There is a defiant glint in her eyes, but she doesn’t say whatever she’s thinking. Instead, she just nods. “I’ll be down in a minute.”
I leave her room, feeling like a child fleeing.
12
Rue
When Dryas leaves my room, I steady myself on an overstuffed chair.
Breathe. That man doesn’t control you, no more than Father Derrik did.
That doesn’t stop my racing heart, though. For a second, when I saw him, I was genuinely glad. That’s before the reality came rushing in like a cold bucket of ice water being dumped over my head.
Dryas made a move toward me, and pain instantly flared to life in my knees and my throat. If you looked hard enough, you could just make out the last of the bruises fading away from my skin.
I flinched.
He noticed with a wince.
So, while his tall, dominating presence and his clean masculine scent are so appealing to me… they make me wish that we were naked together, Dryas doing unspeakably hot things to my body.
But there is a mental block in place, hard and fast. And I have no idea how to embrace Dryas without flinching away.
Gathering my wits, I head downstairs into the kitchen. My heart is still beating like a hummingbird’s; his mere presence is enough to ensure that. I can feel ghostly hands squeezing my knees and choking my throat, which puts me even more on edge.
When I find him at the kitchen counter, he is just pouring coffee from a steaming carafe into two matching handmade mugs. He turns, his lips quirking as he sees me.
“Sit,” he says, nodding to the island. How very himself he is in this moment, ordering me to do what he wants ever so casually.
I suck my bottom lip between my teeth, taking a seat at the bar. Dryas pours a little bit of cream into one of the mugs, then hands it across the bar. Still skittish, I let him set it down rather than taking the coffee from his hands. Touching him seems like a very bad idea, though I’m not sure of the outcome.
He frowns a little but doesn’t say anything. He just sips his steaming hot coffee. I do the same, blowing on its creamy surface a little first. It’s good if a little bitter. We didn’t have coffee at the convent, so the only times I’ve had it have been with Dryas.
Eyeing him over the rim of my coffee cup, I try to figure out what he wants. He’s expecting something from me, I can tell that much. An apology, perhaps?
“I’m sorry that I picked a fight with you,” I blurt out. The words are out of my mouth before I’ve even considered them.
His yellow-green eyes fixate on me. “I’m more concerned with the fact that you ran away afterward. Where did you think you were going to get to?”
I’m taken aback by that for a minute. “You still think I ran away?”
He sets down his mug of coffee suddenly and dark brown liquid sloshes over the side. “You still insist that you didn’t?”
I push my mug back on the counter, crossing my arms. I’m upset, the specific kind where you’re so mad that you’re on the brink of tears. I swallow the lump building in my throat. “If you had asked me, I would have told you exactly what happened. But you didn’t. You made up your mind without even talking to me. And then—”
I cut myself short before I can say what I’m feeling. A stubborn little part of me wants to accuse him the way he did to me.
Dryas bites his lower lip. “You’re saying you didn’t run away?”
I can’t help but lose my temper. “Yes, Dryas! I’m saying that I went for a walk and I was accosted by a stranger on the cliffs.”
His eyes narrow in a way that means he’s doing some mental math. “Where I found your necklace, you mean?”
Looking down, I pluck my necklace up from my skin. “You found it? I was wondering how it got back to me in one piece.”
“It didn’t. The little bird was shattered. I paid the original jeweler to reshape it.”
Again, I’m taken aback by that knowledge. I close my fingers around the bird, unsure how to feel about what he just told me.
He continues after a moment. “So, I am to believe that you were abducted just outside the castle?”
“Not abducted, I was pushed off the cliffs by a crazy man who worked for Father Derrik. I—” I pause, trying not to let emotion overrun my voice, though I fear it is too late. “I almost drowned, Dryas.”
I watch that sink in. “You’re saying that you went over the cliffs down into the ocean out there?” He shakes his head. “That’s impossible.”
