Total pages in book: 141
Estimated words: 140780 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 704(@200wpm)___ 563(@250wpm)___ 469(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 140780 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 704(@200wpm)___ 563(@250wpm)___ 469(@300wpm)
The curtains quivered.
Red shadows danced over his chest—
Whisper snarled, looking back to Lucien and nipping his arm. Lucien coughed and stumbled backward as Whisper bit a little too sharp.
The spell broke.
The windows stopped rattling and the air temperature returned to normal instead of blistering like the sun.
God, now what?
What the hell just happened?
Who the hell is he?
And why wasn’t I running like I should?
“Are you...” I swallowed hard, trying so hard to pretend all of this was normal. “Are you okay?”
Raking both hands over his face, his shoulders sagged. Dropping his arms, he caught my eyes and slowly shook his head.
“You’re not okay?”
He shrugged.
“You don’t know?” I whispered.
His fingers strayed to the vitalsync core that was dull and dead over his heart.
My phone hurled itself around in my hand, reaching its furious crescendo.
Lucien’s gaze locked on it and everything he was feeling shut down. His unreadable mask slipped back into place as he crossed his arms, and ordered, “Answer it.”
Chapter Twenty
FAT LOT OF GOOD MY ORGASM did me.
My body was on a damn roller coaster—burning alive in the bathroom only to find solace in Rook’s arms. I hadn’t planned on having my second ever release while still wearing my goddamn pants but...it’d happened.
Again.
And I couldn’t even care about the damp discomfort left behind because all that ashy, violent heat just went away. She didn’t just calm me physically, she calmed me emotionally—dousing me in ice and cocooning me in snow, allowing me to breathe without setting fire to the bed.
For a few grateful moments, I found a pocket of existence that didn’t come with suffering but then...him.
“Well?” I hissed. “Are you going to answer it?”
Rook clung to that hated little device as if it might detonate in her palm and reveal everything she didn’t want me to know.
Back in Cinderkeep, I didn’t care who she was in the outside world.
I had no way of imagining her life before me or what she got up to outside my walls. I’d become so insular—so cut off from the rest of humanity—that I couldn’t picture what life looked like out there, so I literally had no drive to ask.
But now?
Now I wanted to know everything.
I wanted to tear her history wide open and rifle through every interaction, relationship, and secret.
“Do it,” I seethed, making Whisper chuff as if reminding me to contain my temper. “It doesn’t look like it’s going to stop ringing until you do.”
Her gaze landed on mine, her lips thinning with determination. “Just remember...Dillon is like an older brother to me.”
So what?
He was still a man and she was mine.
I would happily slit his throat if he thought he could take her away from me—related or not.
My hands balled as heat flooded through my veins. Instinct urged me to go to her. To touch her. Kiss her. To bind myself to her so she could keep me cool enough that I didn’t burn the bed and breakfast down.
“Oh God, here we go...” Sucking in a deep breath, she stabbed her finger onto the green symbol and tossed it onto the mattress as if it was a live grenade.
She cringed away as if it truly was about to erupt—
“ELARA SNOWFLAKE! WHERE THE FUCK HAVE YOU BEEN?!”
Whisper growled, not liking another male’s voice bouncing off the walls.
Me and him both.
Groaning, Rook buried her face into her hands. “Ugh, not you, too! Why must you insist on using my pseudonym when I’m in trouble?”
“Because that’s what I’ll inscribe on your headstone if I ever get my hands on you! Here lies the runaway heiress Elara fucking Snowflake. Murdered by her long-suffering bodyguard.”
What?!
My hands balled as flames licked hotter, cutting through Rook’s power over me.
I might quickly be learning how dependent on her I was to stay sane, but right now, I wanted to become the apocalypse everyone feared because he’d threatened her. He had the audacity to talk about murdering the one person I needed, and if he was here, he’d be the one needing a fucking tombstone.
Stepping toward the bed, I fully intended to destroy the phone, but Whisper chirped, wrenching me to a stop.
I glowered at the cat.
“You’re so dramatic,” Rook muttered.
“I’ll show you dramatic, you frustrating, annoying pain in my ass!” he shouted back, making my teeth grind to dust.
“Jeez. I’m still alive, okay? Calm down. No need to give yourself a heart attack—”
“Don’t you dare take that tone with me, Elara Snowflake,” he barked. “Not after what you just put me through. Are you hurt? Where are you? What happened?”
My eyes narrowed.
That was the third time he’d called her that.
So she had lied to me.
Rook Snowdon wasn’t her real—
“My name really is Rook,” she rushed, her eyes widening on mine as little curls of heat evaporated from my shoulders. Once again, she read my thoughts—not that they would be hard to follow. “Elara Snowflake is just a company address.”