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“You touch her like that again and I’ll break your fucking ribs,” I snarled at him.

The guards laughed heartily as they pulled me away. “Give it a rest, Norahi”.

The guard who had a hold of Elara jerked her back towards the thrones, and she tried to cover her face with her hands as she cried. The guard held her hands down by her sides.

“You watch while they drag your lover away, you filthy whore,” he said to her with a hacking laugh.

My rage flared so violently it felt like my face was on fire, and I threw the guards off me, aware of a bone snapping as I put my foot into someone’s leg. I stormed to the guard holding Elara, whose sneer quickly dissipated as he stumbled away from her.

I seized him by the neck. “What the fuck did you say to her?”

He gasped and spluttered, looking to Theron for intervention, but none came. Even the other guards must have been stopped, for no one rushed at me, trying to get me off this simpering fool.

I pounded a fist into the guard’s side, feeling bone give away. The guard’s eyes widened as he sucked in a croaking breath. I threw him to the ground and stomped on his ribcage, satisfied when I felt more ribs breaking, and then I couldn’t stop myself, all the rage and hatred and anger I bore Theron but could not take out on him, making me blind.

By the time I managed to breathe again, by the time my vision cleared of the red haze that had enveloped me, the guard was dead. A bloody, twisted torso, mouth torn open in his last moments of immense pain.

Theron was laughing. I turned to him, blood on my fists, splattered all over my legs. Elara’s face was white with shock, her hands trembling.

“You see, dear one?” Theron said, ambling down the stairs of the dais. “This is who your beloved truly is.”

“You baited him,” Elara said, her shoulders heaving. “You baited both of us. This is all a game to you.”

“He’s a murderer,” Theron spat, his head snapping towards her. “A cold-blooded killer. An animal.”

The collective gasp in the throne room as Elara launched herself at Theron was almost deafening. I took a step back in surprise myself, watching as Elara knocked Theron to the ground, her fists pounding into his face.

“HE IS NOT AN ANIMAL!” She screamed. “YOU’RE THE FUCKING ANIMAL! YOU’RE A FUCKING RAPIST AND A MURDERER!” Her fist landed in his throat, and I sank to my knees as the breath was knocked out of me, my hands clutching my neck.

Elara stopped instantly, and her face twisted from anger to anguish. “Oh Gods, what have I done?” She scrambled across the floor towards me. “Rook, my love, I’m sorry, oh Gods, I’m so sorry.” She’d almost reached me when the guards seized her, dragging her away from me as she cried out for me.

“I’m alright,” I called after her in a broken voice. “It’s alright, my love.”

Theron sat up, laughing as blood ran down his chin. “Take the Princess back to her quarters,” he said, getting to his feet. “And take the prince back to his chambers. Ensure he does not leave, and see to it that the restrictions in his mark now extend to trying to reach out to his beloved over this fucking Bond.”

“No!” Elara screamed as they hauled her out of the throne room. “Rook! NO! NO!”

Her voice was in my head, calling out to me as she was taken further and further away. But then the mark began to burn, and the searing pain tearing at the back of my head drowned her voice out.

She sensed my pain, and with a knot of anguish that threatened to cut off my breathing, she let go of me.

Chapter39

Rook

The silence in my head was terrible. It was worse than hearing her and knowing she was within reach and yet so far away. At least I’d been able to hear her. Now I could merely feel her sadness and hopelessness roiling in my chest like an ocean in a storm, but I couldn’t tell her I loved her, that I was alright. Nothing.

I lay on my bed, staring at the ceiling, and thought of nothing but her. Her smile, the high tinkling sound of her laugh. The feeling of her hair running through my fingers. Her breath against my skin. The taste of her lips. The taste of…

With a sigh I rolled on to my side. Rain dripped in through the broken window. I shouldn’t have been thinking about sex, not now. But once the thought crept into my head it was all I could think of. Elara’s legs wrapped around my waist, her sweat on my skin, her moans as I drove myself into her.

Sex with Elara wasn’t just sex. I’d never experienced anything like it before.

It was more than love, more than a physical experience, more than a feeling or an emotion. I had never lost myself in another person like that. I was joined with her, and she possessed all of me so completely that it hurt.

The sharp wrench in my chest almost distracted me from the growing bulge in my groin, and I groaned with frustration. I wanted to get her out of here. I wanted to hold her in my arms, and make sure she was safe, take her home. And then I wanted to fuck her relentlessly for a week.

My arousal must have been more overwhelming than I realized, because there was a brief flare of confusion in my chest. Elara could still feel what I was feeling. Quickly confusion gave way to something warm and soft, and I sensed her thoughts mirrored my own, tracing over my skin like velvet.