“How long was I out?” My voice is raspy, and my throat is dry and scratchy.
Veon grabs a bottle of water and a straw and helps me to take a drink. It’s a vastly different experience from the last bottle of water I drank. The memory of Maxim feeding me the water flashes through my mind, and I repress the shiver that threatens to make my limbs tremble.
“Only a few hours,” Veon says as he puts the bottle back. He sits back in the chair, but he won’t look at me. His eyes trace the floral pattern on my duvet, and his hands clench together, his thumbs rubbing against each other as his mind wanders.
“It’s not your fault,” I say. I reach my hand out towards him, but he just stares at the ring of purple bruises around my wrist.
“It is, Echo,” he says with a sad smile. “You are mine to protect, and I lost you.”
“Veon…”
His eyes shine in the low light with unshed tears, and I hold my hand out again. He runs a gentle finger over the bruising before settling his large hand in mine. It’s warm and rough against mine, and I wrap my fingers around his, holding tightly.
“What happened, Echo?” He finally meets my gaze, and I suddenly feel guilty. He looks devastated, and I know he saw what happened.
I take a deep sigh and start from the beginning and tell him everything. I don’t leave anything out, and the more I talk, the more devastated Veon looks. When I finish, he doesn’t sayanything. I lie there and watch the expressions play across his face as he digests what I went through.
When he finally talks, his voice is raw and cracked. “So you wanted to stay. With them.”
Guilt threatens to choke me, and I have to swallow it down. “Yes.”
Veon pulls his hand away, stands up and walks to the window. He stares out at the night sky, his hands braced on his hips and his shoulders tense.
“Why?” he asks, disbelief in every inch of the syllable.
How could I possibly put into words how Maxim, Niki and Angel made me feel?
Do I tell him that they made my body feel like it was on fire? Or that they saw me for who I am and who I could be, not just the woman who sits on the sidelines or the man who sees me as nothing more than his duty? “Because I don’t want to lead a double life anymore, Veon. I’m sick of pretending, sick of hiding who I really am, and with them, I got the chance to justbe. Can you even begin to imagine how freeing that feels?”
“But they’re Volkovs!” he yells as he turns back towards me.
I sit up in bed, flinching at the ache that spasms down my spine, but I don’t care. “So? They had the chance to hurt me, and they didn’t. They’re notmyenemy.”
He shakes his head in exasperation. “Don’t be so naïve, Echo. The two families are on the cusp of war. They were probably just using you to get what they want.”
I reel backwards as if his words had physically slapped me. No. That can’t be true.
Could it?
Had they just been placating me? Was it all just fun at my expense?
But then I think about the way that Niki signed ‘precious rabbit’ and how Angel kept checking to make sure I was alright.Maxim was the only one I was unsure of, but even then, there was something in my gut telling me that I had meant something to him. That I wasn’t just a pawn in a game.
“You’re wrong, Veon.”
He snorts in disbelief, and I can’t take it anymore.
“Fuck you, Veon.”
“Fuck me?” he says, pointing at himself and walking closer. “I’m not the one who put on an orgy for everyone to see.”
A blush rises up my cheeks as I realise exactly how much Veon saw.
“And I’m not the only one,” he adds.
“What?”
“I took Sphinx and Kai with me.”
