Her pride smarted, but more than that, her hearthurt.She’d made so many promises to herself the day she left the Sanctuary, but this was the one that mattered most. Some days it was the only thing that kept her going.
You make your own path. This is your service.
Guilt clogged her throat. It made her breathing choppy, but she did everything in her power to disguise it.Hedidn’t need to hear her crying. Hopefully with the heating unit running, he would be able to easily ignore it. Even better, he’d already be asleep.
Her hopes were dashed when, after several long minutes of quiet, his low voice asked, “This thing means a lot to you, doesn’t it?”
There was no hiding the tears in her voice when she answered, “It meanseverythingto me.”
He didn’t reply, but then again, she really didn’t want him to. Time moved sluggishly, each second bringing the reality of the sovereign’s orders closer. She didn’t want to close her eyes. She didn’t want to sleep, no matter how badly she needed it.
Still, sleep came for her. It pulled at her eyelids and did its best to drag her swirling thoughts down, one at a time, to the drowsy deep.
Finally, the only thing stopping her from slipping away was a single, niggling thought.
Sighing, Atria grabbed the other, unused pillow with both of her hands and tossed it over the edge of the bed. The last thing she heard before sleep closed in on her was Kaz’s surprised grunt as it landed on his face.
ChapterEighteen
He barely slept.
Kaz wished he could say it was because he had to keep watch during the brief hours before sunrise, but it would have been a lie. He couldn’t sleep because he was… guilty.
Of course, he was used to it. He’d felt guilty since the day he learned what had happened to his mother, his siblings, all because of him.The weight only got worse as he got older. Each new revelation was a small stone laid on his shoulders: Sam’s trauma, Theodore’s violent anger, his grandparents’ withering hatred.
One stone. Another. Another.
Eventually he got used to the weight — even when it felt like he was being slowly crushed to death under it.
But he discovered a new and terrible dimension to the old feeling as he lay on the floor listening to his mate quietly cry into her pillow.
He knew that what he was doing was the correct thing. The need to protect her overrode everything else — his own self-preservation, her wishes,everything.But as he tucked the pillow she had so generously given him under his head, he thought,There has to be some way to fix this.
Perhaps if he found out who was shelling out millions to have her kidnapped, she could still go to her science thing.
But that would take time, and even then, there was no guarantee she’d be safe. A mid-level bounty could be easily squashed, but when they got this big, this fast, they were rarely resolved without bloodshed.
His stomach clenched at the thought of untold numbers of factions and shady, money-hungry criminals hearing rumors of an easy score at that very moment. Word traveled fast in the Underground. When it spread like he feared Atria’s bounty would, it tended to take on a life of its own, usually to the detriment ofeveryoneinvolved.
This is how Underground wars begin.
Some dipshit with too much money and no experience working with criminals ran their mouth, thinkingthe more the merrier,and then next thing everyone knew, one faction had accidentally killed a member of another.Boom!War.
Or at the very least, a big fucking mess.
That was what he was trying to protect Atria from. He was a scary man with a wide, terrifying reputation as the Solbourne family’s orcish guard dog. No one knew where he came from but everyone knew what he was capable of. In most cases, his interference alone would have been enough to squash any interest in her bounty.
But with enough money on the line, even his name wouldn’t be enough to save her.
The only way to truly protect her would be to root out the people behind the money, but that would take time he didn’t think she had.
Still, the guilt twisted him up inside.
Kaz turned his head to peer up at what he could see of her. It was just the swell of her hip and the dark mass of her hair tumbling over the edge of the bed. A long, long tendril had spilled over to nearly touch the floor.
Unable to help himself, he listened to the even sounds of her breathing as he gently caught the curling end between his thumb and forefinger.
It was like silk. Even in the dark, he could tell that the tips of the strands were very faintly blonde. When he brought it to his nose, he smelled jasmine and soap and fresh water.
