Page 8 of Knot your Princess
I move in closer, warily, my excuses on my lips in case Quinn jumps out of the middle of the lake, demanding to know why I’m talking to his daughter.
“Nope, just enjoying the evening.”
“Humph.” She turns back to stare out over the water.
“Mind if I join you?”
“Yes.”
“Tough.” I boldly sit next to her and watch her scoot over to create a bigger distance between us.
“Wow, insulting. Do I stink or something?”
“You reek like a domineering alpha.”
“Ouch. The hits keep on coming.”
“No one asked you to stay. In fact, I told you to leave.”
“‘Fuck off’ were your precise words,” I remind her, enjoying this banter.
“So why are you still here?”
I sigh. “I wanted to apologise for earlier. I didn’t mean to come across as domineering, overbearing, and definitely not controlling.”
“I get that you have a job to do, but I’m not a child, and I don’t like being spoken to like one.”
“I know. Forgiven?”
“No. There’s something about you…you’re a shady sort.”
I snort. “Me? I’m an open book!”
“I doubt that. Your eyes are haunted.”
Well, she has me there.
“Interesting that you’ve paid that much attention to my eyes.” I can’t help it. I don’t know why I’m doing this awkward flirting thing with her. Do I have a death wish? And weirdly, I don’t mean death by her dad. But by her withering gaze when she realises what I’m doing.
“Lame,” she drawls. “Go away now. It’s bad enough that I have to spend all afternoon with you tomorrow.”
I fall flat after that. She isn’t interested in talking to me or forgiving me. I don’t blame her. She is cautious, and that’s fine. I can worm my way into her life now that her parents have given me this great responsibility.
“Don’t you have a skank to shag somewhere?”
Her biting tone hurts my heart, so I do the only thing I know how to do: strike back.
“Actually, yeah, I do.” The broken fucktard inside me lashes back because I have no other way of dealing with this. I don’t know how to get her to trust me, and I don’t even know if she should. I’m incapable of almost all feelings except for self-loathing and anger. Well, and lust, I guess. Whatever it is I feel for her, and I know I feel something, it’s new and terrifying, and only today, I went from finding her hot to wanting to wrap her in a soft blanket and lie with her while she sleeps with her head on my chest and our fingers intertwined.
“Go on then, go fuck your little whore behind the sheds.”
“Who said it won’t be in my bed?”
I stand up and glare down at her. Her eyes are on fire as she turns her gaze upward. Part of me wants to believe she is jealous, but I know that can’t be true. She is cold and unfeeling, and while I get that her life has made her that way, I was trying to break through those walls.
I guess they are as strong as the cage that is built around her. It will take a stronger, more patient man than I to knock them down. This proves that I’m not the alpha for her. She needs someone who will do whatever it takes, not back down when things get complicated. But try as I might, that destructive button deep inside me has been flicked, and I walk away from her, knowing that any minuscule shot I had with her, is walking away with me.
ChapterEight
