Page 27

“And what would you know of what she wants?” The pirate’s hold on me tightens, leaning toward the edge of painful as his fingers delve into the side of my arm.

Grayson pushes himself off the pillar with grace. Flickers of the surrounding candlelight dance in the shadows cast over his face as he saunters over to us. My breath quickens when he stops within an arm’s reach of me and his familiar scent of a crisp ocean breeze snares me.

But I break free of it. Remembering the words he spoke not that long ago. Words that cut me so deeply, they were the reason I fell into this drunken stupor to begin with.

“Let me be, Grayson.”

The arm draped over my shoulder stiffens. “Grayson?” the pirate mumbles. “Grayson Tyde?”

Grayson flashes his canines in a serpentine smile. The scar along his cheek cinches, making him look even more menacing.

“One and the same,” he muses. “And you seem to have your arm wrapped around something that belongs to me.”

The pirate drops his arm immediately and I whirl on him. His face is a blur of color as it takes my eyes a moment to settle and the room to stop spinning.

Hells, how much did I drink?

When the spins stop, I see he’s backing away with both his hands up. “I’m sorry, Captain Tyde. I didn’t know.”

“I am not a thing and I belong to no one, least of all him .” I seethe, pointing at Grayson.

The pirate looks between Grayson and me, his eyes darting back and forth, unsure of which one of us to believe.

“Leave us alone.” I turn toward Grayson and he just smirks at me.

“Looks like he’s the one leaving you alone.” Grayson snorts.

I toss a glance over my shoulder to find the man missing. He scurries past a few tables of patrons and slips into a seat at the table furthest from us. “Coward!” I shout which earns me a red-hot rod of pain that shoots through my skull.

Squeezing my eyes shut, I rub at my temples.

“Hurting already?” Grayson chuckles. The sound is a deep rumble that vibrates the air around us.

Opening my eyes, I scowl at him. “You’ve ruined my night twice now.”

“Something tells me sleeping with that scoundrel was going to ruin your night much more than my interruption of your stupidity.”

“You’ve said I’m not your prisoner, Grayson.

Yet, you keep treating me like one.” I step closer to him and have to tilt my head back to look into his face.

Midnight black waves fall into his face as he looks down at me.

“I didn’t say a word when you made promises to that whore knowing I’d have to watch you fuck her. ”

An amused tilt of his lips has me curling my hands into fists.

His voice is low as he says, “I made no such promise. Though a question still remains: why did you ready your dagger to throw at her back?”

Huffing a frustrated breath, I look away. When I meet his gaze again, I try not to stare at the swirling flecks of silver floating amongst the sea of his irises. “I didn’t like the way she looked at me,” I mutter.

His hand moves toward my face and I’m not fast enough to evade his touch as he runs the pad of his thumb over the bottom curve of my mouth. “How easily lies slip between these lips.”

“It’s not a lie.” My mind screams at me to pull away from him, but I don’t. I just stay here.

“It is a half-truth,” Grayson says, his voice dropping low. His thumb moves to the edge of my jaw and lower still until I feel the feathering of my pulse along my neck beneath his caress.

“Just leave me be.” The words come out more like a plea than a demand. My mind swims from the alcohol . . . and Grayson’s overwhelming proximity.

“If fucking him is what you desire then I’ll leave you to it.” He clicks his tongue. “Though you might have a difficult time convincing him to join you now that he knows who you belong to.”

I tilt my head at him. “Belong to?” I chuff. “Here I was thinking I’m not your prisoner. Or does your word mean nothing?”

With a stroke of his palm moving back up across my cheek, I suck in a sharp breath before his fingers delve into my hair. He settles his hand at the back of my head and I find unwanted comfort in how close he holds me. In the feeling of his fingertips stroking the nape of my neck.

“You aren’t my prisoner, Little Pearl. But I can tell by the way your body reacts to my every touch that you desire to be mine.”

My toes curl in my boots as I breathe in his heady scent.

But an ember of memory sparks through the alcohol that muddies my thoughts—reminding me of who he truly is.

A monster. A murderer . Grayson is dangerous, and allowing myself to get close to him will only result in my own demise.

I have one mission: to get a letter to Amara and Wells so we might devise some plan for my escape.

“You see what you want to see, Grayson Tyde.” I pull away from him even though my heart aches against it. “The only thing my body is after”—I slowly move to the table nearest us—“is a quick release from whomever is willing to give it.”

