Page 70 of The Cursed Kingdom

“How long have you been in love?” I ask Kie. “Does Mason know?”

Mason’s gaze darts toward me. I hold eye contact, not feeling intimidated by him when his guts were spilling out of his body just moments ago. There’s nothing he can do to me right now.

Kie finishes his last sutures before pouring disinfectant onto a small cloth. It burned like a motherfucker when Mason put it on my knees, and I take sick satisfaction in watching Mason’s face screw up when Kie begins to spread it over his torn-up abdomen.

“Why does the human think you’re in love with me?” he grits out through clenched teeth.

Kie’s shoulders lift in a shrug. “I don’t know. She doesn’t know anything about us.”

I faintly remember screaming a version of that exact sentence to my mother when she tried telling me that my first boyfriend wasn’t a good guy. I was sixteen and in love, and I wasn’t open to hearing any suggestions he was anything other than perfect.

Two weeks later, I discovered he was hooking up with every girl who gave him ten seconds of attention, so maybe my mom had been onto something.

It happened when Lill was still strong, and my lips curl as I recall the way she broke his nose in the middle of algebra class the following week. She was promptly suspended, but she still insists it was well worth it.

I miss how vicious Lill was before she got sick. I haven’t seen that side of her in years.

“She asked me about delysum,” Kie tells Mason.

My heart lurches at the exact moment Mason’s accusatory gaze meets mine. He doesn’t look pleased—not that he ever does. Still, I wasn’t expecting the level of anger and suspicion in his gaze. I fucked up letting that word slip from my lips.

Chapter Twenty-Seven

ABBY

MASON TRIES TO sit up, but Kie smoothly shoves him back to the ground.

It’s an aggressive action, one that seems to hurt Mason as he flattens against the ground with a grimace. I bite the inside of my cheek, holding back a smile. Mason may be injured, but I’m sure his memory is intact. I doubt he’ll take kindly to me laughing at his pain, nor do I think he’d forget it.

“Don’t move,” Kie orders.

He’s finished stitching up Mason’s side, the once-gaping hole now closed and held together with tiny, black knots. It still looks gruesome, but at least Mason’s insides are no longer under threat of falling out.

“What, exactly, did the human ask?” Mason asks, still staring at me.

Kie disinfects the remainder of Mason’s wound before fixing one of the sutures. I lost count of how many he’s done, but it’s a lot. Mason’s abs flex every time Kie shoves the needle through the skin, but he otherwise remains still.

It doesn’t seem like this is the first time he’s been patched up, but I don’t spot any other scars on his body. Maybe shifters don’tscar. Either that or they’ve got some fantastic scar cream I’d kill to get my hands on.

I avoid letting my gaze travel below Mason’s hips, pointedly ignoring how openly exposed his lower half is. I hardly noticed he was naked when he first collapsed on the ground, his giant, bleeding wound and visible intestines the only thing I could focus on. His organs are safely tucked back inside him, though, and I’m uncomfortably aware that he’s nude.

He doesn’t seem shy about it, either.

“What did she ask?” Mason repeats.

He sounds annoyed that Kie didn’t answer him the first time, and he’s still staring at me. I try to stare back, but I almost immediately get too nervous and look away. I’m feeling a lot less confident that he’s going to die, and I don’t want to provoke him.

I doubt he’ll attack me right at this moment, but Mason seems like the type of person to hold a grudge.

“She asked if I’ve heard of it,” Kie says.

And I sure as fuck regret it, too.

The question was asked in a moment of panic, and I wished to swallow the words back up the moment they came out. I don’t think it’s fair to question me about something I blurted out when I was about eighty percent convinced I was going to die, but that’s my personal opinion.

Mason momentarily looks away as Kie grabs his arm and pulls it between them, but his gaze quickly shifts back to me. I intently watch what Kie’s doing, pretending to be interested in how he cleans and wraps the wound on the shifter’s bicep.

Anything to avoid meeting Mason’s frightening stare.

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