She nodded. “Then I’ll spare you the effort.”
“What are you talking about—”
“I want to thank you for…” She touched her face. “Whatever this gift was. I still don’t know what happened to either one of us, but at least I’ve been set on a path where I don’t have to hide anymore.”
He’d also managed to destroy her, though.
The irony was that her insides were ruined now, even as her exterior had been set back to rights.
“Nadya. Stop, okay. This is not about you.”
“Oh, I know. My life has rarely been about me. My father took control of it. My intended tried to destroy it. And here I am again, a male standing before me and reminding me that I don’t matter.”
He threw up his hands. “Oh, for chrissakes. I’ve just seen a female I thought was dead for two hundred years and learned that she sacrificed my life for a pair of mismatched eyes. Will you give me ten minutes to figure out how I feel?”
“And I just saw the male I thought I loved hold the female he talked about nonstop in his arms.”
“It’s not like that.”
They stared at each other, and she relived what she’d witnessed.
“I can’t be an aristocrat’s little side secret. I won’t be.” Tears entered her eyes. “Pain has a way of getting through to our cores. Your love was real, and she’s alive, and sooner or later, you’re going to go back to her.”
“You have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“Oh, I absolutely do.” Nadya took a step back. “You’re not going to be able to help it. I believe you have feelings for me, but I know the way the aristocracy works—”
“You don’t know me. You have nofuckingclue what you’re saying.”
“I know you’re a male of honor and worth, and I know you come from theglymera.” She shook her head. “I’ve already been burned once trying to get a leg up in this world. I can’t do that again. You can say whatever you want right now, and I believe you feel terrible, and, yes, this timing is horrible. But I spent decades deformed because of a lie that was bigger and more important than me. I can’t walk that path again.”
“So you won’t be with me because of my bloodline.”
She thought of her father and his grasping social aggression. He hadn’t thrown the acid at her, but his drive to distinguish their own bloodline had created a perfect storm—and she was the one who had borne the brunt of the hard lessons.
Sooner or later, Kane would have to go back to his mate. His sense of honor would demand his return, but more than that, his social position would dictate it.
She thought one last time of her father’s scheming.
“No,” she said roughly, “I won’t be with you anymore because of mine.”
CHAPTER FORTY-THREE
The fuck he was waiting for Lucan to get back on his feet.
As Apex scoped out the back of the prison camp from the parking lot, he knew only one thing for sure. If Callum was alive and on the premises, he would be held either at the wall or inside the head of the guards’ private quarters. And wasn’t it handy to narrow things down, given how big the place was.
God, he wished he’d saved that severed hand. And he didn’t have enough ammo to blast a hole through the back door.
So under the theory you had to use what you had, he put two fingers to his mouth—
His whistle was so loud, it made his own ears ring, and the sound echoed off the five-story core of the winged building. When he needed a breath, he took one—and shoved his fingers back into his mouth, continuing the noise—
Well, what do you know.
He’d kicked a hornets’ nest.
Guards came streaming out, and he ducked behind a vehicle and started picking them off, one by one. As he kept a count, he wonderedwhether that head of the guards had some kind of mold in the back room where she regenerated whole squadrons by pouring magic wax into a form and letting the shit dry.