Page 69 of Red Masquerade

He took no time at all climbing the wall to reach me. I had no idea how he managed it, as the stone was relatively flat, save for some decorative flourishes that jutted out barely a few inches.

“You cannot be here,” I whispered. But my heart fluttered at seeing him. At the memories of him and me in this very garden, six years ago.

“I cannot?”

“You will be skinned alive.” By Lucas, surely, if not whatever mob he called to march to the manor and kill the beast.

His fingers dug into the windowsill, his body hanging, though he looked so casual, so at ease. “I would not allow it,” he said matter-of-factly. He looked at me pointedly. “Can I come in?”

I stepped backward, allowing him entry. He suddenly perched on my windowsill, his large frame blocking out all moonlight, and I felt a thrill in my stomach at the thought ofhimsneaking into my room. How my mother would have a cow if she knew. How Lucas would turn red and spit fire if he knew.

My own face blushed at the memory of my time with Adam only a few days prior. Staggeringly intimate, our reunion happening all at once, before I could even think about his return. About what I wanted.

His lithe figure stepped down from the windowsill. He stood before me, towering over me, but it was not the domineering looming of my brother, rather a protective encasing of my own figure. Before I could think better of it, I threw my arms around him, burying my face in the cloth of his shirt.

He did not return my embrace immediately, surprised. Then I felt a tantalizing set of fingers twirling through my hair, twisting curls around his fingers. I did not want to move, did not want to leave his arms. I knew that this was where I was supposed to be. I tightened my grip, shutting my eyes against the barrage of feelings that threatened to overwhelm me.

His hands suddenly froze. He was still as stone. “What happened?”

It was less a question and more a demand.

I shook my head against his chest. “Nothing.”

He gently pulled me from him and searched my face in the moonlight. His gaze swept over me, from head to toe, his pupils dilating once they landed on the little red marks on my face. My neck.

He darkened.

“Helena—”

I wrenched myself from him, turning as if to hide what had happened to me.

“It’s nothing.”

Of course, it was something. My own blood had laid a hand on me. And it had not been the first time. Perhaps that was the part that hurt the most: that I let Lucas have such control over me,still.

But what choice did I have?

He had drilled it into my head earlier, calling me stupid to believe otherwise—that this world was his, and that my will would eventually bend to his. Mother had insisted I marry, and were she my only foe, I may be able to convince her to see my side, or at least dodge the problem altogether. But Lucas being here, influencing her, charming her as her only son, her successful, perfect son who happened to know just the right bachelor…

I was foolish. I should not have let Adam in. Visiting here even once was one time too many.

Would I even see him again after this evening? My fate was decided. Wright waited for me somewhere in this city, fully expecting my hand any day now. Lucas had promised it to him. My compliance with the plan concocted between them—

Suddenly I was gasping for breath, a surge of regret and anguish and frustration overtaking me. My body wracked withsobs, but I tried to silence them the best I could, muffling the sound with a hand over my mouth.

A strong pair of hands came around me from behind. He pulled me to him, caging me in. His face fell to the crook of my neck, his lips tenderly meeting the sensitive skin there. He placed the most chaste, most gentle of kisses upon my flesh.

“Darling,” he breathed into me.

Darling.

I could not do this.

“You expect too much from me,” I said through my tears. I wiped my face, not caring how it reddened my skin, how unsightly I must be. My tears felt hot, full of my anger.

“I expect nothing from you,” he countered, placing another kiss to the angle of my jaw.

I squeezed my eyes shut, trying to hold it in, but it all came out at once.