Unbound (The Captive #7)(56)
“And when are you going to let it all out?” he inquired. “Your eyes have yet to go back to their normal color.”
“That’s entirely different and you know it. I’m a dead woman walking without Braith,” she reminded him. “I’m barely keeping it going until all of this is over. You’re twenty-three years old and you have your whole life ahead of you. You deserve love and happiness, more than the rest of us probably.”
“Not true,” he said.
“You sacrificed yourself and became a blood slave because of me. What was done to you should never have been done to another. You deserve some peace, and I will do anything I can to help you find it.”
“You sacrificed yourself and became a blood slave because of John. If not for Braith, your experience would have been as bad as mine, if not more so. I am happy now.” At her raised eyebrow and disbelieving look, he continued. “Happier than I’ve been in a long time. Well, before everything went to shit anyway. I was healing. I’d found my place at Daniel’s side, helping him to rule and make decisions with The Council. I may not have been in charge, but I was still doing good, for all of us, and I enjoyed it.”
“And how do you feel after today?”
“Today broke me again a little,” he admitted. “But I’ll figure out how to put myself back together. I did before.”
“I can help with that, or I can try to anyway.”
“Sometimes, just sitting with someone helps.”
“Like when we used to sit together and fish without speaking?”
He smiled at the memory of those early days after they’d both been freed. They’d been such somber days, but the two of them sitting together had helped. “Yes, like that.”
“I can do that.”
“Are you sure you wouldn’t like some wine?”
“I’d like nothing more than to be drunk right now, but I’m afraid if I let my guard down even a little, I’ll snap. I might even eat you.”
“I would have accepted no for an answer.”
She gave him a small smile as she leaned back in the chair, her reddened eyes surveying him. He missed their crystalline blue color, and he missed her full smile, the one that lit her face and radiated her joy. They didn’t speak for half an hour before he rose to his feet and poured himself two more glasses of wine.
Walking over, he sat in the chair across from her once more. “Do you remember when we were younger and used to play hide and seek in the caves?” he asked.
“I do,” she replied.
“How about the time William put a snake in your blanket?”
Her gaze flicked toward the closed door William and Tempest had gone through. “I’d forgotten about that. I never should have given him my room tonight.”
Max laughed and took a sip of wine. “What about the time you dove off the waterfall?”
“And my pants came off?”
“That’s the time.”
“I’d never been more embarrassed in my life, and all you guys did was point and laugh as my pants were swept downstream.”
“You were so mad.”
“You would have been mad too. The water was freezing.”
He smiled at the memory of Aria, sopping wet as she stomped her way out of the river after reclaiming her pants. “You didn’t speak to any of us for the rest of the day.”
“But you all brought me flowers the next day and said you were sorry.”
“None of us ever liked it when you were mad at us.”
“I know,” she said. “It was always the same way when one of you were mad at me. You weren’t as easily bought off with a bouquet though.”
“You always brought us a new fur.”
“I did.”
He thought he saw a flash of blue in her eyes, but it was gone before he could be sure. He’d once believed he was in love with her; he now knew he’d been lost and looking for someone to care for him when he’d never felt more dirty and unlovable in his life. The thing was, Aria had always loved him, just as he would always love her.
“I’m not ready to lose you,” he said honestly.
Her eyes darted toward the door to the hall, her fingers fidgeting in her lap. “I’m not ready to lose any of you, but without Braith—”
“I understand,” he interrupted. “No explanations. I don’t think either of us need to hear what we’ve experienced and are experiencing. I think we both know.”
Her gaze came back to him. Tears glistened briefly in her eyes before she wiped them away. “You’re right. Those kind of revelations aren’t necessary.”
He sipped at his wine, but he found that this time he far preferred talking with her to the silence. He didn’t know if he would ever get this chance with her again. “Remember when we all covered ourselves in mud along the riverbank and jumped out of it to scare your father?”
This time Aria actually did give a real laugh; it was short, but it was there. “Not even as a vampire have I ever run as fast as I did when he chased after us.”
“Neither have I,” he admitted.
CHAPTER 22
William
“Is she asleep?” William whispered in disbelief when he stepped out of the room and spotted Aria in the chair she’d been sitting in last night. He assumed it was morning because he’d awoken and felt somewhat rested, but couldn’t be sure of the exact time of day.