Seething, I clench my fists. “It happened. If that strange man hadn’t been on his boat nearby, I wouldn’t have made it.”
“What man? The one I killed?”
I nod. “Yes. Don’t feel too bad, though. He worked for Father Derrik too, like Rafi. And… he was a very bad man. He tried to— you know— be with me. When I fought back, he shredded my leg.”
Dryas is silent for a long moment, his jaw clenching. He comes around the island, not stopping until he is practically on top of me. He looks down, those jungle cat’s eyes boring into mine. “He fished you out of the water and told you all of this before he tried to hurt you?”
He’s so close, nearly touching. I can feel the heat radiating from his body. I feel a pull toward him, to bury myself in his strong arms. To beg him to protect me from Father Derrik.
Who will protect me from Dryas if he turns violent again, though?
I press my knees together. My eyes narrow on his face. “I woke up in a shack, with the door chained shut. After he tried to… after that, he locked me up again. He was waiting for Rafi to come to meet him, I guess. I had no choice but to run.”
Dryas has no response for that, it seems. He just stares down at me, a million emotions warring for supremacy in his expression. I swallow, my throat working. My eyes are misty. I’m on the verge of being overrun with feelings and emotions, so much of it bottled up inside, clawing at the inside of my chest and scratching up my throat to get out.
He raises his hand to cup my cheek. I flinch and immediately see regret written plainly across his features. He does it anyway, his big hand easily dwarfing my face. I lean into his hot hand, closing my eyes for a heartbeat. Tears gather in the corners of my eyes, welling.
“Rue,” he whispers.
I open my eyes, tears slipping down my face. I look at him, standing so tall and so broad. He bends his head down, his lips finding mine in a searing kiss.
No words of condolence or apology have been said aloud, but it’s enough for now. Because I’m kissing him.
He is so warm. He stands for protection.
I won’t regret this later… will I?
But then he spears his free hand into my hair and deepens the kiss. My breath is entangled with his, as my hands find his face, his strong shoulders, his magnificent chest.
He sweeps me up in his arms, carrying me as if I weigh nothing at all. We only make it as far as the living room before he deposits me on a couch, my chest heaving.
A second later, he’s pulling down my leggings. He flips me over, putting my face in the crease of the couch. I feel the blunt head of his cock nudging my entrance.
God help me, I want it. I want to feel warm and protected, even if it’s just for these few minutes. I push my butt back as he drives forward, filling my pussy to the very limit.
“Fuck, karthoula mou,” he grits out. “It’s been too long. I’m not going to last.”
He starts to withdraw, but I reach back, grabbing his arm awkwardly. “Don’t you dare stop.”
Dryas grabs my hips and starts pounding his cock into me, in a way that is brutal and wicked. He grabs my hair, wrapping it around his fist. The harshness of that seems to spur me on. My clit aches with a need that is greater than anything I’ve ever felt before.
Wetting two fingertips in my mouth, I slip them down and start to rub my own clit. It feels good… no, it feels great. My eyes flutter shut, I open my mouth and these needy sounds start escaping.
“Oh, fuck,”
Dryas says, his hips working so hard and so fast that he’s just on the edge of hurting me.
I teeter on that edge, loving and hating the way he touches me. My fingers working their magic, circling my clit.
When I come, it’s all at once, an explosion of color and sound and ragged breaths. Dryas finishes with a final brutal thrust, filling my pussy with his hot seed.
He takes a second to withdraw, breathing and delicately running his fingers down my spine. He does, at last, pulling me down onto the ground with him.
When we lie there, my head on his chest, he seems far away. I run my fingers over the smooth vee of muscle at his hip. His body jumps, and he refocuses his eyes on me.
“How was your second time?” His lips curl upward, while my heart plummets at his words. “What, did I do something you did not like? Because it sure as fuck didn’t sound like that just a few minutes ago…”
Though I know better, I can’t help myself. Just like the last time, there are bitter words on the tip of my tongue. Just like last time, they are spawned out of a deep sense of shame and self-loathing at my core.
