Forbidden Honor (Dragon Royals #1)(82)

I’d wanted the moment to last, but he pulled away subtly then, and regret crowded in as my skin cooled without his heat.

“Maybe I keep reminding you because I keep forgetting myself.” He propped his face on his hand, and although he was still just inches away, somehow the distance already felt vast. “I’m only going to get you in trouble. The best-case scenario is the other royals and I hide you somewhere.”

“Hide me somewhere?” I echoed skeptically.

“From the people that did this to me,” he said.

I raced my fingertips gently over his bruised skin, tried to ask ever so lightly, “And who is that?”

Something kindled in his gaze. “I don’t need you to protect me, Honor. You don’t need to make my enemies your enemies.”

“Well, you just said that they’re a threat to me too. But if someone hurts you, I’m going to want blood.” I hadn’t meant to say that out loud, but there was something about the bond between us that teased out words I shouldn’t say.

“Honor,” he said, then looked as if he didn’t know what to say, as if he were at a loss for words. He probably thought I was ridiculous.

I was strangely reckless around him. Not just with my body, but with my heart. “What’s the bond like between dragon shifters?”

He hesitated, suspicion flickering in those beautiful amber eyes. “Why do you want to know?”

“I see you and the other dragon royals sharing this bond, and I know I’ll never feel anything like it. I’ll always be on the outside.” It was a cunning lie to loosen his tongue, so why did the words feel like a painful truth knotting in my chest?

“The bond is powerful,” he admitted. He stroked his fingers down my skin, and I stretched like a cat under his touch, watching his face. He seemed as eager to talk tonight as I was to listen. “I don’t know what to make of Branok and Lynx and Lucien when we’re all tied together now. When I feel I owe something to each of them.”

“Why do they hate him?” I prompted.

“How well do you know Lucien?” His gaze felt like a test. “Has he really not told you what he did to their sister Alina?”

“He took her virginity,” I answered. “But did she want to give it to him? Maybe she didn’t particularly want to keep it in the first place.”

He pulled a face. “She has claimed that it was consensual—to save his life. He claims that he forced himself on her—perhaps he was also trying to save her life, given how Lord Joachim is. I don’t know the truth about what happened with Lucien, except that he made things extremely messy. He never should have gone anywhere near her.”

He mused for a moment, then went on. “Regardless, Branok and Lynx don’t have any doubt. They think that he did violate her. They’ll never forgive him.”

The words violate and never dropped into my gut like stones.

“So what does that mean for your little band?”

“I don’t know. It’s all a mess. And now Lucien thinks they tried to kill him...” He bit off his thoughts, then gave me a strange look. “You get me talking like no one else I’ve ever met.”

“You need someone to talk to,” I said lightly. “We all do.”

“Maybe,” he said, sounding uncertain. “But I don’t know that I like the feeling very much.”

“What feeling?”

“The feeling I’m losing control when I’m near you. I shouldn’t have let this happen between us.”

“Do you regret it now?” I asked, surprised by the throb in my heart and the way my voice almost seemed to stumble over the word regret.

“Not exactly, but I don’t want you to get hurt because of me.” He rose onto an elbow and looked at me seriously. “What if we went away together? For real?”

“Where?” I asked.

“What if you went to one of our hiding places?” he said. “You could leave the academy behind. You don’t need to work as a housekeeper. I’d take care of you.”

I let out a short, dark laugh. “Yeah, sounds super fun.”

“I can’t be there all the time. But I would make sure that you were protected in case something happens to me. And it wouldn’t be forever… someday, I’ll be able to offer you a place by my side.”

Unspoken but clear at the end of his sentence: if I survive.

“You’re talking crazy,” I said. “You don’t want to be with me.”

“Believe me, that’s not the problem,” he said, a hint of his usual steel coming into his voice, which had softened for a moment. But I’m not going to put your safety at risk.”

“I’m not interested in being your personal servant. I have my own life and people to take care of myself.”

“I’ll take care of them too,” he said.

“My little sister still is under my stepmother’s guardianship. If I just disappear, I don’t know what will happen to Hanna. I have to take care of it.”

He looked frustrated, as if this were the one time the prince couldn’t get what he wanted. “Let me take care of you.”

I didn’t understand what I had done to earn this unexpected faithfulness from him, especially in a moment when I’d planned to manipulate him. I was afraid now of what I’d set in motion when I had sex with Talisyn and tried to get him to keep it a secret. Now he had a secret from Jaik and sooner or later, everything would unwind around the three of us.