“You’re far too obvious, Aidon,” Will cut in again, that anger in him stirring, and stirring, and stirring. It raced through his veins, hot and wretched andmean. “The lust was written all over your face.”
Aidon’s hands clenched where they rested in his lap, a muscle rippling across his jaw. “Dauphine cares about nothing more than coin,excepther brother,” he pressed, his voice tight with barely controlled contempt. “You know that. You used thatvery thingas leverage!”
If Aidon sought to reassure him, his words only did the opposite. They were another reminder of Will’s failure, of a bet he had placed only to draw the losing hand.
“She was telling him goodbye,” Aidon insisted. “At first, I thought it was just for an ordinary mission but…I don’t think she was planning on just assembling a team and letting us go on our way.”
Liam leaned forward, his shackles rattling as he braced his elbows on his thighs. “You think she was planning on joining our trip to Kakos?”
Aidon did not balk in the face of the Persi’s skepticism. “Yes,” he said resolutely. “That is exactly what I think.”
Liam shook his head once as he dragged a hand down his face. “Perhaps she thought she wouldn’t survive betraying us,” he offered.
Sheshouldn’thave survived, Will thought viciously. He should have killed her as soon as he saw Finnias sitting on that godsdamn couch. At least, then, he could have done something right. At least then, he’d know the woman who had cost him his chance to get to Aya had died the death she fucking deserved.
Aidon shook his head. “It doesn’t make sense—”
The tether that kept Will’s anger from exploding snapped. His body jerked forward, his feet planted firmly on the ground as he glared at Aidon. “It makesperfectsense! Sparing her brother years ago was foolish. I should have let him die just as she would have.”
The words tasted as bitter as Dauphine’s horror had that day when he’d sensed it across the fighting ring. Gods, what he wouldn’t give to go back and let the boy die. He wondered what flavor her horror would have taken on then.
Perhaps it would’ve tasted like his grief, earthy with a hint of acidity that begged for a distraction.
Aidon fixed him with a steady stare, his brown eyes wide and far too knowing. “You would have never been able to stand by and let that happen,” he finally said.
You are weak.
You are weak.
You are weak.
“And even if you had,” Aidon continued, “she would not have let Luc die.”
Will hadn’t realized how his breath had shallowed until hewas spitting out a bitter retort through clenched teeth. “You spend one evening with her and suddenly you know the intricacies of her mind, do you? You don’t know her, Aidon.”
“Will,” Liam tried, but that heat in Will’s veins demanded an outlet, and he knew exactly how to get one. “Gods,” he scoffed, “No wonder it was so easy for your uncle and Viviane to betray you.”
His words had the immediate desired effect. Aidon lunged across the space, his shackled hands gripping the front of Will’s vest and yanking him off the bench. Will crashed to the floor of the wagon, his shoulder slamming hard into the planks. Aidon barely gave him space to roll onto his back before he was pinning him and delivering his first blow, a sharp hook across the corner of his jaw.
The copper tang of blood had never tasted so sweet.
“Stop it,” Liam hissed, glancing furtively at the front of the wagon.
Aidon did no such thing. He threw another punch, this one to the side of Will’s face. Will’s head jerked with it, his vision swimming as the voices in his head finally went quiet.
“You’re pathetic,” Aidon spat, his weight heavy as he leaned forward to glare down at him, his fingers winding tightly around the edges of Will’s vest. He cut a glance to Will’s shackled hands, still limp on his chest.
He hadn’t taken a single swing.
Understanding lit Aidon’s gaze before he gave a bitter shake of his head and slammed Will back into the ground.
“Find a better way to exorcise your demons,” Aidon demanded as he shoved off of him and staggered back onto the bench. “I refuse to aid in your self-destruction.”
Will’s head swam as he pushed himself up and spat out blood onto the wooden floor.
“Hang on a moment,” Liam murmured from his spot on the bench. “Self-destruction’s not a horrible idea.” Will frowned at the Persi, but Liam was too busy turning somethingover in his mind to notice his offense. “Could you burn the wagon?” he asked Aidon.
Aidon rubbed the back of his neck, doubt written clearly in the furrow of his brow. “Were you planning on us living through this plan of yours, or do we get to be collateral damage?”
