Page 22 of Kingmakers, Year Three

Actually, I’m sure it’s about to get worse.

Dean looks anything but cheerful. His face is heavily bruised on the left side. He’s got a cut on that cheek and a nasty black eye, the purplish marks especially dire against his fair skin. He looks like an angel stripped of his wings and fallen all the way to earth.

“What happened?” I say without thinking.

Wrong question. Dean’s top lip pulls up in the snarl that I’ve quickly come to recognize as the harbinger of his most intense aggression.

“Never mind that,” he growls. “Where thefuckhave you been all day?”

“Breakfast. And class,” I stammer.

“Why weren’t you waiting for me outside the Octagon Tower this morning?”

“I . . . why would I be?”

“Because you’re my slave, Cat,” Dean says, in a tone of stating the obvious. “What good are you to me in the dining hall and at class?”

“But . . . I have to go to class,” I squeak.

“Yes, you do. And you’ll walk from class to class with me. Carrying my books. Every single day.”

“What?”

“You heard me.”

Dean’s eyes are fixed on mine, steady and unblinking. His pupils are so large that the irises comprise barely more than a thin halo of violet.

“Why do you . . . I mean, okay,” I say, knowing better than to argue.

“You mean, ‘Yes, sir,’”Dean corrects me.

My cheeks flame and I feel an intense impulse to tell him to fuck off. But that would be suicidal.

“Yes,sir,” I hiss through gritted teeth.

“Good girl,” Dean says softly.

His low purr sends a thrill through my body.

Am I completely fucked in the head that I feel a flush of warmth at his approval? Maybe it’s just relief that he might not have me murdered in the immediate future.

His smile of satisfaction quickly turns to a scowl.

He seizes my chin in a steel grip.

“What the fuck is on your face?” He demands.

“Makeup,” I say, trying to twist my chin out of his grasp.

He pinches it all the harder.

“I hate it,” he hisses. “Wash it off.”

“What? No, I just?—”

“Clean that shit off your face,” he barks. “Do it now, then get your ass over to the dining hall.”

He lets go of me so abruptly that I stumble back.

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