Page 101 of Eternal Captive

It only added to

I was fuming. Her swooping in to rescue me wasnotpart of the plan. The prince was gone. She shouldn’t have interfered with whatever was going on in my life. Hell, she should have been rejoicing that I was gone.

So why the fuck am I back in this godforsaken place?

“I didn’t think you disappearing on my wedding day only to find you had sworn your loyalty to my father very funny,” she hissed, turning on her heels to face me. Her lips formed a pout, and her eyes were as sharp as ever.

Is she fucking kidding me? I was the whole reason she was able to get out of marrying him.Tolive.Yet she was somehow still blaming me?

I hadn’t had a chance to take her in on the way back to the palace. I was too busy trying to calm myself whilesimultaneously ignoring her and that damned witch who kept sticking her nose in places she shouldn’t.

She looks good. Safe.

“Sworn loyalty?” I asked with a scoff. The anger was becoming unbearable. Boiling up inside me and heating my skin. “I was helping you! You know your crazy fucking father put me in the dungeon? You think I wanted to be down there?”

She let out an annoyed growl.

“You told a secret that wasn’t yours to tell!” she blurted out, closing the space between us. She was so close, I could feel her front brushing across mine. The scent of her floral hair care wafted in my face.

The sun was shining in through the windows, sending colorful rainbows all over the intricate wallpaper, plush carpeted floors, and her face. It was beautiful. The way they splashed against her skin and lit up her blue eyes. The darkness of the dungeons made me forget just how mesmerizing she could be in the light.

“You should have stayed out of it.”

She let out a huff of laughter.

“Sounds familiar, doesn’t it?” she asked and cocked her head to the side, a sly smile forming on her face. “A little mouse not staying in her lane.Interferingwhen she shouldn’t have. Maybe this is karma coming to bite you in the ass.”

She was close enough to touch.

I hadn’t realized just how much I needed to touch her until she invaded my space. It was like a parasite working its way into my brain and controlling my movements. I couldn’t stop myself.

“What else would you have me do?” I asked, stepping closer. She moved to the side, trying to put some space between us, but I followed. A silly dance where we both knew the outcome we wanted but neither of us was ready to admit it. “Have you marry him? Have him use your name to start a war and get you killed?”

“Youkilledhim and started the war anyway,” she growled and tilted her head up to maintain eye contact with me.

“You don’t seem all that upset about it,princess,” I murmured, my voice dropping when I realized the wall was just behind her. She leaned against it, looking up at me with those angry eyes I adored so much. Her neck was outstretched, inviting me to wrap my hand around the delicate column.

I had thought about those eyes so much. Both while her father had me and while I was tied up in my house. As angry as I was, I was relieved more than anything that she was alive. Theexactopposite of what my job entailed, but it was so much sweeter.

I leaned close, putting my hand on the wall beside her head.So close.Just one move, and our bodies would be pushed against each other.

“Well, are you?” I probed, needing her to answer. Needing her to admit that I actually did exactly what she wanted me to do. For her to realize that it wasmewho saved her. For her to confirm that throwing away any further contact with my family and the organization that controlled us wasn’t all for nothing.

“He was mine to kill,” she growled as her eyes searched my face, moving from my eyes down to my lips. “His blood should be onmyhands. When people think of what happened at my wedding, they should be seeing me with my knife in his chest.”

I couldn’t help but smile at the image.

“But you choked. Froze right up until the very end,” I murmured. Anger flashed across her face at the insult. “You did look quite breathtaking covered in his blood, though. I’d pay good money to see it again.”

She tilted her head up even more, the anger starting to fade and something else taking its place.

This shouldn’t happen. Not again.

But the electric tension that had been swirling around us was hard to ignore. Her breathing deepened, her chest rising and falling rapidly.

I gave into the urge to gently place my fingers around her neck before trailing them down to her chest. The gleam of the silver chain that was tucked into her clothing caused my heart to skip a beat.She kept the present.The softness of her skin was intoxicating. I let my fingers brush across the hem of her top before running them down the side of her breasts.

She ever so slightly arched into me.

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