He’s still as stone as he watches me move up to one of the men sitting at the table. There’s nothing special about the one I choose with his plain brown hair and simple face. But he will do just fine.

Keeping my eyes on Grayson, I lean over the man’s shoulder, letting my breasts rub against his back. His eyes grow wide for a moment, but then he realizes he’s not about to be overtaken by some other drunkard.

“I want to fuck.” Clear as day, my words don’t carry the slur they did a few minutes ago. Maybe Harrick’s water trick is starting to work. Or maybe it’s the anger I feel toward Grayson that steadies me.

“Right here?” the man asks and I roll my eyes as Grayson lets out a chuckle.

I shoot him a withering look. “No, you idiot. In my room. Upstairs.”

He rises from his chair and the other men around the table start hollering cheers for their friend.

With a smirk on my lips, I loop my arm through his and start walking toward the staircase again.

Grayson’s brows narrow slightly, the only indication that he feels anything about what I’m headed off to do.

Fine then. He won’t stop me this time and I’ll finally get what I’m after. An easy lay to chase away the wanting of him.

“What about me, princess?” a haggard voice says from behind me and I look to see one of the other men from the table has followed us over and he’s closing the gap quickly.

“Maybe some other time,” I toss over my shoulder.

“Or maybe right fucking now.”

I jolt forward, nearly tripping over my own feet from how hard the bastard smacks my ass, but before I can unsheathe my dagger and stick him in the gut, a whirl of movement passes to my left and then a loud crash booms.

The tavern falls silent and my heartbeat thrums in my ears as I turn to see that Grayson has thrown the man clear across the tavern.

The man I chose as my bed mate yells, “Hells! What did you do that for?”

Grayson rolls up his sleeves and stalks toward the bastard who’s already knocked out cold on the ground from the impact of his back hitting one of the pillars.

He picks the man up by his wrist with such ease my mouth gapes open in disbelief.

A grotesque pop pierces the air and my stomach coils at the sound, knowing that some part of the man’s arm is now broken from the weight of his body pulling down on it.

Grayson is nearly twice the size of any other man in here, but the bastard he holds up is not small.

I can’t even fathom the amount of strength it must take to raise him up so that his feet dangle across the floor.

“Let this man be an example for all of Emerald Cove.” Grayson’s voice lowers an octave as he addresses the inn.

“Rowenya Stone is mine. ” He looks pointedly at me and every pair of eyes in the tavern slide in my direction.

“Hear me when I say that anyone who lays a hand on what belongs to me shall lose that hand.” He unsheathes a dagger from the leather bandolier strapped across his chest and in one fell swoop he cuts the man’s hand off.

I gasp as his body plummets to the floor and he awakens with a guttural scream before falling unconscious once again from the pain.

Fear-driven silence fills the air as all eyes are on the man’s bloodied stump. Blood flows easily from his wound, creating a crimson pool on the floor. Grayson drops the man’s hand onto his belly and it topples over onto the ground with a sickening thud.

Then he turns his attention on me. There is a stern determination in his steps as he stalks toward me.

I find myself backing away unsteadily. For every one step of his, I’m forced to take two until my back rams into something hard behind me.

I look over my shoulder for just a moment to find I’m cornered against one of the wooden pillars and before I have a chance to turn around and run away, Grayson is there. Right in front of me.

There is a coldness in his gaze I’ve never seen before and I have no time to assess if it’s for me or somebody else as he swoops his arm around my waist and hauls me over his shoulder like I weigh nothing more than a sack of potatoes.

A whoosh of breath escapes my lungs painfully and I grunt.

“Let me go!” I scream at him as he starts walking forward, but he has me in a vice with his strong arm curled around my midsection.

Looking up, the tavern remains silent as too many eyes watch me being hauled up the stairs, my head bobbing up and down as I strain to look forward and not at Grayson’s pert ass.

Darkness descends as he continues up the stairwell and my stomach starts to churn from the mixture of too much alcohol and being flipped upside down.

“Grayson Tyde, you better put me down right now or I swear to the heavens I will stab you.”

“Such a daring promise, Little Pearl. An enticing one too. I’d love to see exactly what you’re made of with your daggers in hand. But not tonight.”

“Agh!” I scream and start pounding my fists on his back. “Let. Me. Go!”