Page 39 of Wolf Caged
Kaeleron’s gaze bore into me but I refused to look at him or end my perusal and enjoyment of the room. The most elegant room I had ever set foot in. A room fit for a castle and its king.
“Eat,” he growled.
I somehow made it through the soup with all the genteel manners a fae king might expect, but the delicious warmth of it didn’t satisfy the deep craving for something more substantial—for meat. I set the empty bowl aside and longingly looked at the platters just beyond arm’s reach.
While Kaeleron was watching the fire rather than me, I stealthily leaned over the table and reached for the nearest platters of meat, my senses focused on him as I snared my prize. I piled what looked like beef and chicken onto my plate, together with a pie that smelled of pork and herbs.
It was only when I sat back, my prize secured, and had stuffed an overly-ladened forkful of meat into my mouth and bit back a moan at the juiciness of it, that I noticed Kaeleron was now staring at me.
I chewed and swallowed, hating how vulnerable and exposed I felt as some part of me waited for him to comment on my behaviour.
When he said nothing, simply continued to stare at me, I bit out, “What?”
He swept his hand out towards the vegetables with a regal elegance that only made me feel the difference between our table manners even more fiercely.
“You’re welcome to them,” I sniped, feeling it was too late now to act civilised so I might as well act like myself rather than trying to please a male who had sunk so low as to buy another person. I was better than him, even if my manners weren’t quite as refined. “Don’t hold back on my account.”
I jabbed my fork into another slice of beef and devoured it as I stared right at him, my wolf side rumbling in approval.
“I should have presumed a wolf would prefer meat.” Kaeleron eased back to lounge in his chair again, as if it were a throne and he was holding court, a challenge in his eyes as he swirled his wine. “I have something you can wrap your pretty lips around if you like the taste of meat.”
I didn’t miss a beat. “I’ll bite it off.”
I snapped short fangs for emphasis.
His throaty chuckle was alarmingly thrilling as he held my gaze, the bold challenge in his eyes joined by a glimmer of amusement, and then his focus shifted to his drink, freeing me of his hold. I wasn’t sure how he did that. Was it some kind of power he had? His gaze was magnetic and demanding, holding me fast at times, even when I wanted to look at anything but him.
Silence stretched between us, pulling something inside me taut as I struggled to find something to say while shovelling more meat into my mouth. He had brought me here for conversation, and if I failed to provide it, he might deem tonight a failure and not reduce my debt.
“You’ve barely touched your food.” I waved a fork at his plate and the terribly balanced meal he had selected for himself. Far too many vegetables. Not enough meat. I had thought someone with so much honed muscle would be packing in the protein at mealtimes. I cut a piece of the pie, placed it in my mouth and almost moaned as the salty pork hit my tongue, denying it so he wouldn’t get the satisfaction of hearing it. As I chewed, I looked at all the food on the table, enough to feed my entire pack. “This is wasteful. At my pack, we never waste anything.”
I hesitated as words rose on my tongue, my heart demanding I voice them.
“Speak.” Ever the king, Kaeleron waved regally in my direction.
I added observant to his list of qualities, ones Neve had failed to mention, mostly because she had spent a lot of our time together trying to make me believe he wasn’t a monster.
“I need to contact my pack.” The sound of my fork hitting my plate was loud in the heavy silence, jarring me, and I struggled to hold his gaze as his eyes darkened and his fine brows lowered, narrowing them on me.
“No.”
I bared fangs at him and shoved back from the table. Or I had intended to shove back from it. Rather than my chair moving, the table did, shooting towards the fae king as the legs scraped loudly over the marble floor.
He braced one hand against it and arched a brow at me.
It hadn’t been an act of retaliation.
My body locked up tight anyway, bracing for his wrath.
Rather than punishing me for apparently trying to hit him with a table, he gently eased it back into place and continued to study me, the scrutiny making me want to squirm in my seat.
“I will not allow you to contact your pack.” His words were careful, coming out slowly, as if he was considering what he would allow as he spoke and hadn’t quite decided which course of action to settle on yet. “But I will consider writing to them to let them know you are safe.”
It was more than I expected, but I still said, “Will you let them know where I am?”
“No.” That word was hard and unyielding, a flat denial that I knew I wouldn’t be able to bend into a maybe let alone a yes. He set his glass down on the table, shadows forming across his broad shoulders as he gazed at me, his expression as cold and firm as his denial had been. “I will not disclose your location. I will not be responsible for your family attempting to navigate Lucia to reach you and getting themselves killed.”
I hadn’t even considered they might try to find me, but as I absorbed those words, it hit me that they would. My parents would do as I asked if I told them I was fine and safe for now and would return to them, and explained the dangers of where I was.
