Page 85 of House of Lilith

We’re not alone anymore. There’s the fiance standing next to her, scowling at me.

It instantly makes my blood start to boil.

“What do you think you’re doing?” he snarls.

I take a deep breath to calm myself, but I don’t have time to say anything.

“Max,” Romanov calls in a warning voice, making me turn to her and see her throw him this surprised, pissed-off look as she grabs him by the upper arm, forcing him to look at her. “Didn’t wejusthave this conversation?”

“I saw it, Anastasya,” he says through gritted teeth, “I saw you accept a drink from him.”

“So?” she snaps. “I accepted one from your stupid cousin, too.”

“You’ll give him ideas,” he snaps as he turns to throw daggers at me. “We’re leaving.”

“Well,I’mnot,” she says as she folds her arms, her face flushing with embarrassment as she avoids looking in my direction.

It’s none of my business, I chant to myself as I keep gritting my teeth. It’s none of my fucking business.

Still, my fox starts snarling as soon as I see the asshole prince grit his teeth and then grab her by the upper arm. “I said, we’re leaving,” he spits out as he starts trying to drag her away.

And just like that, something in me snaps.

I take a step forward, balling my hands into fists in an effort to stay in control. “I don’t believe that’s the way to treat her,” I hear myself growl.

Both their eyes snap to me.

There’s a second of deafening silence before the asshole prince lets go of her arm, gets in my face and drawls, “You didnotjust say that.”

I sense some of the people around us start to pay attention to what’s going on. But I can’t bring myself to care anymore. I return the favor, taking a step forward so he has to take one back. “But you see,” I drawl, “I did.”

There’s a flash of anger through his eyes before he eyes me up and down with contempt, spitting out, “She’s my fuckingfiance, you fucking asshole. I can do whatever the fuck I want.”

What the… I grit my teeth so hard, I’m grimacing, all my restraint falling away. “Including disrespecting her like that? I don’t think so.”

For a second, he just looks at me. “What the fuck?” he yells out.

And he shoves me, hard, in the chest, and the very next second, I see everyone around us stop and I hear her yell out, “Max!”

But it’s too late. I stare at him for a second. I’ve never hated anyone this much before. And I fail to stop the anger from consuming me and I shove him back, even harder than he shoved me, and I send him flying back into the circle of people around us.

All hell breaks loose. He rushes back, I get his fist in my mouth and someone slams into me from behind. My ears ringing with people’s shouting, I swing my arm back and I land a blow myself, kicking him in the ribs. It gives me so much pleasure, seeing him grimace and bend over, his hands flying to his chest.

Rip him to shreds,I hear my fox command and I can already picture the blood, the very thought giving me a surge of adrenaline.

But just as he stands straight and I move to land another blow, she pushes herself between us, throwing me such an angry, disapproving look that it makes me freeze in place. It’s like a cold shower on a raging fire.

“No, stop it,” she yells out, blocking her fiance as he tries to push past her, cursing under his breath. She turns to him and I hear her say, clearly upset, “Fine, I’ll go. Just stop.”

I’m only vaguely aware of some of the other students still fighting around us, lazily and drunkenly. My eyes are fixed on the two of them as they turn and start walking away. The asshole prince is throwing comments at people staring, looking all too jolly all too quickly, considering he’d just tried to rip me to pieces.

But it’s her that my eyes linger on. And she doesn’t even turn around to throw me a glance, so I don’t know what expression she’s wearing right now. But there’s this tension in her shoulders, her body in general, that gives me a bad feeling.

Then I see his hand dart to her upper arm and squeeze. She doesn’t break it free, but she does become even tenser, making my fox start letting out a low growl.

Bad feeling. Bad, bad feeling.

But it’snone of my fucking business, I remind myself, recalling the look she threw me when I just now tried to stick my nose in it. So I force myself to go back to the bar, putting on an indifferent face while seething inside.

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