Page 48 of The Blood that Binds Us

Aldred prowls between the rows, surveying the armies he commands and stopping to correct mistakes. Mistakes that could be the difference between killing and being killed on an unforgiving battlefield. He pauses next to Ileana where the Black Hand duels with a male partner much larger than herself, and they both lower their weapons at once. Aldred adjusts her stance, shifting the position of her hips and shoulders, then has her raise the sword in her slender hand once more.

My stare darts back to Sin as he extends a hand to his partner, heaving him off the ground and back to his feet. He wears the same steel plate over his bare chest and back, his long, sculpted arms exposed on either side. Molded to his thick thighs are black leather fighting pants—pants that leave little to the imagination of the powerful, muscled legs beneath them.

I call out his title, my voice falling from my lips softer than I meant and out of place amidst the tense surroundings. Even the air out here is a honed knife, sharp enough to cut through flesh should one take a careless step.

Even under the armored plate, I see the tensing of his shoulders when he hears my voice, and he rolls his neck once before turning to face me.

I swallow my gasp.

It has only been a few hours since we parted ways, but the chilling intensity of him clad in his silver armor nearly knocks me back a step. His eyes, bright as stars in the midnight sky, widen for a mere second before his usual hard stare slams down. He assesses me from head to toe, either checking me for lingering damage or scanning for new hidden weapons on my body.

“We need to speak. Privately,” I add.

He shoots a quick glance around us. “How private?”

“Very.”

His dark eyebrow threatens to touch his hairline, but after a quick read of the nerves surely written on my face, Sin nods and turns to dismiss his partner as he sheathes the weapon at his hip.

I follow him through the double doors of the southern entrance and up a winding staircase. My feet scramble to take twice as many steps as him to keep up with his long legs as he ventures down a long corridor that spills into the wing that contains his study.

Sin stops at a door with an arched threshold and presses his palm to the wood to unlock it before pushing it open and stepping inside. When I enter behind him, a sudden rush of heat floods my cheeks as I take in what room we now stand in.

His bedroom.

A massive bed with a towering head and footboard of black stained wood juts from the wall to my left, a golden blanket draped over the red sheets. A couple armoires crafted from the same ebony wood line the opposite wall, and thick, pewter rugs are thrown tastefully about the polished stone flooring. A large chair made of what appears to be buttery soft black leather sits in the far corner, next to a decorative table with a decanter filled with a garnet-colored mead. The walls are devoid of art, merely painted with the same gray and silvery patterns as the rest of the castle’s interior walls. A set of double doors on the far wall open to a balcony, and I glimpse a few plants adorned with simple, decorative pots dotting the outside space.

“You said we needed privacy, and I can’t think of a more private place in the entire keep. They know not to disturb me here.”

The ice in his words suggests a few may have made that mistake before and would surely never make it again. Sin leans against one of the armoires, this one having a wide mirror attached to the side of it, and crosses his arms. An invitation for me to begin.

Suddenly feeling awkward standing in the center of the room, now too aware of myself and not knowing what to do with my hands, I clasp them together and pin them against my waist.

“You never asked what I learned when I tried locating my sister back at the cabin.”

He shrugs a rounded shoulder. “Why would it be of any importance to me where they’re keeping her? It’s not as if I was going to escort you to a Legion camp so you could entangle us both in your mess.”

I scoff at his blatant disregard for my sister’s predicament. “You needn’t worry about that, Your Grace, because I do not know where she is, and even if I had been successful in locating her whereabouts, I would not require an escort, and surely not from the likes ofyou.” The words spill from my mouth with frustrated haste.

“If you were unable to perform a simple locator spell, perhaps I’ve overestimated your power.”

“I was perfectly able to,you arrogant asshole,but they’re hiding her location with a cloaking spell.”

He crosses the distance between us in one step of his long legs, his large hand cupping the entirety of my throat as he pushes my shoulders against the wall. I claw at his hands, and his grip tightens, restricting my airway almost completely.

“Such a filthy mouth you have. I’m beginning to think you enjoy my hands around your throat, little witch.”

I swallow hard under his too-large hands, willing my pulse to stop pounding wildly under his fingers and failing.

He inhales deeply, his nostrils flaring as a gleam of what can only be described as pure sin flashes in his forested eyes. “It certainly smells like you do.”

Lifting my foot up, I slam it down on his with as much force as I can muster through my now darkening vision. He chuckles softly like my assault was nothing more than a feather quill tickling his foot, but he releases me, taking a few steps back.

“You’re an animal,” I seethe, rubbing my neck as if I could massage away the imprint of Sin’s callused fingertips, and sucking in a deep breath of air.

He smirks. “I’ve been called worse.”

“As I was saying,they’ve hidden her with a cloaking spell which means they don’t want me finding her. And if they don’t want me coming to them, it must mean they intend to bring her to me.”

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