Page 106 of Vicious Princess
“What arewedoing about the Kata situation? She enjoys having a secret this big on me, but I can tell she’s reaching her limit. Besides, there are rumors circulating aboutus. I bet she’s the one behind them. I can’t fucking do this any longer.”
“You’re doing nothing but focusing on the approaching mission and your graduation day. I’m handling the problem.”
He just keeps adding fuel to the fire.
I shake my head. “No. This doesn’t work for me.” I stab a finger in the middle of his chest. “You said you wantus. Well, if we’re together, Daegel, it means we have to be a team. This, you handling a situation and keeping things away from me, is not how a team plays.”
“Phoenix, I’ll explain everything when the time is right,” he says, as he has before. “Nightingales are part of an old, influential Ezkai family. I need to be very careful about how I handle this.”
“Fine, be careful. I’m not suggesting you be reckless. But tell me, how are you going to solve this issue? Are you going to speak with her family to get her to back off and mind her own business? Do you have friends in high places who will ensure she keeps her mouth shut?”
He presses his lips into a thin line.
I wait.
No words come out of his mouth.
My shoulders slump. “I see.”
Shaking my head, I turn my back to him and walk away.
“All I ask of you is that you trust me,” he says, pleading. “I won’t let anything happen to you, and I will not let Nightingale ruin your future. I’m doing all this for us.”
Whirling on my heel, I raise my voice. “What is it exactly that you’re doing for us?!”
He’s silent once again.
A sarcastic laugh bubbles out of my chest. “It’s like I’m speaking to a wall.”
He closes the distance between us in a few steps. I want to push him away, but the moment his hands are on me and he presses his hard body against mine, the anger fizzles out.
I’m desperately trying to hold onto it. This ends tonight. He either starts telling me the truth, or?—
Or I’m walking away from this.Us.
Daegel cups my cheek. “I’m crazy about you, Phoenix. And I’ll do anything to make sure you’re safe, and thriving, andmine.”
From the way he looks at me, I can feel in my gut he means every word.
“You ask me to trust you, but you don’t trust me enough to be honest.” My words are a whisper.
Daegel presses his lips to my forehead. The backs of my eyes burn, so I close them.
“It’s not as simple as that, princess. Many things in my life are more complicated than I’d like, and I’ll need time to explain them to you the right way. Just give me that time.”
Saying the next words hurts me more than I want to admit. “I can’t be yours until you do.”
My future is not the only thing on the line here.
My heart is, too.
Daegel doesn’t try to stop me as I peel my body away from his and walk away.
CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
Ican’t sleep. I can’t eat. I can barely focus enough on my training for the next three days.
I’m at the library, trying to finish reading a text written in the most complicated Ekiosh I’ve ever seen, when two Ezkai arrive. I know exactlywhythey’re there.
