“So long as you cooperate with our little agreement, your sister will live a long and happy life here. I have a younger boy in mind who we can betroth her to,” Maxim said.
I tried not to react, repeating an old saying we used to spout as children.Sticks and stones can break my bones, but words will never hurt me.Anything to keep him from knowing my thoughts. The saying looped in my mind loudly over and over as I panicked about him marrying off my little sister.
Maxim’s head snapped to Whitney, and the woman paled. She was in her mid-twenties, beautiful in an understated way. There was a strength in her he hadn’t beaten out. Yet.
“After all I’ve done for you, you still think that way about me?” he asked her. I wondered what Whitney had thought, and suddenly, I felt an unspoken alliance with the woman.
“Forgive me, sir,” she said sweetly, fakeness dripping from her voice.
He waved his hand at her as if annoyed, and I wondered why she was with us.
Ricov was clearly here so that Maxim could read our thoughts, but what was her gift? I wondered.
Maxim grinned at me. “Oh, you’ll see.”
I sighed, sad that I no longer had privacy with my own thoughts. Everything was under his control. My body, my mind, my free will.
Visions of our wedding night bloomed in my head, and I went numb, sinking into a deep sadness that I wasn’t sure I could ever crawl out of.
We drove through the downtown area, passing large buildings, and then finally past where the Red Palace used to be. It was cleared land now, already halfway through rebuilding, this time from steel.
I glanced at Maxim to see him watching me.
“That night, you made all my dreams come true,” he said wistfully.
The night I killed his father was the night all his dreams came true? That was telling of his character, or lack thereof.
I glanced at Ricov, ready to have him send that thought to Maxim, but Maxim seemed preoccupied with Whitney. He stared at her and she glared back at him, and tension filled the car, the kind that did when you were former or current lovers.
Interesting.
I stared back out the window, taking in all the sights and wondering how far we would have to travel to see my sister, what conditions she was being kept in, and how the hell I was going to survive this new life.
I suddenly had a thought. Maxim had taken my power to control, but he hadn’t taken my power to explode. If I detonated myself right now, I could kill us all and?—
Maxim’s hand snaked out and wrapped around my throat, pinching off my air supply. I tried to reach up and pry it off, but he forced my hands to remain down.
“If you try to end my life in any way, the men I have holding your sister will kill her as I have instructed them to. Do you understand me?”
I nodded, able to move my head, and then he let go, leaving me gasping and sputtering for air.
My gaze flicked to Whitney, who appeared horrified at my treatment. But when Maxim peered at her, the look was gone, and she appeared unfazed.
Ricov stared out the window at the passing trees as if nothing had happened.
Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me,I repeated over and over as I tried to process what had just happened.
I’d learned something. Iwasable to kill Maxim. That plan would indeed work, or he wouldn’t have freaked out.
Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me.
Ricov glared at me with a confused look on his face, as if he couldn’t read my thoughts clearly when I chanted the nursery rhyme.
I grinned.Checkmate, you bastard.
The car pulled off the main road and onto one that led to a huge set of iron gates. The forest was thick here, and it looked like a manor had been carved out of it. I peered up at the sky to see Maxim’s firebird flying over us and to a house that sat atop the hill.
I peered at the wolf, who was also staring at me.
