Page 51 of Malevolent King

She swallowed. “The best revenge is to forgive.”

“Do you want my forgiveness, Sofia, as I lie here bleeding?”

She bit her lip, and I watched, helpless to touch her when it was all I wanted.

She opened her mouth to speak, and I thought for one heartbreaking moment she might let down her walls and be honest. She might say she regretted it, and everything I’d endure in this basement would be worth it.

A slight sound from the hall sent her mouth snapping shut, and her shoulders rose under her ears. She seemed to steady herself, and any trace of vulnerability on her face melted away.

She pursed her lips, her eyes hardening.“You should have let me go,” she whispered. “At the motel. It was obvious that you should have left me behind.”

The memory of her sprinting up the stairs and barreling straight over the rusted railing was already a permanent fixture of my nightmares.

“Then you’d be the one lying bleeding,” I pointed out, anger tinting me at the very thought.

She raised her chin with all the majesty of a queen. “Yes, I would be. If you cared about escaping, you shouldn’t have cared about that. I’m not yours to worry about, Nikolai.”

Despite the kicks I’d taken in the last few hours, that one hurt.

She was watching me, waiting for my reaction, so I gave her a shrug.

“Are you asking me or telling me?”

“Nothing can happen between us. Nothing real,” she whispered.

She thought she could erase everything that had happened between us? She actually thought I’d let her? Something had shifted in the dark between us, and I would never allow it to be forgotten.

“Correction: every single thing that has ever happened between us was real. I bet they’ve been the most real moments of your overprotected life.” It was always a gamble to reach under Sofia’s good-girl act and let her know how I saw her. I understood her in a way that I was sure no one else could.

Her eyes shot to mine, and I knew I had spoken a truth she couldn’t deny. Then the vulnerability left her eyes, and she tensed as her gaze lingered near the doorway. I wondered what was making her so nervous in her own house.

“I’m not here to chat. I’m here to make sure you don’t starve to death,” she muttered, gripping the tray of food as if it were a life preserver in a stormy sea.

“Come closer, I don’t bite—much,” I goaded her.

The urge to tempt her closer and get hold of her had overtaken my mind, driving out all other thoughts. If only I could pull her close. That mask she was wearing would drop, and she’d let me see her again. The real her. Maybe I’d be lucky enough to catch a hint of her perfume. The ugly smell of captivity and old rot was giving me a headache. One inhale of Sofia’s feminine perfume, her soft skin and sweet-scented hair, would give me the strength to carry on.

With her teeth sinking into her lower lip, she complied. Despite my less-than-ideal state, the sight of Sofia following my orders still stirred my cock. No amount of pain in my bones could lessen my desire for this woman.

She kneeled beside the tray she’d set down, glancing nervously over her shoulder.

“You still can’t reach there, prom queen.”

She sighed and inched forward.

“Will Angelo tattle to your father if you’re seen being kind to the bratva scum?” I wanted to know who the bad guy in Sofia’s life was, apart from me, of course. What could I say? I got jealous like that.

“No, he wouldn’t. He’s on my side,” she muttered, that haunted, pinched look in her eyes still not shifting. “My father told me to come and feed you. I think it’s his form of further torture.”

“He’s good. Seeing you so close, but out of reach, is torture,” I murmured to her as she got closer still.

She looked down at the tray, spearing pieces of cold pasta with the fork.

“Or maybe it’s because he told me how you tipped him off to find us.”

She paused, and that beautiful pulse thumped hard under the soft skin of her throat. Her eyes finally met mine, as rich as melted chocolate. They were shining. It was a shock to the system. She was nearly in tears.

“So, do you finally hate me?” she asked, blinking her long dark lashes until they became spiky and wet from her unshed tears.

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