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“We’re running out of time,” Peter whispered. “We won’t be able to keep meeting like this when the Masters are back in residence. We’ll probably have hell to pay once Victor sits down and sees how often we’ve come into the kitchens. Hopefully, he’ll just think we’re being pigs and indulging in food while he’s not here to enforce his smoothie rule, but…we need to get everything locked away so we all know our jobs and can keep working without checking in with each other.”
I nodded. “I know.”
Stepping into me, Peter murmured, “Don’t be afraid of using him for your own ends, jaanu. You have to know how he feels about you. Use that to your advantage. Don’t let your goodness get in the way of manipulating him.”
I hid my shiver at the thought of being cruel enough to wield someone’s emotions for my own gain.
But…it wasn’t just about me.
My shoulders rolled and honesty spilled free despite myself. “I think whatever you saw the night he killed Kyle might’ve died in that cave too. He can barely look at me anymore and…and the truth is.” I looked down, unable to keep eye contact. “I asked him to play along with me the night of Emerald Bruises. I was as high as a kite and let my guard down. I practically begged him to choose me. I said if the guy who asked me to play along with him was still in there to play with me now.”
Peter sucked in a breath. “What did he say?”
“He didn’t say anything.” I looked up and stepped back. “And that’s the problem.”
Peter studied my eyes. His own gave too much away. Asking me to seduce Henri hurt him. His love for me exceeded the bounds of friendship. And every day he grew stronger, I feared he’d step over the line between us and force me to admit that I loved him as deeply as I did my brother, but…the tormented beast I slept with conjured a different sort of—
Not love.
Never that.
What I felt for Henri had no title, no definition.
It was just…ugh.
Kissing Peter’s cheek, I smiled at the girls and backed away. “Look, I’ll try again tonight. I’ll do whatever it takes to find out if Henri can be trusted. I’ll see you later.”
Slipping out of the kitchens, I broke into a run.
Henri would most likely be in the library working.
That would give me time to figure out how the hell I could get through to him…before it was too late.
Chapter Eighteen
………………………….
Henri
THE CURSE OF BLOOD & DARKNESS
by
Henri Mercer
THE BOY WHO WOULD NEVER be my brother, despite the shared blood in our veins, appeared in the wing of the house where we were kept.
He emerged covered in blood. A gun in his hand and murder in his eyes. He looked at us as if we were something he’d scraped off his shoe. A hoard of children sired by his father, a harem of women who’d been his chattel.
Two of my little sisters crawled into my arms, breaking into wails as Quincy strode amongst our midst. Counting us, he nodded, then spun on his heel and left.
A day later, the locks on the doors and the bars on the windows were removed. Our mothers were interviewed and given rooms. Their children going with them.
By the time my mother and I were dragged before the new lord and master, my mother had pissed herself in fear and I prepared to kill him if he laid a single finger on her like our father had.
Instead, he’d handed her an envelope and offered to send her home.
We’d been flown far, far away.
