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Leonid hardly flinches. “No,” he says, shaking his head. “I wasn’t.”
But that just confuses me. Sitting up beside him, my aching legs subtly spasm.
“But that was the tradition. All boys over the age of eight fought in that dreadful ritual. From Greek Families to the Black Delphi. There was no escape. You would have been over eight… why weren’t you there?”
For a moment, all I can think of is how quickly I would have chosen this blonde haired, blue-eyed boy over everyone else in that bloody line up.
My prince.
… But if I had done that, I might have doomed his brother to be one of the boys in the garbage bags, burning alongside of my books…
There would be no coming back from that, no mending—not that I want this twisted hate between us to be mended… right?
My mind is still whirling from what we just did. I don’t know what I want anymore.
“I was in an accident…” Leo whispers, as if he’s being thrown back to a dangerous part of his life. He… he almost sounds vulnerable… like the boy that the dead girl always dreamed of, like the boy that little girl would have chosen… “Here in America. A car bomb. A week before the ritual. I just barely survived…” His head grows heavy and his blonde hair sways as he bends his neck. “My mother didn’t make it…”
I don’t think I was meant to hear that last part. He says it so gently it makes my heart sink.
Who are you, Leonid Barinov?
“I’m sorry…” I say, my heart heavy at the thought of a sorrow I can relate to. “My mother died when I was young too…”
“How?”
“I… I don’t actually know. Father would never tell me.”
“So, you weren’t there when she died?”
“No.”
“Count yourself lucky,” Leonid says, forcing his gaze off of the floor. “I was burdened with more than just bad memories that day.”
Pushing himself off of the bed, Leonid takes a step towards the bathroom, but something seems to give out on him.
“Are you alright?”
“It’s just my fucking leg,” he curses, grabbing his thigh.
“What’s wrong with it? Did you hurt it at the library?”
When Leonid looks over his shoulder at me, it’s with a twisted curiosity that I haven’t seen painted on his gorgeous face yet.
“No… my leg wasn’t hurt by the bomb your men planted,” he sneers, before a much softer look comes over his sharp features. “It was hurt by the bomb that killed my mother… that’s how I got my limp.”
“Your… limp?”
“… You never noticed my limp?”
“… I guess not.”
Stepping back towards the bed, Leonid seems to drop a little when he puts weight on his left leg. Instantly, I know why I’ve never notice it before.
The sway it gives his body makes his golden hair wave like it’s caught in a light breeze.
Fucking hell.
All of this time, he had something so blaringly wrong with him, and all it did was make him sexier to me.
