Page 21 of Breaking Isolde
I watch her go, heart pounding, skin buzzing with the need to finish what I started.
When the silence returns, I go to the altar, run my fingers over the old marble. The sigil she traced is deep in the stone, just visible in the weak moonlight. I press my palm to the center, feeling the cold bite through my skin.
I stand there a long time, until the cold is all I can feel.
Then I pick up her notebook, thumb through the pages, and walk out.
She’ll come back for it. She’ll have to.
And when she does, I’ll be waiting.
Now that that’s done and I’ve satiated the beast she brings out in me, I can go find out once and for all that she’s going to be mine.
There’s a technique to entering the Board’s chamber: never let the Board see you sweat. I have it down to a science, muscle memory ingrained from years of attending disciplinary hearings and legacy ceremonies. But tonight, the pulse in my neck is loud—each beat a reminder of the chapel, her mouth, the copper-bright taste of blood and need.
I walk the corridor with my hands in my pockets, shoulders set, tie knotted tight. The floor is stone, uneven, freezing through the soles of my shoes. The air tastes of old books and secrets—formaldehyde and dust, the ambient rot of a building grown too fond of its own ghosts.
At the door, I pause and run my tongue along the split in my lip. There’s a smear of blood there, drying into a scab. I savor it, then push inside.
The chamber is worse than I remember. All carved oak and black marble, with oil portraits stacked up the walls like an archive of dead men and their disappointed wives. The ceiling is low, the lights deliberately dim. At the center: the table. The rest of my Boys are already in position, each radiating a different shade of threat.
Julian lounges with his chin on his fist, angelic in his contempt. He sees me and grins, teeth too even to be real. “You’re late,” he scoffs.
“Fashionably,” I reply. I take the chair beside him, keeping my back to the wall.
Colton is two seats down, hood up, hair shadowing his eyes. He flicks a glance at me, says nothing, but his fingers drum the table with a steady rhythm.
Bam is at the far side, arms folded, bulk filling the chair like it’s an afterthought. His jaw works on a phantom chew, eyes fixed on the surface of the table. He’s bored, or pretending to be.
At the head of the table sits Dr. Abelard, spine ramrod-straight, hands folded with disdain. Ms. Valence perches to his right, posture perfect, her hair in a chignon so severe it might be a weapon.
Abelard’s eyes are glassy and pale; the irises seem to dissect you. “Welcome, gentlemen,” he says. “Let’s begin.”
The guards close the door.
Abelard launches into an update: new rules for the Hunt, security upgrades, a rundown of all the “unfortunate incidents” that forced the change.
I don’t care. My mind is elsewhere.
I see her: Isolde, the line of her throat, the way her jaw set when I forced her down. The way her lips parted, softening for a single heartbeat before the hate returned. I want to taste it again. I want to drag her out from behind that armor and see what’s left when she’s out of words.
“Rhett.”
Abelard’s voice cracks me back to the present. I meet his gaze, steady.
“Yes?”
“You seem distracted,” he says, and the ghost of a smile flickers at his mouth. “Are you prepared to accept your obligations for your Hunt?”
Julian snickers, low. Bam grunts. Colton just watches.
“I am,” I say.
“Very good. Then let’s address the matter of your candidate.”
He produces a file, slim and cream-colored, sets it on the table and slides it toward me. I don’t reach for it.
Abelard continues, “Isolde Greenwood has been selected as your Prey. In accordance with the Night Hunt protocols, you will be responsible for her integration, capture, and, ultimately, her subjugation and reproduction.”