This isn’t my second time, not even with him. But how do I explain that we had sex when he was too drunk to remember it?
Besides, even if it was really my second time with him… it’s not as if I came to him clean and pure. And it feels like the worst lie of all to let him think that.
So instead, I pick a fight. “You haven’t said you’re sorry, you know.”
Sitting up, I start gathering my clothes, angry and hateful, unsure how to turn it inside instead of spewing vitriol onto everything I see.
Dryas sits up too, his eyes narrowing. “Is this how you respond to being fucked the way you ought to be fucked?”
Furious, I gather my things and storm out of the room. I don’t want Dryas to see the river of tears that I am about to cry.
13
Rue
Things are unsteady between us for a while. I find myself brooding a lot, feeling like I’m hiding something from Dryas that is so big and so unforgivable that I can’t even say it aloud.
Not even that — I don’t even have words for the things that I let Father Derrik do to me. Replaying all my time at the convent, every single confession ever heard by him… it is almost physically painful to think about.
Focusing especially on all the punishments doled out makes me cringe. I have this image of myself kneeling in Sister Marguerites’ office, my heart beating fast, feeling the weight of Father Derrik’s hand coming down on my shoulder.
The way my lungs hurt after each time I remember it. It’s like being hit with a lead pipe across the back, time and time again.
A thousand memories of pain and shame, all consolidated into five seconds, played back on repeat.
If I think about it too much, I get so upset that I am literally nauseated by it. Looking at Dryas only makes the burning acid pit of my stomach hurt worse. Not to mention the fact that I’m sort of angry that he can’t actually say he’s sorry.
So, I stay quiet. I know why I’m quiet, but Dryas is also prone to moodiness and staring broodingly into the distance. We are quite a pair, the two of us.
I do summon the courage to ask Dryas for something in the waning light of one evening. He’s outside on the verandah, where he’s been a lot lately.
When I step outside, I notice an unopened wine bottle sitting on the ground. He doesn’t seem to notice it, instead focused on the blue-green waves. He’s absorbed in his thoughts, so much so that when I call his name he starts.
“Dryas?” I say, questioningly. “What are you doing out here?”
He turns, frowning. “I am thinking.”
Stepping closer to the balcony rail, I run my fingers along it, peering down to where the rocks meet the sea. “I’ve been thinking too.”
He raises a brow but doesn’t comment. I push onward.
“Could I have a computer?” I ask, blushing. “To research the Rebel King. Maybe also to look at finding more outings we can go to, like Cimiez?”
He doesn’t say anything, and for a moment I worry that I have asked for too much. But then he just shrugs his shoulders. “Of course. That was a nice day when we went to Cimiez, was it not?”
He seems so melancholy, leaning over the balcony rail. I reach out, my fingers almost touching him. He glances at my outstretched hand blankly, blinking.
As quick as that, I crumple pulling my hand back. Wherever Dryas is, whatever murkiness he’s struggling through, he isn’t interested in my help.
“It was nice,” I say in a quavering voice. I’ve never felt so small as I do right now when I’m faced with the unstoppable wall of Dryas’s bleak mood. “You’d like to go for another excursion if I planned it?”
He just dips his head in response. “I will have a computer brought to the house for you as soon as possible.”
Then he turns away, the movement unsubtly telling me to leave. Turning around to go back into the house, I almost kick the unopened wine bottle. Glancing at Dryas’s back, I bend down and pick it up, carrying it back into the house.
Unsure what I’m supposed to do with it, I hide the bottle in one of the heavy cabinets in the formal dining room. Heading back upstairs, Dryas’s gloomy expression sticks with me as I pull out my colored pencil. I start sketching the broad outlines of his face and his upper body as they were downstairs on the verandah, staring into the ocean.
