Page 41 of Sinless Demons
“Aries. Aries, don’t.” My hand pushes beneath me, but when I try to sit up, my arm gives out, and my head bangs against the wooden armrest. “Fucckk,” I hiss.
“What do you want?” Aries continues on as if I never said a godsdamn thing.
Corva’s smile dips. It falters into a low frown. “I want to be with my family, Ari.” Her tone is so gentle, it’s alarming. I’ve known this woman for a while now, and I’ve never fucking heard that kind of sincerity.
I don’t believe it for a fuckin’ second.
Aries’s iron-like eyes shift across Corva’s face as seconds pass in silence. “I know,” she finally says.
Fuck me.
“Aries,” I call to her, but once more, I’m just the forgotten dying seraph in the background of everyone’s thoughts. Pain slices through me, and I groan from it as much as I’m groaning in annoyance.
“I want to come back to court,” Corva the Conniving Cunt says.
“I know.” Aries looks at her sister with too much kindness in her pretty eyes.
“You’ll help me, then? You’ll help me come back to the castle?”
No. Fuck no. “Aries,” I whisper on a shaking breath, my entire body trembling with agony.
Damien looks back at me. “Shh,” he says with a small shake of his head, like I’m interrupting a fucking family moment here.
What the fuck is this shit? Why is no one listening to me? I have one little heart condition, and all of a sudden, I’m the horse looking down the barrel of a shotgun?
“I can’t trust you, Corva.” Aries lifts her chin high in that sexy little dominant stance of hers.
That’s my fucking girl!
Gods, she’s so much smarter than she looks. Sometimes. I mean, she’s... whatever.
“You’re one to throw stones,” Corva says with an arch of her brow. “How’s Nathiale, Aries? How’s my sweet little brother? Tell me.”
Aries doesn’t flinch from those sharp-spoken words. She doesn’t even blink with the confrontation thrown at her feet. She’s fucking fearless.
Why am I so turned on right now?
“I can’t trust you, and you can’t trust me. Why in all the realms would you think anything has changed in the last twenty-three years, Corva? This is what father raised us to be. Not family, but not quite enemies, either. We can’t trust each other. But we can help each other.”
Shit. Aries might act like nothing gets to her. But her family, they get in nice and deep under her skin, it seems.
“Take a vow with me,” Corva says swiftly. And all of a sudden, I’m pushing to my feet. I stumble just slightly, but I right myself on the corner of the couch.
“She’s not fucking doing that,” I growl out.
Finally—fucking finally—Aries looks at me. Her eyes are big and shining in a way I couldn’t see before. It cuts into me deeper than the pain that’s already tearing me open.
“You should rest,” she whispers.
“I’m fine,” I say for what must be the hundredth time.
“Aries Sinclaire, I vow never to harm you, never to hurt you, never to kill you,” Corva announces in a scripture-type tone that chills my bones.
Aries turns to her sister then, her chin held high, her features fearless.
“Corva of the Unknown, I vow never to harm you, never to hurt you, never to kill you,” Aries repeats.
Fuck.
