Page 24 of The Stolen Throne

“Get out,” he grunts.

“No, I’m not leaving.”

Time passes as silence surrounds us. After taking a deep breath, Kas settles on the bed beside me. I shiver when the shadows kiss my skin. Peeking out of the corner of my eye, I see his shoulders droop and his head slump forward.

I debate if I should try to comfort him or not. He isn’t one to exchange niceties. Biting my lip, I decide to scoot a bit closer and lay my head on his shoulder. My body heat seeps out of me the moment of contact.

He stiffens, but he doesn’t push me away. I feel my cheeks heat as I whisper, “I’m here. You can talk to me, or not, but I am here.”

“Why are you here?” he rasps. He doesn’t sound angry or irritated, which is odd for him. Instead, he sounds exhausted, like he’s fought a thousand battles in his head during the last few minutes.

Taking a chance, I grab his hand to weave my fingers through his. I give it a squeeze as I say, “Because I care about you, you asshole. I may not like you. I may even hate you… occasionally. But that doesn’t mean I don’t care. Even if I don’t really want to… sometimes.”

His body slowly relaxes the longer we sit in silence, and eventually, the wisps of his dark power begin to recede as he takes deep breaths. “Why are you not in bed? You should be sleeping,” he asks, his voice rough.

“I could ask the same of you.”

He grunts before replying, “I… I don’t sleep. Much.”

“Why is that?” I ask quietly.

I watch as his thumb caresses the top of my hand, and he answers, “My mind is a scary place with the capability of being dark and demented.”

“Is it not normal for villains to be plagued with dreams of that nature?” I try to joke, but it falls short as he stiffens. I squeeze his hand and quickly say, “Ignore me. That was meant to be a joke. So, you don’t like your dreams?”

“No,” he murmurs.

Damn, I’ve ruined this. He was finally opening up, and I made him feel worse. Caressing the back of his hand in return, I ask, “You are afraid of your dreams?”

“Yes,” he rasps.

Trying to think of anything to help get his mind off his dreams, I remember his tattoos. I reach my free hand up to run my fingers around the inked designs on his forearm. “Do any of your tattoos have meaning?”

He’s quiet for a moment before softly replying, “Not really. It was more of an escape.”

“An escape?”

He huffs out a sigh. “My head can be a pretty dark place, Princess. Getting these tattoos caused physical pain, which helped with the psychological pain.” He’s silent another moment, but then his fingers tighten around my own. “But now that I’m saying it out loud, it sounds stupid.”

I squeeze his hand back. “Not at all.”

He hums in reply, so I hum back. We sit in comfortable silence for a while longer before determination starts to fill me, and I can’t stay quiet anymore. My grumpy man is not acting like his typical grumpy self. So I'm going to fix it. Jumping up from the bed, I tug on his hand. “Come with me.” He looks up at me, confused, and I can’t help but smile when I see his eyes are back to their normal dark hazel instead of black.

He sighs. “Where are we going?”

I tug on his hand with a laugh. “Come on!”

His eyes narrow, but he relents and lets me drag him into the hall. Glancing over my shoulder, I find he’s still glaring at me. I give him a wide smile, and he grunts.

“Stop that.”

“Stop what?”

He gestures to my face with his free hand. “Doing that thing with your face when you’re happy. It’s making me nauseous.” Then he grumbles under his breath, “This whole night is making me nauseous.”

I laugh as I drag him toward the kitchen. I'm still determined to find dessert. But my heart feels lighter when I hear his annoyance; it’s his version of normal. “I hate you, Grumpy Man!” I say but can’t hide my giggle.

He huffs as he quietly says, “Hate you, too, Princess.”

---