What if there are bears?
Or worse, more men.
“We have to go back. He had Rosie under possession. She’s still in the forest,” I demand.
Sin’s expression is hard, and he doesn’t budge. “Artorix is dead. His possession died with it. Rosie is fine.”
I sigh, relieved to hear she’ll be okay.
My relief is short-lived, though, when I realize that Sin is still glaring. Immediately, I glower back. I’m not sure what his problem is now, but I assume it has something to do with the fact that I followed the sketchy underworld man into the woods. Which is an entirely unfair judgement, given Artorix had Rosie, but hey, if we’re playing ‘let’s be angry for stupid reasons,’ I’m coming out on top this time.
“What the hell took you so long?” I demand, poking him in the chest.
“What?” Sin whispers, barely containing his rage. He’s still glowing red.
Something must be wrong with me because I’m not even remotely worried. “You heard me. I held him off for ages in that forest, making sure he didn’t kill Rosie. I couldn’t kill him with my flimsy dagger, could I? So, I stalled him. And you took your sweet time coming to find me.”
Sin’s jaw is clenched so tightly that I’m worried for his teeth. His body is rigid like he’s ready to jump down my throat. “You –” he starts, his voice accusing. His hands fist and un-fist at his sides. “He could have –”
“I followed the crazy person into the woods because he was threatening to kill our friend. He tried to hurt me, but he didn’t. Because I was armed. Because you made sure of it. And because I’m not useless,” I snap at him.
I felt proud of myself tonight. And I refuse to let Sin’s anger tarnish that emotion. No one gets to take that from me.
The frustration continues to bleed off Sin as he rakes his fingers through his hair, but the glow in his tattoos fades, if only a smidge. He’s still very clearly upset with me, so my jaw almost hits the floor when he reaches out to grab my waist, pulling me to him. I go stock still in response, just for a moment, waiting to see what he’ll do next, but he just… holds me. The feeling is completely foreign, and after another breath, I let myself melt into him.
My mind wants to spin circles around the fact that no one has ever held me, at least not outside of a bedroom… not like this. This is dangerously uncharted territory. But I shut it out, letting myself enjoy this, even for just a minute.
Of course, Sin then has to go and ruin the moment. “I don’t think you’re useless, kitten,” he notes, the deep timbre of his tone soothing me even further. “I think you’re slow.”
I move to pull out of his arms. However, the warlord wannabe doesn’t seem quite ready to let me go just yet, and my efforts are in vain.
I stomp on his foot.
That does the trick.
Sin laughs and releases me.
I frown at him, crossing my arms. “I’m still angry,” I grumble, surprising myself.
Admitting to feeling angry, rather than shoving the emotion away where it can’t hurt me, is so far out of character for me that I nearly cover my mouth once thewords are out. And there was no excuse for it at this moment. I’m not trying to deflect Sin’s anger or fighting for my friends.
I just willingly started a conflict.
But rather than responding with anger of his own, Sin just grins at me, and it is pure wickedness. “Good. I like your anger. Throw it all at me. I’ll take it. However, the others are likely waiting to be briefed on what happened tonight. Did you want to fight first? Or hold off until after?”
Embarrassment quickly takes hold when I realize we’ve kept the others waiting. “No, of course, they should be briefed first.”
Humming at my answer, Sin takes my hand. “And kitten, the next time you put yourself in danger like that, I will not hesitate to manipulate your mind and make you read every dog-eared page from the book I borrowed. Out loud. At dinner.”
Chapter 31
Rule thirty-one:If the fairy says you’re partying, you party.
I’m pretty convinced that we blew it at the party. Especially given the whole ‘Sin used his Destroyer powers in front of all our potential allies’ thing after Sin and Morgana explicitly stated that doing so would make us enemies across all the realms. And, of course, I also went and pulled a knife on a party guest forflirtingwith Sin.
I need to work on myself.
The others have been gone for well over an hour. They have their hands full, making sure all the party guests return to their realms, ensuring all Shadow Realm citizens get home, and re-adjusting the wards to stop emissaries from returning here.
