Page 197 of Brutal Prince

“Well thank God you were there,” I say, desperately trying to reign in the conversation. Hoping Indi has the patience and foresight to see what I’m trying to accomplish here. High hopes indeed — I don’t think she has a single patient bone in her body.

Marcus cocks his head at me. “But I set you up,” he says, a calculating twinkle in his eye. “Aren’t you mad?”

“I was,” I agree, nodding slowly as my mind races. “But that cherry had to be popped dude, no two ways about it.”

Marcus lets out another laugh, but I can see I’m far from convincing him that I’m on his side.

“Where do you think you’re going?” Marcus snaps, and the gun lifts so fast I’m already tensing for the impact of the bullet.

But he’s not aiming at me. He’s talking to Indi, who’s snuck out behind me.

“Put it down, Marcus,” she snaps. “We both know you’re not going to shoot us.”

Damn it, Indi!

“Why the fuck wouldn’t I?” Marcus growls.

“Because someone will hear and then they’ll call the cops. Which means you can’t have your fun.”

There’s no mistaking the venom in Indi’s voice. I don’t dare look back at her in case she thinks I’m encouraging this stupidity, but I’m a hundred percent positive she’s glaring at Marcus.

“Indi,” I murmur as quietly as possible, barely moving my lips. “Shut the fuck up.”

“What, so you two can go on reminiscing about how you raped Jessica?” Her voice rises into a yell at the end. “I’d rather you shoot me now and get it over with.”

“Shut up!” Marcus yells. “Shut! Up!”

Instead, Indi screams at the top of her lungs.

I don’t know where my mind is at. I guess I still think my idiotic plan is working. Being chummy with Marcus, at least, had the gun pointed at the floor, not at Indi. Then she intervened.

Stubborn, stubborn!

I slap my hand over her mouth, wrench her around, and throw her to the mattress. I stare for a second as she bounces, and she stares right back at me, shock writ large in her wide eyes and over her trembling mouth.

“Wh-?” is all she gets out before I’m on top of her.

She must have been gagged or blindfolded at some stage, because the cloth used to do it is still hanging around her neck. I rip it off and shove it between her lips. She slaps at my hands and tugs at my wrists, but it’s easy enough to tie off the gag since she’s obviously not trying that hard to injure me.

In the silence that follows, my breath sounds like that of a wild animal caught in a trap.

“There,” I say, leaning back. I widen my eyes at Indi, but she doesn’t seem to notice. Her hands go up to the gag, but I grab her wrists and pin them to her stomach. “Now you can’t go running off your mouth again.” I throw all sorts of inflection into my words, but I could have drawn a fucking picture and it wouldn’t have helped.

It doesn’t matter. I finally have her exactly where I wanted her. Which, ironically, is where Marcus wanted her to be all along.

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