“You don’t know what actually happened with the ring.”
“You think my former intended, who I hadn’t seen for ten years, who no doubt had heard I was dead, infiltrated the prison camp, found my berth among all those tunnels, and left his ring there? His single most precious possession, the gold ring that was his grandfather’s?”
Kane rubbed his face. “I don’t know.”
“Yes, you do. You just do not want to see me for what I am.”
“Don’t tell me how I feel, okay? That’s my job.”
She looked down at her hands. “You need to take me back there.”
“What?”
“To the camp.” With a shaking hand, she touched the scars that ran down her face. “I live there.”
Kane blinked. And then couldn’t find the words. “You can’t be serious,” he blurted.
“That is my home, my purpose.” When Kane just stared at her, she made a move to get up—and promptly waved him off when he leaned in to help her. “What did you think was going to happen once you ‘rescued’ me. I have nowhere to go.”
“Your parents—”
“Are dead. They were killed in the raids about three years ago. My father had taken work at one of the grand houses of the aristocracy as a handyman. My mother joined him as a maid. Thelessers… attacked the estate and my parents were locked out of a safe room by the family. They were… slaughtered.”
Kane closed his eyes. “I am so sorry, Nadya.”
“I found out because… I overheard some of the males who were doing the drug deals down in Caldwell talking about the raids. They mentioned specific houses and I knew where my sire andmahmenhadgone to work because, back when I was living with the nurse, I would return to their house to check on them from afar. When they moved out, the new family in our home gave me their forwarding address. That’s how I found out the name of the mansion. That’s how I recognized the name when I heard the males say it.”
Her voice cracked at the end. And then she lowered her hands into her lap.
“I am grateful for what you did for me. But I will go back to the prison camp because that is all I have.”
Kane cursed. Because he didn’t know what else to do.
Then he sat forward on the sofa. “Look at me. Nadya. Look up, at me.”
When her focus shifted to him, he braced his palms on his knees. “You were about to be killed. When I found you? You were mounted on that wall like a piece of meat, and they were going to kill you. If you want to fall on the sword of your guilt, or whatever it is? That’s your business. I’ll take you back myself. But you’ll be dead before I’m off the property.”
She blinked. A number of times.
As tears came to her eyes, he cursed again and got up to walk away, but where was he going? When he found himself standing over the sink, he ran some water and splashed his face a couple of times. There was a roll of soft paper by the basin, and he dried himself off.
Then he pivoted around and leaned back against the counter. He tried to imagine taking her back to that abandoned human hospital, with its underground cruelties and its drug dealing and all those guards.
He’d thought she wouldn’t last without protection before. Now she was on the guards’ list of things to do. He might as well drive her up to the Fade and drop her off in front of that white door.
“Why do you care so much,” she asked.
It was on the tip of his tongue to say that he didn’t know, he really didn’t.
Instead, the truth jumped out of his mouth: “I couldn’t save myshellan. I guess I’ve decided to try to save you.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
The following evening, after night had fallen, V was in the Pit, sitting in front of his Four Toys and playing with his mouse. Which was not as sexy as it sounded. His dick’s nickname had nothing to do with any of the thirty-eight or more species in the genusMus, so, yes, he was actually moving his wireless palm puck around in circles.
“You coming to First Meal?”
His roommate was talking as he came down the hallway from where the bedrooms were, and as Butch stepped into the living room, the former homicide detective was dressed for the field. Instead of as someone from the cast ofBridgerton.