AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Wes heaved a sigh, his fingers running across his forehead. “The why is to keep you safe. The where is not something I’m going to tell you.”
“Why not?”
“The more you know, the more it interferes with keeping you safe.”
She leaned forward, her hand curling into a fist and thumping onto the table. “That is bloody backward logic. If I know where I’m going and why, then I can keep myself safe.”
“Can you?” His eyebrows lifted high. Too high.
Pompous ass.
“What if I get separated from you?” Her voice fell into a hiss. “How would I know where to go?”
“I’m not letting you out of my sight.”
“No? You don’t know that.” Her head shook. “There’s going to be a moment when you are not right next to me. And who knows what can happen in that moment? I know I can protect myself—I’ve lived on my own, taken care of myself for a very long time and if I get separated from you, don’t you think I should know where to go?”
His bottom jaw shifted back and forth. “You’re not getting separated from me.”
“You can’t control everything, Wes.” Her hand pulled back from the table and she crossed her arms over her ribcage, her gaze going to the junction between the stone fireplace and the charred heavy beam that ran alongside the top of it. “That was always your way when we were younger—you had to control everything—and look where it got you.” Her look dropped to him. “When you couldn’t control everything around you, you got lost—you disappeared. You didn’t know what to do.”
His mouth pulled back into a terse line. “Don’t push me, Laney.”
“Even now you’re doing it.” She jumped to her feet, her hands slamming down on the table as she leaned toward him, her glare meeting his. “You can’t control me. You never could and that has always been at the crux of your anger at me. Did I ruin you? Yes—I did something you couldn’t control and that alone was the worst of the betrayal. The whole reason you hate me so.”
“Laney—” The growl in his voice was unmistakable. She ignored it.
“No. I am done. I am done apologizing.” Her nails scraped along the table as she pushed herself away from him. “Done feeling so guilty seven years later that I let you drag me into the middle of the bloody countryside for heaven knows why. Morty died, I was almost tossed into the river, and now Mr. Filmore is dead. And you’re demanding I blindly trust you. When any trust—any loyalty I once had for you is now down to the tiniest shred. I’ve been doing just fine on my own for the last seven years and I don’t need you in my life now.”
She snatched the key from the table and spun from him, stalking her way across the room and up the stairs.
Leave the ass to his own dinner.
She had lost all appetite.
{ Chapter 17 }
A low whistle reached his ears.
Wes ignored it, not bothering to look up at Rune as he approached with three plates full of mutton pies next to heaping lumps of green that he couldn’t quite identify. Rune set the plates onto the table and sat across from Wes.
“I didn’t see anyone go up the stairs before or after—you?” Wes grumbled into his tankard.
Rune shook his head and picked up his fork as he scanned the room. Constantly on guard. There wasn’t a better man for seeing things before they came to be than Rune.
Wes scratched his brow, his head shaking, then picked up his fork, jabbing at the food on his plate but not taking a bite of anything.
The blasted woman had a knack for driving him mad. He’d forgotten that about her—how she liked to challenge him at every turn. After he grew into his height at fourteen, his size and his position had meant that few challenged him. His father. Laney. That was it.
She had been too damn entitled to it then. Too damn entitled to it now.
After the low whistle as he’d approached, Rune ate in silence across from him. Pointed silence.
Wes’s stare locked onto Rune. “What?”
One more forkful of mushy beans into his mouth and Rune lifted his look to Wes. “Who is she?”
“You know exactly who she is.”
