Page 59 of Vicious King

I narrowed my eyes at him. “No. Just stop it,” I said. “I’ve been telling you for two weeks now: there’s nothing you can possibly say to make me believe that you actually want to help me!”

“What if I told you I was falling in love with you?”

All the breath left my lungs. I felt like a fish yanked from the sea and left to flounder on a dock. I stared up at Elias with my mouth hanging open, electrified and petrified in equal measure.

“No. Don’t say that,” I finally mumbled, ducking away.

He took a step closer. “Why?”

“Because I know it’s not true.”

“It is. I can’t fucking help myself. I want you. I need you.”

“Please just stop,” I murmured.

“No.” His eyes burned with passion as he stared right into mine. “I love you, Tatum.”

I accidentally bit down on the inside of my bottom lip so hard it began to bleed. The pain wasn’t enough to stop the trembling, the way my insides had suddenly turned to liquid, the fire in my core.

Oh, no.I was so close to letting go. So close to letting myself believe him. There was a crack running all the way around the wall I’d put up around my heart, and with just a few more pushes, it was bound to come tumbling down.

“God, how far will you go?” I said in a ragged whisper.

“To save you? I’d go to the ends of the fucking earth. The thought of something happening to you makes me want to fucking die. Even the thought of what’s already happened to you.” He looked stricken, face still drawn.

I shook my head. “No. I meant how far will you go to convince me?”

“I’ll do whatever it takes.”

“Lying about loving someone is a really sick thing to do,” I murmured.

He steeled his jaw. “I’m not lying,” he said. “Can you really say you don’t feel anything for me? Because I know there’s something here. Something real.”

“It doesn’t matter what I feel,” I said abruptly, avoiding his piercing gaze. “I just want to be free. If it means having to leave you behind, then so be it. Everyone here might think I’m trash because I wasn’t lucky enough to be born into a good family, but I know better. I know I deserve better than this.”

“I don’t think that about you at all. But you’re right. You deserve better than this,” he said.

“Great. We finally agree on something.” I began to well up with more tears. I didn’t want him to see me cry. Didn’t want him to see me being so weak and pathetic yet again. “Could you please leave?”

Pain twisted his face. “No. Tatum, I really do—”

I pushed him away, glaring daggers at him. “Don’t say it again. Don’t you dare fucking say it! If you actually loved me or cared about me, you would’ve believed me when I told you I didn’t sign that contract and didn’t sell myself to this hellhole!”

He lowered his gaze to the floor. “I should’ve listened to you then. I fucking regret that now, believe me.”

There was a long pause as I figured out how to respond. “Well, you can’t erase history,” I ended up mumbling.

“But I can try to fix it. And I will. I’m going to figure out a way for you to escape, okay? But it won’t be quick. Knowing what I know now, my father and a lot of the other society members are seriously dangerous, and they’ll go to any lengths to cover things up. They could hurt you if you went back out into the real world, just to shut you up. So I need to plan it out properly, and I need you to trust me. Please. I’m literally begging you, and you know I don’t fucking do that.”

He looked so earnest now, and his words had a disturbing ring of truth to them.

So maybe he really wasn’t lying after all…

I swallowed hard and looked at my feet. Brick by brick, my walls were crashing down. A silent sob punched through me, ripping through my muscles and guts. My heart felt like it was being yanked right out of my chest, then pulling back in. Over and over. In and out.

Part of me still didn’t trust him. Another part of me yearned for him, begged me to start believing him. But I was so scared. I still felt like the second I told him I believed him, it would all be revealed to be a game. A horrible trick.

“Do you believe me?” Elias asked, drawing me closer to him. I didn’t fight it this time. Even after everything that had happened, that same old jolt of attraction was there. That tingle of pure desire.

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