohen had to help me dress. I knew we didn’t have much time before more people came, and I couldn’t speak. I couldn’t believe he was here. We crawled out the window together, and Maxim’s wolf was dead outside the window. More soldiers approached us, and then two more shots went off.
Kohen was killing people from fifty feet away. It was incredible. We ran on foot to the thick woods by Maxim’s house, and Onyx was there. I nearly wept with relief when I saw him. Kohen got me onto his back first, and then crawled on in front of me so that we were facing each other.
Kohen peered over at me. “Do you think you could use your power right now if we meet sky resistance?”
