Page 65 of Cruel Crown

“Did anyone tell her this?” Both the woman and the man who had been sparring with Bas shook their heads.

“Tell the others. Try to find her.”

The two Sekt members left without a word.

This was the kind of loyalty my woman inspired. These people would do anything because they believed in the same cause she did. They committed treason against the same society in hopes of rebuilding a better one. They were so loyal they took their orders from someone else because it was too risky to take them from her.

“If she finds out about the Italian girl committing suicide, she will blame herself,” Bas said as we went out through another door.

Maybe this was the part I should feel like an asshole, but I didn’t feel anything for the woman dying. She chose to take her own life after I decided to kidnap her. A series of choices strung together and they fucked up her life.

“I’m the one who kidnapped her,” I said.

Bas snorted. “She won’t see it that way, especially not after seeing Alexis. It always fucks her up a bit, seeing her like that. It’s why I steer clear of her on those days. She also feels guilty about training me.”

She could feel guilty all she wanted, but there was no way in hell I would leave just to protect her from feeling.

Bas and I walked down halls and went up corridors, coming up empty. If she was fine, I was going to strangle her myself.

I knew most feelings; I’d been mimicking them all my life just so people would leave me alone or help me get wherever I wanted to go. But the ones I was feeling now, I fucking hated them. It was this despair, like I was trying to scratch my skin out.

Time was going too slow, and there was an anxiety that clung to me like a second skin. Feelings could go suck a dick because I didn’t want them anymore.

Someone came running toward us but didn’t stop, and in the wind, his words carried.

“She’s in her room.”

I took off running in the direction of her room. I swore if she was fine, I was going to fuck her half to death for making me feel like I was dying for a quick second.

People passed in a blur, and I didn’t care what anyone said or what they thought of me. All of that was irrelevant.

By the time I was at her door, I was out of breath. The woman who had come to the gym was standing outside. I tried to go in, but she stopped me by putting her palm on my chest.

“She doesn’t want you in there.”

I grabbed her wrist like a vise. “You better get the fuck out of my way before I snap your neck.”

The woman didn’t back down. “I’m not scared of you.”

“It’s okay, let him in,” Bas said, coming to a stop behind me. He then motioned for the woman and they left me alone.

When I walked inside the room, Daphne was lying on the bed, the covers over her body.

“Where were you?” Probably not what I should have said, but I was acting beyond rational. No one pushed my buttons like the woman before me.

“Go away,” she said, sounding annoyed that I was in here.

“You know what I said about taking it easy on you because your pussy was sore—if I have to make you bleed until you submit to me, I’ll fucking do it,” I growled.

I walked to the bed, and then I tugged at the comforter to remove it from her face. Daphne fought it, and the moment I pulled it away, rage like I’d never felt before coursed through my veins.

“Who. The. Fuck. Did. That. To. You?” I gritted out the words slowly. I wanted to—no, I needed to kill the person responsible for this.

Someone had hurt my woman. Her cheek was busted open where someone had kicked her and blood poured from her lips. She held on to her stomach, trying to add pressure, and I knew…I just knew they had kicked her there too.

Daphne didn’t even look at me. “Go away.”

She reached for the comforter and tried to pull it over her face, and I saw the way she gritted her teeth in pain.

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