Page 83 of Living Legend

I let go of my dagger, watching him quickly remove it from sight and back to the inside pocket of his jacket. I pulled back from Cullen’s body and planted my feet on the ground, a shot of vertigo hitting me like it always did when I came down from one of my dagger’s highs.

“You look like shit,” Reese pointed out, walking over to Cullen and pushing his limp head forward so his chin now rested on his chest.

“We need to get you out of here and err…cleaned up,” Nicholas said, reaching his hand out to me. I looked down, tilting my head to the side. My hand wanted to reach out, but I didn’t know why. I let Nicholas pull me out of the room, each of our footsteps leaving bloody marks on the floor. I looked back over to Cullen and tried to make sense of his words, even after his body left my view. Nicholas held my hand the entire way while I kept my eyes trained on the floor.

Cullen said I was a pawn. That rubbed me the wrong way, since I had no idea what I was here for. Lilith was using me to achieve something. If Lilith was using me as a pawn, then I was the worst kind of pawn.

A dangerous one.

Chapter Fourteen

NICK

It was raining. Rain that splattered against the glass of my window. It was soft and delicate, the kind of rain you could let yourself fall asleep listening to. The wind picked up, but it was nothing that would hinder an angel from flying. I watched the drops of water hit my window as I sat on my bed, letting my elbows press against my knees. The sky was starting to darken as the rain continued and it was only mid-afternoon. I had a feeling the weather was about to get even worse as the hours went by.

I had remained in my room once we took Dani back, not missing the way Elise stared both of us down but said nothing. We had stopped in at a washroom to let her clean herself up, but small remnants of blood remained, as if tethered to her in some way. Reese had tried to start conversations with me when we headed back to our own rooms, but I wasn’t in the mood. I didn’t try to get anything out of her as I held her hand the entire way back to the more delightful part of The Skies, but I could feel the way her hand tightened around mine, the soft feel of her fingers and the way they’d hooked around my own, as if she would lose her grip at any moment. She didn’t let my hand go immediately once I deposited her into her room. She had her back turned, my hand still in hers, and she squeezed. One quick squeeze. A squeeze that meant she would be fine, or maybe like a pinch— letting her know this was reality, that she was okay.

I was alright with either.

I had said my goodbyes to Reese, kicked off my shoes, and settled into my bed with my clothes on. I was exhausted. It had only been a short amount of time, but I honestly couldn’t remember when life had been simple and all I had to worry about was my next training session or the Animus Seeking. I let my forearm drop over my eyes as I let my mind drift to that place I promised myself I wouldn’t go. I was completely fucked.

I kept myself together when Reese brought her through that door, but I couldn’t help looking at her.Reallylooking at her. I looked at her curls that flowed over her shoulders and remembered how they’d looked splayed around her head as she writhed underneath me. Her bottom lip had almost jutted out in a pout, making me want to take that lip between my teeth and pull her into me. Iknewshe knew I was looking, and that made it all the more embarrassing. It was a little unnerving, thinking she was remembering the same thing.

Reese and I had always been different when it came to girls and dating and sex; he was the promiscuous playboy whose longest relationship was withme, whereas I was the one who had monogamous sex, with just a few random hookups thrown in that I tried to forget about.

I wasn’t the type to do something like this, but here I was—having done it. I had crossed that line I hadn’t even known was a line I needed to be worried about. It had happened literally a day and a half ago and I had already jerked off twice to that memory. The way she kissed, the way the skin of her stomach and thighs felt against my hands, the little sounds she made every single time I pushed into her. The way she felt around my cock was…fuck. I didn’t want to have to jerk off a third time, so I forced myself to sleep.

I woke to the sound of rain, the same continuous rain I looked at now, and a knock at my door, an obnoxious, repetitive knocking, almost as if whoever was on the other side was trying to create a beat with their knuckles. I knew exactly who it had been.

The same person was currently pacing the length of my room and talking about something. A loud clap startled me, causing my gaze to shift from the window and look directly at Reese. He had his hands together inches from my face, his lips pressed in a hard line.

“Nick, did you even hear a word I said?” he asked, annoyed. I pushed his hands out of my face and shook my head. “Well let me sum everything up. We have a meeting with Jonah today and we have no idea what our demonic princess is going to say.”

“So?” I shrugged. “We don’t really have a say in what comes out of their mouths.”

He rolled his eyes. “This is different. What if she knows everything and it's worse than we thought? What if she knows nothing and we just risked our dicks with that dagger bullshit?”

“Reese, calm down. If what she had to say was serious, she would have told us.”

He narrowed his eyes at me. “Are you sure? You saw her, right? Black eyes, dark smoke, another guy's blood all over her face with his throat open. Whatever he said triggered her, so I’m going to go with whatever he said wasn’t good.”

Reese had a point. I had seen her face when I walked into that cell. Through the black wispy smoke, I had seen the distant look on her face. The whites of her eyes were gone, and she was breathing so heavy, I thought she would pass out. She seemed to settle at the sound of my voice; she had snapped out of her madness and come back.

“Whatever it is, we’ll deal with it. Jonah will deal with it. It will be dealt with.” I sounded like a crazy person.

Reese leaned back against the wall opposite me, crossing his arms. “How much sleep did you get last night?”

I rubbed my fingers against my eyes. “Enough.” The way my body felt, I would have said it felt like I had only just fallen asleep. I peeked up at him to see him regarding me carefully. He was taking in my day and half old clothes and distraught facial features.

“Take a shower.”

“I’m fine.”

“I didn’t ask if you were fine. Take a shower.” He had a serious tone to his voice.

I firmly rooted myself onto my bed, refusing to move.He stared back at me, equally ready to stand in front of me for hours. A small smile played at his lips.

“Reese.”

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