Scarred(Never After #2)(52)

“The scarred prince is unhinged, Sara. Stay away from him until necessary, do you understand?”

“How do you know it was poison?” Michael questions.

“Because I’m not an idiot.” Tristan breaks our connection and spins toward his brother. “Did you not see the convulsions? The struggle to breathe? The quick and torturous death?”

Michael sucks in a breath. “He’s dead?”

Tristan chuckles, the sound rumbling deep in his chest.

“Hyenas,” Xander hisses.

My brows rise to my hairline, irritation at the disgusting name bleeding through my pores. I get what he’s doing; pinning the murder on the rebels. It wasn’t the plan, but I see the appeal of using them as scapegoats to help us hide in plain sight. Still, the thought of innocent people being hurt drops in the center of my chest, weighing me down until my legs tremble. Hopefully, I can finish the job before it comes to that.

Michael huffs. “Here? In the castle?”

“They’ve made it in the castle before,” I speak up. “Is it so far-fetched to believe they could again?”

Tristan leans against the wall, the muscle in his jaw tensing and releasing. He pulls a joint from behind his ear and rolls it over the cupid’s bow of his lips before slipping it in his mouth, and even though it isn’t an appropriate time or an appropriate reaction, my stomach tightens, desire pooling between my legs.

After our night under the stars, I don’t know that I’ll ever look at smoking the same.

He grabs a match from his pocket, a few wayward strands of his jet-black hair falling over his scar as he leans forward to light the end; the flame making his features glow a warm shade of orange. His eyes flash when they flick to me, and he straightens, allowing the fire to burn down the wooden stick until I’m sure it’s grazing against his skin.

But he doesn’t even flinch. Doesn’t even move.

I swallow, stuck in his gaze like quicksand.

He smirks, smoke seeping out of his mouth and curling into the air.

“Regardless, there’s nothing to be done for it now,” Xander says, snapping me out of my daze.

My chest twists as I turn my attention away.

Michael paces back and forth, his eyes bouncing from one wall to the next, and I bite the inside of my cheek as I take him in, wondering why he seems so uneasy when a few short weeks ago, a decapitated head rolled at his feet and he couldn’t be bothered to care.

“Don’t worry,” Xander continues. “I’ll take care of everything.”





CHAPTER 29





Tristan





“Do you think it’s a rebel?” Edward says, adjusting the cuff on the edge of his uniform. “Someone who’s grown restless and took matters into their own hands?”

A shot of rage fires through my chest at the thought of a rebel disobeying me, and I glance at Edward, distrust weaving through my mind.

“Why would somebody wish themselves a torturous death by my hands?” I ask. “They have to know that’s what would await them.”

He nods, rubbing at the scruff on his jaw. “Do you think it’s Alexander? That pathetic little bird?”

“I think everyone is suspect at this point.” I rise from my seat, making my way to the corner of Edward’s room and staring into the mirror perched on top of his chest of drawers.

“Even Lady Beatreaux?”

Defensiveness slams down like a concrete wall, cracking my foundation with its force. I spin to face him, tilting my head. “If you have something to ask me, Edward, do it. I cannot stand guessing games.”

He swallows, lifting a shoulder. “I mean nothing by it… but she is an attractive woman.”

I clench my jaw, tamping down the urge to cut out his tongue for speaking of her as if he has any right. As if he has any clue of how devastating she truly is.

“She’s my brother’s.”

He glances at me from his peripheral as he comes to stand next to me in the mirror. “Yet you warned the rebels not to touch her.”

I sigh, tiring of his line of questioning. “I will be the one to kill her, Edward. Preferably while Michael watches.”

My mind flashes back to the dinner, when she brushed against my cock, then placed the same fingers in Michael’s hand, smiling up at him like he was her world.

A sudden thought strikes me like a sharp slap to the face.

What if it was her responsible for Takan’s death?

She’s always sneaking around in places she doesn’t belong, has knives attached to her thigh, and plays the part of a doting royal when I know for a fact she’s a silver-tongued snake.

She was also sitting next to Lord Takan at the banquet.

A huff of air escapes me as the puzzle pieces slot together, a cool trickle of relaxation sliding down my insides at the realization.

Of course, it would be her.

My little liar.

I expect to feel anger, but instead I grow aroused, delighted that if it is her, she’s far more nefarious than I thought. It makes me want to push her, see how far she’ll go until she breaks.

My cock rises to half-mast from her devious deeds, and I sink my teeth into my bottom lip, biting back a groan, recognizing that this makes her even more attractive to me than she already was.