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Anger burned in his chest. He wondered if she had known. But then, she had only been fifteen. Perhaps it was foolish to blame her for any of it.
And yet... He found it difficult not to.
“Well. I think... I think you shouldn’t consider things like revenge. Not now. Your father was a modern leader. He didn’t keep those sorts of blood scores, I imagine.”
“A blood score?” he asked.
“I made it up. I thought it sounded somewhat medieval, and a bit intimidating.”
“Well. Definitely that.”
“Just focus on yourself. Finding herself. That is actually what I’m trying to help you do. I’m not trying to turn you into the leader you never would’ve been. But the one you would’ve been if not for all of this. The one you wish to be.”
“Thank you.”
“Sleep in the bed tonight, Riyaz.”
He nodded slowly. Perhaps it was time.
The roar woke her out of a deep sleep.
It did not sound like a man. It sounded like an animal. And when she began to hear the crashing of furniture, she leaped out of bed without thinking.
Riyaz. She knew that it was him. She knew it was Riyaz having another one of those episodes. PTSD. Flashbacks. Whatever they were.
And she knew that she needed to be the one to go to him. She knew it as sure as she knew anything.
She threw the covers off of her bed, and began to run down the hall.
No one else was coming. They all feared him. She had heard them whispering earlier in the day about the mad Sheikh. Referencing what had happened in the library.
Nobody was confident in his ability to hold it together.
But this... This didn’t mean that there was something wrong with him. And she knew that. She knew that. Even if he didn’t.
Even if no one else did.
He was traumatized. And that was understandable.
All she needed...
She opened the door to the bedchamber, and found a dresser on its face.
Curtains torn down. The room was in a state, and Riyaz was standing at the center of it, a hollow-eyed warrior who looked remote. Unreachable.
Gone was the man who read books. This was the man who lifted stone benches. This was the man at his most elemental.
This was what he had tried to prevent himself from becoming.
Tonight, the beast had won.
“Riyaz,” she said slowly.
He breathed out hard, and reminded her of a spooked stallion, his eyes wild.
And she knew that he still didn’t see. Not really.
“Brianna,” he said.
