Page 98 of His Prince

“I dare you to try. You’re small. I could squish you like a bug.”

“Challenge accepted,” he replies and then twists that saw in a little deeper, sending pain right through my chest. Damn kid stabbed me. How is that possible? A fucking saw doesn’t do that.

He must have had some sort of hidden knife built into it.

I stare down at my shirt and see blood pooling through the fabric. Shit.

I press against it and feel myself listing slightly to the right before over-correcting and falling into Gael. He catches me and grins, noting the bottle in my hand.

“You need to eat, boss.”

I huff, trying to stem the bleeding from my stab wound. “I’ll eat when I’m dead.”

Gael pulls me through the crowd and forces Felix from his seat, hefting me into the chair.

“Boss needs to eat before he passes out.”

“And bleeds to death,” I slur, glancing down at the blood still seeping through my shirt. It’s the first time Angel has looked at me all evening.

And there’s a flicker of concern before he shrugs it away. He’d probably rather I was dead.

“It’s just a cut. Mikhail is a baby,” Diablo says.

“I am no baby,” I say, standing up, the chair crashing backward. I rip my shirt open, buttons flying everywhere, showing off my bleeding chest. Angel bites his bottom lip as his gaze travels down my abdomen.

“Your brother did this! Doesn’t anyone care?” I point at it, and my husband’s eyes move to his brother.

“He deserved it,” Diablo replies, and Angel nods, unconcerned by my imminent death.

“Gael, Felix, do you mind patching him up? I don’t want dinner to burn.”

“You’re my husband!” I nearly roar, but I go ignored, shuffled out of the room by the two men, Nina trailing after me and tutting at me like I’m a child.

Well, perhaps I am. Perhaps I need to be coddled instead of ignored.

“Do not make those sounds at me, Nina. I’m the man of the house.”

She rolls her eyes at me, grabbing some sterilizing wipes and a bandage.

“You are not behaving like one,” she replies and then cleans my wound, making me hiss. “If you cry, I will send you to Georgiy and he will show you what a real wound is.”

I purse my lips and hold it in.

I’m a man. The manliest. I am Russian. I am the Russian-est.

“Stop this,” Nina says and then tosses me a shirt. It lands on the top of my head and I peel it down, covering myself with the itchy fabric before Gael and Felix snicker and help me back down to the kitchen. Not that I need it. I can walk fine on my own.

I’m just having a hard time balancing correctly. It has nothing to do with the fact that I’m drunk or bleeding to death.

By the time we make it back to where everyone is, dinner is served.

And of course, I’m given my plate last.

A pity dinner. I eat it all anyways, proud of my husband for making such authentic Russian dishes with no training, and hating that he’s not looked my way again. I’m unsure in my drunken state if I should be happy or sad. Or perhaps both. But by the time I sober up, I’m realizing that I’ve made an ass of myself and am more angry than anything.

Angry that it’s bedtime and Angel is nowhere to be found.

“Where is he?” I grump as I pace the room, waiting for him to appear. But of course he doesn’t. He always makes me fucking wait.

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