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Every inch of me was whirling beneath Fletcher’s glare. I dared not even catch a glimpse of him, afraid it’d tear me apart from the inside out. And I would not give Fletcher that satisfaction.

I kept my eyes down on my golden shackles, fighting through his harsh, unwavering gaze that weighed on me like he owned me. To be in the same room as him, no barrier between us, was deadly to us both. My body heated as his scent constricted around my throat.

I lifted my gaze to the end of the bed only to gauge how far away he was.

I was caught off guard when I glimpsed his tall figure looming in the corner like a dark shadow as he took a step closer.

“Ripley…” His voice was smooth and velvety, and I hated that it reminded me of the Fletcher I had fallen in love with.

“You’d be smart to keep your distance. I will rip your heart out with my teeth.” I lowered my eyes back to the shackles and resumed my gnawing. With the cuff still in my mouth, I mumbled, “Say what you want and be quick ’cause I’m close to getting these off.”

Fletcher moved like a lion in the presence of a gazelle as he slowly sat on the end of the bed, just out of my reach. “Look at me.” It was a plea, not a request.

His ask spidered up my body. If I were to look at him, I was unsure what would happen. Mostly, I was still afraid of what I might feel for him. Afraid it would be something other than rage, and fury, and fight. “No,” I gritted through my teeth.

There was a beat of silence before I saw his hand slide across the covers an inch as if he knew the gesture would be in my peripheral vision, coaxing me to look up. “Please.”

I drew my eyes even farther away to shield myself from his form.

But just seeing his hand made the tears claw up my throat with uncertain emotion.

Being a victim under his heated gaze only made me crave my old Fletcher.

The one who had made me feel worthy, accepted, brave, and loved.

The one I was naive to and ignorant of. I loved that Fletcher.

But I was in love with a nonexistent version he had created, tailored to make me fall for him.

This stranger in front of me was a shell of what I missed.

I kept my mouth pressed shut and chewed on the metal again, tears now snaking up to my eyes.

They fell over the Cidris’s shackle as I kept biting Aldris’s cuff.

I knew he saw the tears and would soon prey upon that weakness. But then he surprised me by letting loose a shallow sigh. In a low, barely audible murmur, he said, “I can’t imagine how much you hate me right now.”

“I can.” Yes. That felt good. Anger was fitting, satisfying. And as he spoke, I harnessed it, sending away the sadness—the fear.

His voice turned to a quiet confidence. “It was never my intention or my plan to have the Cidris find you—”

“At least not before you got your magic back, right?” I said in between bites .

When my remark was met with silence, I was tempted to look up. I wanted to see pain twisting on his face. Nothing would please me more. But, I kept true to my task as I continued working on the cuff.

“You’re wrong.”

I stopped. I had been wrong in the past wherever Fletcher was concerned, but I didn’t dare fall in the same trap twice. “When I get out of this, I’m going to find a way to obliterate your magic.”

“Do whatever you want with my magic.” His voice cracked in a way that made me think he was on the verge of tears. “It’s yours.”

The answer caught me off guard. He had wanted nothing more than to get this lilac magic back into his body.

He had claimed I had stolen it from him when we were little and journeyed with me all that way to get it back.

And now, he was just ready to surrender?

I didn’t want to dive into anything that caused me to sympathize with him, so I ordered, “Uncuff me.”

“Not before I tell you that I’ve only cared about one thing my entire, miserable life.

One thing that has been on the forefront of my mind for two decades.

And that’s you, Ripley. I’ve only ever cared about you.

Since the night the ritual started when you were four, I felt it in my blood.

I felt you in my blood. Your magic called to me, and I came for you. ”

“Shut up,” I bit out, not wanting to hear his pathetic excuse on why he had betrayed and tortured me.

He raised his voice and steamrolled over me, the conviction in his words demanding my attention.

“It has always only been you. I can feel when you’re hurting.

I can feel when you’re sad. And I felt it the whole seventeen years we were apart.

Every time your awful mother put you in that chair to bleed you dry, she bled me dry too.

Every time I pressed that button on your cage, I felt your pain. When you hurt, I hurt.”

There was a pause in his story, and I clenched my teeth, hoping it was over. But the silence only allowed him to crawl into my mind and nestle there like a relentless virus.

