I hiked a brow.
He sighed. “If they survive the evening, they’ll be fed proper and allowed to rest. Afterward, the next morning, it’s a free-for-all. Those of the Initiates who caught their prey are to stay for the rest of the week, where we’ll have the branding ceremony at the end of it once all candidates have been slaughtered. Isn’t that fun?”
A ceremony. Candidates. Slaughtered.
I smile broadly and nod. “It sounds like a fantastic time. Let me get out of these garbs. I want to impress everyone.”
He lifts a hand and pinches my cheek before kissing my forehead. “That’s my girl. I’ll be back for you in a few. They’ll be arriving shortly.”
I sigh and turn toward the window as more snow begins to fall. Kane said Maksim would be resting today. So I let my eyes close. But it doesn’t take me away. Instead it takes me back to a snowy void where screams are cut short and the uncertainty is a constant garbled, whirring hum in the back of my mind.
Slight tapping on my shoulder pulls me out of a slumber but it’s the whispered “Duchess?” that makes me spring up quickly.
A new maid with big brown eyes and blonde hair I haven’t met yet is blinking at me. I squint at her. “Who are you?”
She keeps her voice low but sets a large tray with tea down on the nightstand. “I have to go before I’m found. So I'm going to talk very fast. My name is Alice. I’m a nurse. I’ve been helping Maksim in the facility. He’s not there anymore. He’s in the east wing with the others who survived the night.”
“Can you get me to him?”
“I can tell you how to get there and which room he’s in but not much else.” She gives me quick directions as I fumble for my purse.
I hand her the small sack Franny gave me yesterday. “You’re a nurse. Help him with this. It’s to tag him. I know how that sounds. It’s a bio chip that goes just beneath the surface of his skin, smaller than a grain of rice. Get that in him.Please. It’ll help me find him no matter where he is.”
Without a word, she takes it from me and shoves it into the front pocket of her apron and begins to leave. “I won’t forget this kindness, Miss Alice. Thank you.”
“He said you'd say that.” She grins at me, and then a little louder she says, “Enjoy your tea, ma’am.” Shecurtseysalmost perfectly just as Kane enters the room.
Ergh! Cockwombles.
Chapter Twenty
Maksim.
Fuck!
Fuck, she looked so beautiful standing there waiting for me. I knew she had to turn away. I knew she had to go, but it didn’t kill me any less.
As soon as we’re lined up again, I count twenty-three of us. Out of fifty, less than half survived. I keep my head down as we’re shuffled inside but this time, through a different entrance than the one we came out of. We’re served breakfast but I’m too exhausted to chew, so I eat the oatmeal we’re served, and let it warm me up. Afterward, we’re shown to different rooms.
I’m given clothes and a towel.
Rooms fit for fucking kings. Ostentatious and comfortable like a hotel suite. The bed is large and lavish with seventy fucking pillows and a fluffy comforter. I go to where the drapes are, but when I shove them to the side, there’s nothing but a brick wall. FUCK!
I shower.
I change.
I get into the large king-size bed and fall asleep so hard and fast that when I’m being tapped on the shoulder, it feels like being pulled out of quicksand. Until I remember a day just like this… whereshetapped on my shoulder, ready for a night out with her parents. Beforethis. Before I fell so deeply for a woman who couldn’t stand the mere sight of me. Before she was my wife.Moments.
That’s what I had with my wife.
A series of seconds and blinks full of disdain before I allowed myself to open my eyes completely the second I lifted her veil… and fell for the woman hidden beneath it.
And then it was snippets of moments, seconds, and blinks that enraptured me, that I relive daily, cut together and plastered behind myeyeballs like a montage. And this time, I know when I open my eyes, it won’t be her.
How can a heart be both hopeful and split open all at once?
How can I never have felt such emotions so deeply before I ever laid eyes onher? My wife. My Sabrina. My Duchess.
