She didn’t know if she should have told him or not. She hadn’t even thought before speaking.
God, she was tired of thinking, of trying to decode every damn thing.
She swallowed, her bravado making her slowly get to her feet, her need to know, to finally know if that was why he hated her so acute it tightened every air cavity in her chest to the point of pain.
Because if he hated her for being alive when his sister most likely wasn’t, she really didn’t see any way forward for them. And looking at his back, at the multitude of scars littering his flesh like a lover’s kisses, after witnessing that moment of utter pain and agony bleeding from him not hours earlier, she wanted a way forward.
She clenched her shaking hands into fists.
“I know she was taken and never came back.”
He didn’t move.
Didn’t even breathe.
His back remained completely motionless.
Her heart clenched for him, for the pain he must have felt, still evidently felt. She remembered the softness with which he’d spoken of his sister.
Biting her lip, she took a step closer to him. “I know I was taken too.”
Another step.
“But I came back.”
Stillness.
“And she didn’t.”
Such stillness.
The air heavy between them, like it had been chafed too much, rubbed raw and had swollen in pain.
Morana closed the distance between them on shaky legs, until she stood beside him, and looked up into his face, placing a hand on his scruffy chin like he’d held hers just moments ago. He turned his face towards her, a clean slate wiped of all expression, his eyes vacant, dead, just looking out at her.
“That’s what you hate me for, don’t you?” she whispered in the air between them, her voice wavering slightly. “Because I was found and she wasn’t?”
His lips trembled for a split second before they were pursed again, a movement so minute, so quick, so real she’d have missed it had she not been standing so close to him.
His jaw clenched.
Morana let his chin go and looked down. “How can you even stand to look at me? God, how can you let me stay here when you hate me for…”
“I never hated you for that.”
Barely a whisper but the words reached her.
Her eyes swung up to his. His were still devoid of all emotions.
But she knew he was telling the truth. A man like him, who’d made his hatred so honest since the beginning wouldn’t lie about it when blatantly questioned.
“Then what do you hate me for?” she asked softly, all her speculations, confusions, crashing a hard death.
The light in the room dimmed even more, shadows elongating as the clouds took over the sky.
He broke their gaze, looking away.
She waited for him to take a few breaths, waited for him to look back at her, waited for him to speak. He didn’t.
Anger flooded her veins with surprising speed.
Grabbing a hold of his bicep, she shook it, tried to shake it, gritting her teeth. “Tell me, damn you! Tell me why you want to kill me. Tell me why you didn’t when you could have. Tell me why you’re so bothered with hurting me when you promise me my death with every word that you speak. Tell me!”
She was yelling by the end of her tirade, shaking his arm, her anger, her confusion, her frustration, her desire, all warring in a way she’d been so unfamiliar with before she’d met him, a way that had become her bedside companion now. She’d been abducted along with twenty-five other little girls, including his sister, and nobody had returned but her. She’d never been told this, never even had any indications, but clearly, it had been important enough for the anonymous person to tell her. And even though it could have been an understandable reason for his hatred, it wasn’t a reason at all.
What the fuck was then?
His blue eyes speared hers, a spark of anger in them giving them sudden life. His free hand came up to take a hold of her wrist as he pulled her hand away from that taut bicep, pulling her closer until suddenly they were nose to nose, his chest rising and falling as rapidly as hers, her heart pounding with a vengeance as she glared at him.
“I don’t owe you a fucking thing,” he growled inches away from her mouth. “I do what I do. Only I need to know the reasons for it.”
Morana growled back. “Not when they affect other people, which in this case happens to be me.”
“Not my problem.”
She narrowed her eyes. “It is if I start believing you’re just full of shit and hot air. You’re losing your touch, Predator.”
His lips curled slightly at her sneering tone even as his eyes bore down upon hers with unwavering intensity, without a hint of amusement.
“You forget I haven’t really touched you at all.”
Her breath hitched even as she understood his deflection. He released her hand and climbed the stairs three at a time, his taut ass flexing as Morana watched him disappear back inside his room, once again leaving her without any answer at all.
Morana closed her eyes, inhaled deeply, and walked to her room, deciding, once and for all, that she was going to get some answers from somewhere no matter what she had to do. She needed those answers to keep hold on her sanity, which she could feel slipping away with multiple epiphanies sinking into her – the realization that she’d been a part of something so horrific at such a young age; the realization that only she had been lucky enough to have been recovered; the realization that everyone had deliberately kept her in the dark for some reason.
Her bed was a mess from tossing and turning all night. Quickly making the bed, she dressed in dark jeans and the first top she could find from Amara’s collection. Putting on flats, she knotted her hair on top, adjusted her glasses, grabbed her keys and her gun, and walked out.
Tristan Caine was in the kitchen, surprisingly dressed and freshly showered from the looks of it. He didn’t look up at her as he whipped eggs efficiently, his wrist moving at a quick speed, and she didn’t stop on the way to the elevator, not sparing him another glance.
“Going somewhere?”
Duh, asshole.
She stayed silent and kept walking, her keys digging into her palm.
“The guards won’t let you out until I say so.”
The words stopped her in her tracks. Rage flooded her system as she whirled around to skewer him.
“I didn’t get the memo that I’d been promoted to a prisoner,” she spoke in a cool voice, completely at odds with the riot inside her.
His face remained blank as he placed the bowl on the counter and leaned against it, crossing his arms over his chest.
“I’ve treated you as a guest here, Ms. Vitalio, we both know that,” he pointed out evenly. “You’ve had the access to your beloved car. You’ve had the freedom to come and go as you please. But yesterday, you changed the equation. You followed me the entire day, putting not only your life on the line but mine. Not just once, but repeatedly.”
He pushed away from the counter and started walking towards her slowly, his arms still crossed and face hard, the shadows playing on his face, the longer scruff and stiff look making him seem even more intimidating than he was.
“Do I need to remind you we’re on the cusp of war here?” he grit out, blue eyes sparking fire. “Just because your father hasn’t retaliated yet, don’t think he wouldn’t. I insulted him on his territory, not only by hitting him but by letting you stay here. That’s not considering your wild codes out there that need to be found.”