“Ryker, please. Let me stay with him. Just until he wakes up.”
He clicked his tongue, dismissing my plea. “I don’t think so, wife. You and I have a few things to discuss.”
Chapter Fifty-Six
Cadence
Ryker’s anger was tangible, thickening the air as it coiled around us like smoke. A tremor ran through my body, and I prayed he wouldn’t notice.
He stepped forward, crowding me. His jaw flexed, and his eyes were like twin storms, churning with hatred and condemnation.
“You’re going to tell me exactly what you’ve been up to, Cadence. Right fucking now.”
I didn’t flinch, and that small victory burned through my fear.
“My only goal was to get free of you,” I said, my voice steady. “Every move I made was to keep you distracted. I needed you scrambling, desperate, so you wouldn’t notice when Callum and I slipped away.”
“And you thought aligning yourself with the fucking Crimson Enclave was the best way to achieve that?”
“No. Not them.”
He stepped even closer, almost nose-to-nose. “No more games, Cadence.”
“I’m telling the truth,” I said, pressing my palm to his chest in an effort to create space between us, but Ryker didn’t move.
“Then who?”
I couldn’t reveal Henry’s involvement in my schemes. He was a victim of circumstance who only wanted to protect his people. He didn’t deserve Ryker’s wrath.
But I had to offer him something.
“I have been working with some of the villages who have been displaced by the Wraith Borne attacks,” I said.
“Names, Cadence.”
“I will not give you their names, Ryker. They are only trying to survive in a kingdom that has turned its back on them, leaving them to fend for themselves.”
Ryker snarled, but he didn’t press me on it.
“I knew from the council meetings that rebels had already been attacking the food stores, and that you were looking to uncover the traitor feeding them their information.”
Ryker’s gaze narrowed, his mind working to put all the pieces together. “You used that knowledge to set a trap, another attack to send me running in circles.”
“Not a trap. A diversion.”
Ryker’s hand darted out, collaring my throat. His face twisted into a cruel snarl, all pretense of civility stripped away.
“You endangered an entire fucking kingdom of people by undermining my plans, Cadence, and you stand here, hiding behind a clever play of words.”
The fury in his tone pinned me in place, daring me to contradict him. Guilt surged through me, images of Melania and Malesh, Eamon and Riordan flickering in my mind. I knew the danger, yet I’d embraced it.
“You left me no choice.” My protest sounded weak, even to my ears.
A dark, hollow laugh slipped from Ryker’s lips. His shadows rushed forward, his control hanging by a thread.
He bared his teeth at me. “You think you’re clever, don’t you, Temptress?” His fingers tightened around my throat, a reminder of who held the power.
I dug my nails into his wrist for no other reason than to prove to myself I wasn’t afraid of him, despite the way my body trembled.
