Page 50 of Seduce & Destroy

“That’s not what I’m asking.”

Her eyebrows lifted.

“Where are you from, Kenna?”

“Bilham.” She answered too quickly, but at my angry expression she continued. “Princess, what’s the matter?”

“Don’t lie to me, Kenna. I need to know. You were at that school. This isn’t the first time we’ve met.” The corners of my eyes stung with the exertion of not letting tears fall. I needed screams, not tears. “Don’t make me feel crazy.” My voice broke.

Resting a hand on my arm, she stepped closer to me. “I was homeschooled. I didn’t lie.”

“Stop it!” I burst. “Stop lying! Just trust me, please trust me.”

“I’m not, look–”

The tension in my body pulled tighter. I reached down to my ankle, whipping out my trusty mini weapons.

“Okay, okay, look,” She paused, the glint of the blade catching in her eye still her shoulders were set back. “I was at St. James's Academy.”

A relieved sigh struggled to release from my lungs.

“Briefly.”

I shut my eyes and pressed my lips together. “At the same time as me, Kenna. You said it couldn’t have been you. It was though, it was you.”

“It was.” She lifted her hands as if calming a stray cat.

“You remembered me.”

She nodded with me, a declaration that perhaps I wasn’t the only one haunted by the interaction. We were a dyad. I believed it.

“Why did you say those words to me?” Beware the assassin. No, that’s not right. Your mother warns you to beware the assassin. I scrunch my eyebrows. It didn’t make any sense. “You didn’t know my mother.”

“No,” she pleaded almost in prayer. “Just you.”

“Why can’t you just speak the full truth? More than a sentence, please!”

“There are things that I need to protect. Foremost, you.” She pulled me in for a hug, and I rolled my eyes. “Secrets have thorns, and I don't want anyone to be pricked by information they didn’t have to suffer.”

“Why do you say that? As if revealing just the tiniest thing about yourself will bring others pain. They won’t. Quite the opposite, it would make me happy.”

“There’s not much there worth knowing.”

“Not true.” I tried my hardest not to hit my foot on the ground like a petulant teenager, but I think it looked the same to Kenna.

“Oh really?” She joked. A small smile played on her features.

“Yes, really. You’re a wonderful and engaging person, just hard as a rock trying to squeeze information from.”

“Seems you’ll have to squeeze hard. I know some parts of me that would like that very much.” It clicked a moment too late.

I groaned. “Ew, no, stop that.”

She leaned down to the point where we shared breath, suddenly serious.

“Never.” She sighed softly before landing a wet kiss to the side of my mouth.

“You’re distracting me,” I said in a singsong tone.

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