Page 128 of Ravenrose

I hear them both moving down the hall, listening to the sounds of their footsteps disappearing up the stairwell before I take even a single step toward Riggs.

He swallows hard, taking a couple of steps away from me.

“You went into my cell,” I say flatly. It’s not a question.

Riggs’ eyes dart around, searching for an exit before he answers. “Captain, she— I can explain⁠—”

I hit him.

One second he’s talking, and the next, my fist is slamming into him so hard his face snaps to the side. He stumbles, yet he stays on his feet.

“I thought we’d been over this,” I say, closing in on him, my voice low and lethal. “You don’t touch what’s mine.”

I hit him again.

Riggs takes the hit, spitting bloody saliva onto the marble floor, a sneer on his lips. “She’s a faerie,” he snarls, his eyes red. “Or have you forgotten⁠—”

I hit him again.

This time he goes down, but I’m already after him, hitting him once more, then hauling him up by his leather armour and slamming him into the stone wall before glaring down at him.

The fucker laughs; blood coats his face.

“She’s a prisoner, fae filth,” he spits at me. “She deserves⁠—”

His words cut off when my fist lands in his ribs. Once, twice, three times.

Riggs coughs hard, doubled over, still on his feet solely because of the grip I have on him.

Voices echo as men spill out into the hall upon hearing the commotion, but no one moves to stop me.

“I know what you were trying to do,” I growl as my mind flashes to Rowan’s torn dress, the blood on her lip, and the fear in her eyes.

Riggs recovers enough to straighten up to look at me, wiping blood from his mouth while studying my face—seeing the rage in my eyes—and yet he still smiles. “Are you really getting sentimental over a faerie? You, of all people? You remember what her brother did, right?” He eyes me with contempt, clicking his tongue. “And yet you protect the sister of the prince who put a blade through Ridge’s heart?” His words land like a punch. “What would Theo think?”

Something in me goes cold. Darkness gathers at the edges of my vision as I seize Riggs’ armour and drive him back against the wall.

“Theo gave her to me. She’s mine to keep. Mine to question. And mine to do whatever the fuck I want with until I decide otherwise—to fuck, if I so choose. Her life belongs to me!”

The hall is quiet, and I turn my head slightly, raising my voice to address the lot of them. “The Sitari princess belongs to me. If anyone touches a single hair on her head,” my eyes darken, a lethal undertone in my voice, “they die.”

I slam the back of Riggs’ skull into the wall one more time to really drive home my point.

“Got it?”

But Riggs doesn’t know when to quit.

“You greedy bastard, you just want her all to yourself,” he spits venomously up at me.

Something snaps deep within, and I feel my eyes go entirely black.

I swing on him again, but this time… I don’t hold back.

Riggs drops to the ground, knocked clean out.

“Yeah, I do,” I growl, looking over his unconscious body. “And I’ll bury anyone who thinks they can take her from me.”

I leave him there, then stalk off through the gathered crowd of both his men and mine, tightening my fists to keep from circling back around to strangle him.