Page 6 of Deviant Princess (Knight's Ridge Empire 5)

THEO

Closing the door, I suck in a huge breath of sterile hospital air.

“Any news?” Daemon asks, pushing from the wall he was leaning against.

He’s still covered in the evidence of Cora’s almost suicide, but he’s missing the bloodlust in his eyes that normally comes with that amount of our enemies’ blood.

I shrug, the movement itself is hard work with what feels like the weight of the world pressing down on my shoulders.

It’s been forty-eight hours since Daemon called me to tell me that he’d found Cora bleeding out in her cell. Forty-seven hours since Emmie discovered all the secrets I’d been keeping from her. And a little less than that since Daemon shot her full of drugs to chill her the fuck out.

He panicked when he saw her losing her shit, but the spur-of-the-moment move was a little over the fucking top, if you ask me.

“They think she’s going to be okay.”

It’s been touch and go since we finally got Cora to the hospital. Doc worked his magic and somehow kept her alive until we got here. It was only once she was on the operating table that she flatlined and had to be brought back.

I paced this corridor for hours thinking I was going to have to return to our building and tell Emmie that not only had I been lying to her all this time, but that I’d allowed the person she’s been desperate to hear from for the past few months die under my watch.

All of this was a disaster waiting to happen. It didn’t take a fucking genius to work that out. But I never expected it to blow up on me in the way it did.

It’s my own fault. If I’d locked that fucking folder away again, she never would have found it. She never would have come snooping. She never would have seen…

Fuck.

I swallow down the lump of emotion that threatens to clog my throat, considering how she must have felt seeing her mum lying helplessly in a giant pool of her own blood.

“You should get back,” Daemon tells me. “I’ve got it covered here.”

Reaching up, I rub the back of my neck.

He’s right, obviously.

It’s where I need to be. It’s where I should be.

But fuck.

Catching Emmie as she collapsed in my arms after he injected her, then again when she freaked out when I went into the cell we placed her in so that we could get Cora out for the treatment she needed… both of them sent a bolt of fear through me.

She’s never going to forgive me for any of this.

Hell, she shouldn’t forgive me for any of this.

“Don’t be a fucking pussy, Cirillo. She’s just a girl. A job. When have you shied away from one of those before?” He lifts a knowing brow that makes my fists clench.

He knows as well as I do that Emmie has never been just a job to me.

Daemon and I might not see eye to eye all the time, but the two of us are more alike than either of us like to admit.

He’s always been the outsider of the group, the one that never really fit in. But the truth is, if it weren’t for the others dragging me with them, I could have easily ended up like him—on the outskirts, always looking in.

We’re the same. Fucked up beyond belief. Cold. Harsh. Ruthless. Determined.

Psychotic, I’m sure Emmie would say. She’s used the word to describe me more times than I can count. And sometimes I can’t help but wonder if she’s right.

But then, I remember our better times. How good it felt to lie with her in my arms. How relaxing it was to just watch her sleep. How it lit up something I didn’t know existed inside me when she smiled at me like I’ve never seen her do with anyone else.

Yeah, maybe I’m not a complete lost cause after all.