“I even know that you won’t look at me because you’re afraid of what you’ll feel for me. But, listen to me when I say it’s my purpose in life to protect you.”

Blood dripped off my teeth when the cuff shifted and slid up my gum forcefully. I stopped to swallow. “Then you failed,” I snarled, enunciating every syllable .

That shut him up for a long stretch of silence. Silence that choked me. He only cared about me? Had he cared about me when he smashed that red button? When his friends leered at me like I was a piece of meat? When he shoved me into the group of Cidris leaders who smacked me across the skull?

“Listen to me carefully, Ripley. I only joined the Cidris because they had the resources I needed to find you. Without them, you’d still be in that tower with that awful woman who you call Mother.”

“And far better off than ever having met you!” I barked, eyes down at my lap.

“I know you don’t mean that.”

He might be right. But he also might be wrong.

“I was taking you to Elizy where you could live worry free from the Cidris and your mother. I really don’t know how they were able to track me down when I was in the hills with you that day. I was devastated, Ripley! I was pretending .”

“I bet the money helped,” I said flatly.

His lack of response once again tempted me to look up at him. I’d hurt him and I was desperate to see how much.

“It was the only option I had. If they knew I had feelings for you and knew I was a traitor… god, there wo uld be so many terrible outcomes where we both ended up dead.”

Impulsively, my eyes lifted back to his hand that was still planted on the blanket in front of me.

“What about the outcome where you drink my blood and torture me day in and day out for two fucking months, Fletcher!” With my words, pressure built in my head, straining the veins in my neck as spit came off my lips with his name.

He withdrew his hand with a groan. “I had to drink your blood. I had to keep you drained at all times so no one else got their hands on it.”

“Why? Why not share me with all your buddies? They all looked at me anyway. Daydreaming about being with me. Did you just relish in the way they stared at me?”

“Stop what you’re saying, right now.”

I didn’t. I just spoke louder and faster. “They lingered on me longer than any other woman. They fantasized about me. Fucking me with their eyes.”

“Rip—ley,” he ground out of clenched teeth.

“And I felt every second of it.”

“Please,” he urged, a noticeable lilt in his voice surprising me, “stop.”

“They wanted to do more than just drink me. ”

His hand slapped the mattress with a loud thump. “Stop, Ripley, and look at me!” The new grit that entered his tone was both torturous and satisfying.

“Or did they already taste me? Huh? Did you share me with them?”

“I would never share you with anyone.”

“Did you guys go back to your rooms, have a heyday of all different bottles of blood? How many other women did you drink from?”

“The only blood I have ever drank is yours. And the only reason I did it was because your blood is vastly different than everyone else’s because of your royal bloodline.”

“Bullshit,” I screamed.

“Your royal blood doesn’t just heal like all those other Elizians.

It lets the drinker use your magic. I was keeping your secret safe .

If I didn’t… you…” that lilt made itself present again.

“If they found out they had Princess Ripley in their midst, they would have taken you… they would have bred you relentlessly, drained you until you withered to dust. They would have tortured and used you as a bargaining chip to get the king and queen to lower the barriers around Elizy, to capture the entire kingdom. I had no other choice. I had to protect you and your magic. ”

I sneered, “How righteous of you to say after drinking my blood to use my magic.”

“Please, Ripley. I can’t go on like this anymore. You have to believe me.”

I had thought by now he’d be back to his gritty-textured voice of the corrupt Fletcher, but it remained soft, like the man I’d traveled with two months ago.

“I had to drink enough at all times in case I had the opportunity to get you out safely. Those cages are magic proof. I couldn’t go in and grab you or I would have the second I had your magic.

I had to wait until you were out. I needed to use your magic for when that happened.

And I’m so sorry. I didn’t know how else to get you out safely. ”

I listened more than I had anticipated I would. I hated that his voice was what caused me to soak in his words. But, it did nothing to squash the anger—the trauma he’d bestowed upon me. “How many Elizians have you damned to that place?”

“I don’t want to talk about them. I want to talk about you.”

Through my clenched jaw, I said, “How many?”

He was quiet, like he was repeating the number in his head, trying to get it out of his mouth. Finally, he muttered, “Eighteen. ”