Total pages in book: 254
Estimated words: 240032 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1200(@200wpm)___ 960(@250wpm)___ 800(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 240032 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1200(@200wpm)___ 960(@250wpm)___ 800(@300wpm)
I squirmed in my seat. “Because I don’t want you to look at me differently.” Well, more differently than he already was, avoiding me, and just… retreating.
But maybe this would be a good thing. I didn’t want to hide myself from whoever I ended up with. It was bound to come out anyway. And maybe I’d have a better excuse as to why Henri would pull back and stick to being polite with me from now on.
That would make things easier to an extent. Moving on, that was.
I didn’t think he liked my answer, though, from the way he frowned.
“Dominic was rude to Agnes, and I said some things I don’t regret, but I’d rather you hear it from me than from him,” I told him, crossing my arms over my own chest, hugging myself. “I owe you that much.”
His face went even broodier. “Was he rude to you too?”
“I don’t think he knows how to be nice. From everything I’ve heard, he’s mean to everyone,” I explained. “But I got mad, and I may have threatened him a little.” A grimace shaped my mouth.
“A little?”
I nodded and held up my index and thumb apart. “Little bit.”
“How?” Henri asked, his tone cooler and flatter.
I bit the inside of my cheek, but I had to own it. Nobody had made me do what I’d done. “He got in my face for telling him to leave after he got an attitude with Agnes. I may have said that he can bully some people, but there are other people who wouldn’t put up with his BS.” I swallowed. “Other people who might make him pay for his actions.”
Henri shifted his weight, his expression still sober. “Make him pay how?”
I scratched my cheek, but there was no hiding me. No hiding who I was, and this was something else I shouldn’t be too ashamed over. Did I wish it was different? Absolutely, but I was the knife, and I could cut a cake, or I could stab someone. And I’d warned Henri already in bits and pieces. There was a good chance he might have already deduced what I was about to admit.
I could only hope.
“You probably already have an idea,” I said. “I’ve told you more than I’ve told anyone else in a really long time….”
I couldn’t say it. It was one thing to threaten Dominic. To insinuate heavily. But it was a whole different ball game to tell Henri. To tell anyone, I wanted to believe. Matti knew because he was Matti. I trusted him more than anything and anyone. He would never look at me differently, and because of that, his reaction could never have been devastating.
If Henri did….
Why had I done this to myself? Why had I given another person so much power over my feelings? Was it because I wanted him to like me? Was it because I more than liked him?
Amber eyes burned a hole straight into me. “You can tell me anything,” he claimed, like he could read my mind.
I lifted both my shoulders, pressing my lips together.
“I’m not scared of you. I thought we went over that already,” he went on, steadily.
But I still hesitated.
Sure, he thought that. Sure, we’d faced two bogeymen and he hadn’t batted an eyelash with them or with Spencer, and who knew what other beings he’d come across in his life. But… that was different.
His thick throat worked, and I didn’t think it was disappointment that came over his features, but it might have been something close to it. “You don’t need to tell me if you aren’t ready.”
Would I ever be?
Planting my elbows on the table, I palmed my forehead and released a low, long breath. “You’re going to hear about it. I don’t think that bigmouth is going to keep it to himself, and you don’t deserve to find out from someone else.”
His voice was so deep. “Tell me then.”
I closed my eyes. “Remember I told you about those people who tried to kidnap Duncan? How they had brain damage?” I didn’t wait for him to answer. He wouldn’t have forgotten, it was a stupid question, and I was trying to avoid getting to the point, so I kept on going.
“I know about their injury because I called the hospitals in the areas where we were and pretended to be related to them. They’re all at the ICU, or they were last time I checked, which was a month ago. I didn’t know for sure when I did what I had to do, that that’s what would happen if I used my magic on them. I honestly thought they would have a heart attack, if anything.” I pressed my forehead tight into my palms. “I took a little bit of their life away from them.”
Silence stretched long in the trailer between us.