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“Who are they again?” I asked.
“The two other richest families in Good Port, besides the Hakobyans,” Hayk explained. “Their patriarchs, Ivor Lobe and Sanzhar Arzumanyan, were Lord Vikhrov’s two closest competitors in the election two years ago.”
“Is there any way to learn the names of all the people who work for both families?” Peter asked as we puffed our way on up the hill. “To see if they match any of the names in Hadrian’s book? That would be the quickest way to resolve this whole thing.”
“It would, wouldn’t it,” Lefric said with a smile that didn’t fit the seriousness of the moment. “That little book could make all our lives so much easier. It’s a good thing you found it.”
Once again, I felt as though I’d been left out of a bigger adventure. So many things had happened before I’d rowed up to the dock in Hedeon a few days ago. It felt like a lifetime ago…a lifetime I hadn’t been part of. Like everything else, it made me feel separate from my friends, different from them. They all had lovers now. They held important roles in the Wolf River Kingdom. They were comfortable with their own bodies and sharing them with others.
“Stop looking like that.”
I snapped my head up at Hayk’s surprisingly sharp command. He was frowning at me.
“Like what?”
“I don’t know,” Hayk said, shrugging. “Like you think it’s your fault that the entire frontier is in danger of falling to pieces.”
“It’s notentirelymy fault,” I said, sort of attempting a joke.
Sort of.
Hayk laughed and squeezed my hand. I’d forgotten he was holding it.
“You’re interesting, Anton Fuck Me,” he said. “The more I learn about you, the more I want to know. I want to peel away your layers like a banana, and then swallow you whole.”
I blinked at his strange, mixed metaphor. My cock twitched, and I prayed he hadn’t noticed.
As much as I didn’t want to, I pulled my hand out of his. “I’m not that interesting,” I muttered, out of breath from the hike. “I’m not a leader, like some of my friends. I’m not clever or quick or good looking like them either.”
Hayk threw a hand out at me, and I flinched, jerking out of his way.
“Youarequick,” he said, a mischievous light in his eyes.
I let out a breath and frowned. “Not that kind of quick.”
“You’re good looking too,” he said, craning his neck back to stare at my ass. “Very good looking.”
“I am not,” I growled.
“Beauty is in the eye of the beholder,” Hayk said.
I paused and blew out a breath. We were within sight of the gate to the Hakobyan estate anyhow.
“Will you please stop trying to make me feel better about myself?” I hissed. “It’s humiliating.”
Hayk stopped with me, his eyes going wide. “Humiliating for me to give you a compliment?”
“You’re lying. You’re making fun of me,” I insisted. “For once, I just want someone to be honest with me, to stop trying to fill my head with nonsense that I know isn’t true. At least Dmitri is honest with me.”
An odd, sour feeling filled my stomach as those words left me. I didn’t like Dmitri. He was horrible, and he’d gotten off on hurting me—physically and emotionally. The last thing I wanted to feel for the man was respect.
Even worse, instead of laughing or arguing with me, Hayk looked to be at a loss. He stared at me with an expression like he was at the end of his rope.
“In all my days,” he said in a quieter, somehow fuller voice, “before Da sold me and Billie to Master Daron and after, I have never met anyone like you, Anton Buckbee. I’ve never met anyone who fights so hard against themselves, and with so little reason to. I can’t figure you out.”
“Then don’t try,” I said, moving on, since they others had made it all the way to the gate and were watching us. “You don’t know me. You don’t know the horrible things I’ve done or all the reasons I don’t deserve to be hap—”
I snapped my mouth shut and clenched my jaw. I’d already spilled more things from my lips than I was comfortable with for one day. It annoyed me to no end that this gorgeous man I’d barely just met could draw so many truths from me against my will. I would have to avoid him as much as I could for the rest of the time we were in Good Port.
