Page 38 of Resurrection
SEBASTIAN
“I think you are too harsh on her,” Marcus says as he comes to sit across from me in the living room.
“Hmmm…” That’s all the reply I’ve got.
“She struggles to come to terms with the fact that her life is not what it was. I see it as clear as day, but you refuse to give her a break.” Undeterred, he keeps pushing, leaning his forearms on his knees.
“We don’t have the luxury to let her deal with it.” With a tired sigh, I rub a hand over my face. “How long do you think it will take what’s left of the Council to storm this place? I can feel the tension in the air of this city. It won’t matter to them if she is ready or not.”
“We can protect her until she is ready.” As stubborn as April, he frowns at me, making my hands clench so I don’t rip his head off his shoulders. “We were prepared for this. Isn’t that what we were doing for years?”
“You are pressing your luck, my friend.”
My softly spoken words have the desired effect when I tell him that he is pushing his luck. Calling him my friend is like a knife in his chest. He stiffens, his fingers curling so he can hidethe tremble in them, and I can’t stop the cruel curl of my lips at that.
“I just hate to see her suffer.” Deflating, he leans back on the chair.
“It kills me with each moment, as well.” I don’t lie to him when I admit that it’s painful for me to see her like that, too.
“We found four humans around the building last night.” Changing the subject, Marcus straightens his shoulders. I’m grateful for it, the wariness pulling on my body like a stone tied to my feet.
“I’m assuming you took care of it.” Not a question. He knows better than to allow the Council to get any information on what’s going on here. “Did you keep any of them alive so we can question them?”
“I did.” Grimacing like he can smell the stench of something foul, he rubs the top of his head with his hand in frustration. “April got to him before I saw her coming.” Glancing at me through his lashes, he shakes his head, a small smile playing on his mouth. “She is glorious to watch when she is defending her nest, Sebastian. A vision to behold.”
He calls her a vision to behold, like I haven’t been fighting the urge to go to her every night. Luckily for all of us, she doesn’t seem to remember anything when the morning comes. As stubborn as she is, she will either stake us all while we rest or she’ll do something stupid, like harm herself.
“Keep that to yourself. I don’t need to remind you.” Power pushes from me through our connection, making sure he doesn’t dare utter a word to April. Marcus shivers and nods tightly at me.
“Keep what to himself?” April speaks from the hallway, glaring at me with her hands propped on her hips. “More treachery and schemes? How very much like you, Sebastian.”
Turning around, she storms back to my bedroom, slamming the door shut and making us both wince. We look at each other and sigh at the same time.
“What a fucking disaster.” Marcus mumbles.
“Disaster, indeed.” Leaning my head back on the chair, I close my eyes. “A clusterfuck as she likes to call it.”
He chuckles, and my lips twitch, but there is no humor in the situation at all.
Chapter Thirty-Seven
APRIL
They are hiding stuff from me again. My emotions are so heightened after that dreadful night when I saved that jerk Sebastian and died because of that stupidity that it’s hard to keep myself from breaking everything in the room. And that’s what I really want. To grab anything I can get my hands on and grind it into dust with my bare hands.
Panting like a feral animal, I pace a line in front of the bed, wearing the carpet thin under my feet. My body feels warm, the temperature rising with each breath to a point I feel tears prickle my eyes from the pain.Pain? Wait, what?
Startled by the voice in my head, I glance down, and a shriek echoes in the empty room when I see my feet looking an angry red with blisters popping out like in a cartoon. The door bursts open, and the banging on the opposite wall is followed by a plume of smoke from a body that is blurry through my teary eyes. Whoever it is, picks me up like a rag doll and bolts back out in the dark hallway with my hair flying around us from the speed, like a flag blowing in a windstorm.
“What’s wrong? What happened?” Sebastian’s blurry face looms an inch from my nose, and my eyes cross when I tryto focus on it. “April, speak.” Shaking me by the shoulders, he sounds frantic.
“My feet…” My voice trails off.
I push with both hands on his chest to move him away from me. His scent fills my nostrils, that expensive cologne he wears and the natural smell of his skin making me fight the urge to wrap my arms and legs around him and start tearing the shirt and pants he is wearing to shreds. An embarrassing squeak comes from me when he dumps me on my butt and lifts my feet to his face to look at him.
“Stop manhandling me, asshole.” Shoving on his back, I push him down on his butt too, tangling his limbs with mine. “Damn it! I can’t even hurt in peace, away from you.”
“Why are your feet blistered?” Ignoring my comments as usual when it doesn’t suit him, he glares at me.
