Page 77 of Sweethearts and Savages
“I don’t know.”
Kell moved closer to Frost. A show of solidarity? Or did he just think there was safety in numbers?
I paced up and down the small corridor, trying to corral my thoughts. Frost stepped closer to the bars, shaking off Kell’s hand as it tried to hold him back. In a miraculous display of human stupidity, he stepped right up to the bars, close enough for me to grab him and choke the fucking life out of him.
He sucked in a breath and pushed it out past his teeth, the sound whistling in the silence. “I’m sorry. I know that doesn’t mean shit to you right now, that you can’t trust the things I say, but I promise you, I would never have hurt her. She’s… I don’t fucking know. I know she isn’t supposed to affect me the way she does you, but there’s something about her that makes you want to see the good in the world. Like she’s the last fucking good thing left and destroying her would be your one way ticket to Hell.”
I stared at him until he turned away. “You both came really close to destroying her though. The fact she’s still standing at all is no thanks to either of you fuckers. I’m left behind trying to fix what you guys so fucking easily destroy without a care.” They both stared at the ground, but Kell eventually raised his gaze again. If he’d been a shifter, he’d have been a strong one.
Which somehow made it worse. I wanted to climb in there and assert my dominance. I wanted to make him pay for every fucking tear she’d shed on his behalf these last few months. I stuck the keys in the door, and watched them both tense as I opened it slowly.
I sauntered into the cell like I wasn’t worried about being trapped in there with them, which in all honesty, I wasn’t. I would always be genetically superior to humans. To Enit though? It didn’t matter if we were humans or supernaturals. Whether we’d wooed her or stolen her love like a greedy child.
Something in her had decided on these two, and eventually she’d get over the betrayal. But they would still be her abductor and the spy. They couldn’t be trusted here and this world wouldn’t accept them. It would be better if I killed them before they had the chance to break her heart even more.
But instead of rending them limb from limb like my lion was screaming for me to do, I stepped to the side.
“Leave. There’s no place for you here, but this is where she needs to be. I can’t look at either of you without seeing a threat, and I’m hoping that time dulls the urge I have to tear off your dicks and make you eat them.”
Frost blanched but Kell held my eyes. I could begrudgingly admire that. I held out a folded sheet of paper from my back pocket. “In two years’ time, we will be at this address. Either be there or don’t—I don’t give a fuck. But I won’t let us get stuck in this cycle for another year, do you understand? If you return here, you will die. Frost has our numbers; he accrued them while pretending to be our friend rather than a threat to our entire safety.”
“Bohdie…” I turned at the voice behind me, but I wasn’t particularly surprised to see Enit and Stacey. I dropped my head, not wanting to see the look in Enit’s eyes. She’d only just gotten Kell back, and here I was, making him leave because I was so damn jealous and pretending it was because I was fucking altruistic.
She rested her hand between my shoulder blades, soothing me, before stepping around me and facing down her demons. Or her potential love interests. It was hard to know which was which, after this last year.
Kell stood frozen, like he didn’t know what to do now she was within arm’s reach. But when it came to moments like these, where it was all feelings and heart stuff, Enit was the Alpha. She stepped up to him until she was completely in his personal space, then she merely leaned her forehead on his chest, over his heart and shuddered with relief. I could feel the bond flare where it ran beside mine, and I gritted my teeth.
She drew back, looking up into his eyes, her brilliant blue ones wet with unshed tears, and… headbutted him in the nose.
The crack reverberated around the room, and she grabbed her forehead with both hands, wincing.
“Argh, Carmen always said no one wins in a headbutt, but Jesus fucking hell,” she groaned, and I stared between them wide-eyed. My sweet, gentle Enit had just broken this guy’s nose. I didn’t know if I should be worried or proud. When she let go of her head—which was going to sport a bruise for sure—she grabbed Kell’s shirt, pulling him into a kiss. She didn’t care that there was blood pouring from his nose, and neither did he, given the way he was kissing her back.
Finally, she pulled back—her face smeared with blood—and smiled. “Be better, asshole. Wait for me.”
He swallowed hard, kissing her once more on the head. “I will, I swear it.” He lifted his shirt and pinched his nose, trying to stop the bleeding. Looked painful. I grinned in glee.
She turned to Frost, and her face was now solemn. The betrayal was written all over her face, and Frost looked like he’d been punched too. She didn’t say anything, but her face said it all.
Frost moved toward her, ignoring my warning growl. “Enit…”
She held up a hand, not giving him the chance to step closer. “She could have died because of you. It’s going to take me time to forgive you, to believe that the man who made me smile, who watched Netflix with me and my mates, who I was falling for, wasn’t just a figment of my imagination. Because I can’t reconcile the Frost who laughed at my terrible jokes and stroked my hair and looked at me like I was his goddamn salvation, with the man who tried to blow up half of my heart.”
I had to admit, Frost looked absolutely shattered. It was hard to fake that raw devastation. “What can I do?”
We all waited then, waited to see whether they had a future with us, or if it would all be for nothing.
Enit closed her eyes and sucked in a breath. “Stay with Kell. Make amends. Show me that you are the man I thought you were.”
Frost chewed his lip, his head hung low as her words hit him like blows. She tucked her hand under his chin, lifting it slightly. Leaning forward, she barely touched her lips to his but I knew what it was. A promise. Or maybe the hint of a promise.
Whatever it was, it was a liferaft to cling to when times became hard.
I saw the shine in her eyes as she turned and fled from the cell. No one stopped her, no one went after her. She needed to process, and she deserved the space to do that in private.
I stood aside once more, waving the two men out of the jail cell. “Hurry the fuck up, because this town is populated entirely by vampires, and I’m pretty sure you two are the equivalent of Whiteclaw in a sorority house right now.”
They both blanched, and having met X, I didn’t blame them. God knows how they even made it to a jail cell and weren’t both in a shallow grave in the woods already. I leaned down to Stace, brushing her hair away from her bandage.
