“When did you put it together?” I asked, fury tensing every aching muscle.
“At the winter ball,” she said. “Do we have an agreement?”
Melanie—once the love of my life, my best friend’s twin sister, the vixen of Falls Court, and the desire of every man near her, no matter their age. She played the game well—she knew what to say, what tone to say it in, and all the right places to strip you of control.
But Melanie was a lie.
She offered you wine but laced it with poison, the kind that killed you slowly, drawing the life out of you in excruciating pain.
That was the life she was asking me to return to—one of solitude, obligation, and perception.
One without Anna.
But one where Anna had a possibility of still being alive, versus wherever she was right now.
“Why should I trust you?” I asked.
Melanie stopped pacing. “Because I am your only chance to get her out of here.”
“And you know where she is?”
She nodded.
I tried to swallow, but my throat was dry.
I had no other option. Not while I was chained up like this.
“Who did this?” I asked. “Why are you still here?”
Melanie looked down and to the left, a rare sight of guilt.
“The rumors are true, Blake,” she whispered. “I did not believe it at first, but it is true. I think I can get out of here without being stopped but I need to go soon.”
Rumors? She could not mean those rumors. I shook my head in disbelief. It did not matter. Getting Anna out of here was all that mattered right now.
“Fine,” I snapped. “But the deal is only valid if you get her out of here alive,” I growled. “If you do, then I will do whatever you ask.”
“I want your oath,” she whispered.
I should have expected this. There was little reason to object at this point. Whatever Ezreal had done, I was certainly going to be implicated.
“I will marry you,” I said, looking far deeper inside of her than I had in some time. Like before, I found a hollow void.
She released a shaky breath and broke eye contact. She turned to leave but paused.
I watched her, wondering what was going through her head. Why would she want this? Was being Queen that important to her?
“I heard what Ezreal said to you the day you were found in the sub-level training hall,” she said. “That if you kept looking for her, he would hurt me.”
The moment she referred to came to my mind in vivid detail. And the events that preceded it. It was not a memory I ever wanted to revisit, but it still came calling in the later hours of the night.
“Again.”
I could not hold my sword properly as it slipped from my grip due to the blood.
I glared at Ezreal, his bright red eyes unnerving me.
We had been training for hours.