I wonder what he’s thinking about. My drawing comes together slowly, his arms propped up on the rail, his hunched shoulders, his broad back. I get his hair nearly perfect, a dark uncouth sheaf. His nose, that comes easily too.
But when it comes to drawing his expressive mouth or his intoxicating chartreuse eyes, I can only sketch in the vaguest bits. The rest is a mystery to me.
The question is whether that mystery will resolve itself with more time and familiarity or not. Maybe Dryas will always be just beyond my reach and my understanding.
When I venture back downstairs with food in mind, I find a sleek new laptop waiting for me on the kitchen island. I’m excited; I’ve never owned anything as space age as the sleek silver laptop that I pry from the box.
I force myself to eat first, then I turn the laptop on. It knows my name somehow.
Welcome, Rue.
That fades away, leaving a screen of shiny new apps for me to comb through. After trying a few, I pull up the computer’s search and ask it to take me to information about the Rebel King.
Suddenly, it’s all there for me, within my reach. A page comes up with a million different results. I look at the first one, labeled Wikipedia. It says: The Rebel King or Declan Stewart was…
I click on it, changing the page. The first thing I’m struck by is how awesome this computer is. So much power and knowledge, at my fingertips. It makes a frisson of excitement skate down my spine.
The second thing I’m struck by is an image of the Rebel King himself. Scrolling down, I take in his dark hair and red beard, his strikingly high cheekbones and ginger eyebrows. He’s frowning gently at the camera as if in the next instant he would reach out and sweep the camera away out of the photographer’s grasp.
My breath catches. This man looks an awful lot like me. I picture my mum in my mind, blonde and lovely, all cheekbones and pouty lips. I try to mix and match that picture with the one before me.
If I had to guess what a girl borne of my mother and the Rebel King would look like, she would look an awful lot like me. I blush as I realize that it could be that I’m just guessing. Maybe the Rebel King never met my mother, much less impregnated her.
Looking at his photo though, I have to admit that it is not impossible.
After looking my fill, I turn to the information besides the image. Apparently, the Rebel King got his name because several attempts were made on his life as early as age twelve, all from the French, English, and Montenegrin thrones. A young man with Scottish and French royal blood, he traveled with an elite army of mercenaries, always on the lo
okout for assassins.
There are a few paragraphs about what he was like and what his goals were, which I skim. There are several lines indicating that the Rebel King might have been a vain man; he liked to stamp his name on armor and weapons, even on his personal items. There is an image of the Rebel King’s logo, the R reversed to mirror the K, both done in a swirling font.
It looks vaguely familiar to me, but then again, I’m not sure how much I recognize and how much I would like to.
Scrolling down the page, I stop at a section titled Last Rebellion and Death. It hits me like a wave.
His death.
This man, who may or may not be my father, is dead. I mean, of course, he is. It wouldn’t make sense any other way. But I still feel a pang of sadness, knowing that I could never meet him.
Blowing out a breath, I skim the paragraph. It basically says that the Rebel King died in a blaze of glory, surrounded by his legion of mercenaries.
There is a last bit of information in a section titled The Legacy of The Rebel King. It says that the loss of his line has put some royal families at ease while putting others on edge. For those that wish to challenge any of the thrones, Stuart’s lineage would be the thing they needed to establish authority. He has had several people try to claim his throne, only to have their claims revealed to be illegitimate.
Well, now it makes a ton of sense why Father Derrik would want to keep an eye on me and Amabel. It makes even more sense that Prince Henrik would be in on the whole insidious affair, too.
It also suddenly makes me wonder where Amabel is. Did she return to the covent? Does Father Derrik do to her what he did to me?
I shudder, the idea sends cold fingers down my spine. At the same time though, I did try to warn her. I couldn’t say the words, but I was so afraid of him every time I saw him. Surely, she must have picked up on that pattern.
Knowing Ama, she probably did and chalked it up to my wickedness or something. How am I supposed to protect her if she so obviously doesn’t want to hear the truth?
Possess: Protect Book 3 Page 6