Page 257 of The Throne Seeker
Tristan was immediately outraged. “The hell you’re leaving!”
Roman’s glare shifted back to her with a knowing look.
“You’re not taking her anywhere. Are you both out of your minds?” Tristan looked back and forth between the two of them. “The safest place for her is here! And you know that, you selfish bastard. You just don’t want to stay because you know if you stay long enough, she’ll come to her senses and leave you. She’ll see you manipulated her.”
Roman punched him in the face.
Rose flinched.
Tristan’s mouth dripped blood again, likely from the same blow Xavier gave him only hours earlier.
“This is treason!” Tristan shouted at Roman.
Roman didn’t care.
“Rose, please,” Tristan begged. “Please don’t do this.”
She diverted her eyes as she wrapped her arms around herself.
“Don’t look at her,” Roman growled, grabbing Tristan’s jaw and snapping his face back to his. “Look at me.I’mdoing this. Not her.”
Tristan jerked his chin from Roman’s grip, ignoring him. He looked at Rose again with desperate eyes. “Rose. Don’t leave again, please. We can?—”
Roman had had enough. He placed a gag roughly over Tristan’s mouth, tying it with aggressive tugs. “Let’s go,” he grumbled. He grabbed his sword off the floor, marching for the door.
Rose hesitated, looking back at Tristan’s pitiful frame. His eye was already swelling from Roman’s strike, the blood trickling from the corner of his mouth. His eyes still pleaded with her, though they were full of betrayal. He tried to say something, but the gag reduced his words to incoherent mumbles.
Roman moved to where she was standing and gently but firmly took her shoulders, twisting her to face him. “We need to go now. If anyone finds him before we leave, we’ll be sitting ducks.”
Rose nodded weakly.
Roman removed his cloak and set it over her shoulders, covering all that was left of her slip and throwing the hood over her head. With a nod, she followed. When she reached the door, she looked back at Tristan one last time.
She wished she hadn’t.
Tristan’s betrayed eyes gouged hers, ripping her soul to shreds. She felt every dark part of him—his unworthiness, his love, his pain, the endless pit of darkness he was falling into. The storm that had been brewing had morphed into a terrifying tsunami.
“I’m so sorry,” she whispered, looking at him through blurred vision.
She could still hear his muffled cries through the gag as she closed the door.
Roman had her things waiting for her outside the door. She grabbed her sword and bag. The corridors were blissfully empty, suggesting that most of the court had remained in the grand hall for the passing ceremony celebration. Roman helped her into a new dress, covering her exposed body with his cloak as she put it on as quickly as she could, eager to put as much distance as possible between herself and this place.
Roman was silent as they moved through the halls. He wouldn’t even look at her. His powerful strides urged her to almost run to keep pace as they headed to the stables where they had all agreed to meet.
“Roman,” she whispered so softly, she was surprised he heard it.
His eyes met hers for the first time since they’d left Tristan’s room.
“It was a mistake to leave him like that,” she said, risking angering him.
“You think I wanted that?” He rounded on her. “To part ways with my brother like that? But you just couldn’t help yourself, could you?”
“I’m sorry. I should’ve never gone in there,” she admitted with regret.
“No, you shouldn’t have,” he agreed harshly. “So why did you?”
“Satin came to the room,” she explained. “She was so upset. She told me she was worried about Tristan and didn’t know who else to turn to. I couldn’t tell her no.”
