Page 96 of Beg the Night

I kept my focus on the bottom of her foot, making sure she had truly gotten all the dirt out of the cuts. “Why what?”

“Why do you care?” she asked, her voice more timid than I would have expected from her. “Why are you helping me? We’re supposed to hate each other, remember?”

I scoffed. “That was before we got out of that godforsaken dungeon. And that was before the claiming.”

“So you’re helping me now because we’re claimed.”

I held her ankle but I sat back on my heels so I could look up at her. “The claiming honestly has nothing to do with it.”

Her eyes went wide, like she was as shocked as I was by my words. It had been my cover for the last few weeks. That I only cared about her because of the claiming. I’d only helpedher because performing the claiming was my ticket out of those damn dungeons.

But somewhere along the way, sometime during the dark nights, under the spray of the shower, maybe while she whispered with Mags, things changed. And my emotions were only amplified when I was given access to her memories.

I realized I would have protected her regardless of the claiming.

Why? Probably because I was the biggest idiot I knew.

Don’t get attached. Don’t get close to anyone.That was my number one rule. I didn’t allow myself to worry about anyone but Mags. Not if they were destined for the same fate as my first childhood friend. The one I killed while he stared at me in horror.

But we were long, long past that now.

She didn’t say anything else as I stood and adjusted my towel. Though she did turn before I let it fall to the ground.

“Come on,” I said once I’d pulled a pair of pants on. “You need to sleep.”

“We both need to sleep.”

I scoffed and held out a hand. “I’ll be okay. Don’t worry about me.”

With her palm against mine, she slid off the counter. “I do worry about you.”

My heart fucking cracked. Yeah. I was so, so screwed.

She held my gaze for a handful of seconds. Enough to light up the shadows running through my veins. They wanted her. They wanted to protect her. To keep her safe. To heal her.

They wanted to consume her, too.

But I had already taken too much from her. I wouldn’t touch her again unless she asked for it. And even then, only if it was completely of her own free will.

Fuck, I would never let that happen. I would be the only person to ever see her in her pleasure like that again.

Before I could do anything stupid like run a thumb across her pink lips, she turned and stepped into the bedroom.

Mags was still sprawled across the bed, so I settled on the floor near the window and stretched my legs out in front of me. I’d been sleeping on a cot for months. This wasn’t any worse. In fact, I was more comfortable than I ever remembered. Here, I knew that door was locked. I knew Director wouldn’t be barging in to take Mags from me.

And for the first time in a long time, I actually started to feel hope for the future.

TWENTY-EIGHT

athena

Benedict ran his fingers through his dark hair and exhaled loudly. “I can’t simply teleport us all back there. That would be suicide.”

“Why not?” I asked. “It worked before!”

“Because they weren’t expecting me to help you. Hell,Iwasn’t even expecting me to help you.”

The five of us stood in our room at the inn. It was cramped, but when Katherine and Benedict brought us breakfast, my stomach growled loudly again, and I begrudgingly allowed them to enter.

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