Page 113 of Captive Souls

For only a handful of seconds. Then he let me go.

He turned to give Lukyan what looked to be both a threatening and thankful nod, then he walked out the door.

Without looking back.

Again, his walk had the gait of someone walking to the noose.

Twenty-One

Piper

“How long does this stuff usually take?” I asked, interrupting a question that Elizabeth was in the middle of asking me.

It was incredibly rude, especially since they were gracious, if not slightly intimidating hosts.

Elizabeth was small, unassuming, even delicate at least upon first glance. But since I’d become somewhat of an amateur expert at spotting dangerous people, I had come to understand that she was one of them. The way she carried herself, the way she moved… She was powerful in a subtle way. Her husband was deadly in a much more obvious way, but I didn’t doubt she was just as fearsome if she needed to be.

I’d contemplated them as a couple. I couldn’t ask outright if they were some sort of super villain power couple, but I assumed it was likely. Would that be me and Knox if this all worked out? Living in the affluent suburbs, masquerading as normal people? Me baking cookies while Knox buried bodies in the backyard?

I didn’t have it in me to transform into the kind of partner Elizabeth most obviously was to Lukyan. Sure, I’d survivedKnox, but most of that was on the luck of him falling in love with me.

I wasn’t a victim, but I sure as shit wasn’t a villain either. I was akindergarten teacher,for goodness’ sakes. But the fact remained that I simply wasn’t okay with sitting there, playing the polite houseguest to two morally gray people who made great food.

Hence me interrupting Elizabeth with my question that was almost a shout across their dining table.

Luckily, Elizabeth wasn’t insulted by my lack of manners; she just smiled knowingly and looked to her husband.

He did not smile. He didn’t seem capable of such a gesture.

He sat as close to his wife as humanly possible, something I’d noted in my short time as their guest. The way he watched her, moved around her… It was familiar. It reminded me of the energy Knox had around me.

It wasn’t love.

It wasn’t that simple, that easy to define. Love was fallible. One could fall out of love. Love did not conquer all, lest what all popular culture said. But what these men felt, it could. It could conquer countries, take down regimes, raze the world.

Lukyan looked at his wife when he spoke.

“It takes as long as it takes.”

I drummed my fingernails on the table. My stomach turned at the food in front of me, even though it had smelled delicious moments ago. “Ballpark?” I pressed.

He considered me with rapt attention, holding a wine glass full of what I was sure was delicious and expensive wine. Not for the first time, I resented my biology and the fact that I wasn’t able to use substances in moderation to take the edge off.

Not that I thought a glass of expensive red would make me any less keyed up.

“I don’t think there is a ballpark amount of time for dismantling a hundred-year-old criminal enterprise,” he replied dryly.

He found me amusing, that much was clear. Which only served to piss me off further.

I knew that getting annoyed with him was dangerous, if not just impolite. I was his guest, after all. And not just the garden variety guest. I was technically on the run from a very powerful and dangerous man. It was a liability, having me under his roof. He was doing me a favor, a big one, by letting me stay. Yet I couldn’t swallow my tongue. “Well I’m not going to just sit here and wait.”“That’s exactly what you’re going to do,” he answered, sipping casually.

I didn’t miss the order in his tone.

Sure, I might’ve in my previous life, sat back and obeyed him, sitting on the sidelines, away from the peril, letting a man save me.

But not then.

This wasmylife. This wasmyfuture. And I wasn’t about to just sit there and let a man take care of it for me. Even if that man was Knox.

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