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Either I’m insane or he is. I don’t know what to make of any of this.
I sure don’t feel safe.
Maybe he can tell, because his eyes search mine. He sighs. “If I let you up, can you agree not to punch me again?”
I shake my head quickly, and he rolls his eyes—and all of a sudden, just for a flicker of time, he looks like Wes. “Well, that’s true enough, I’m sure.”
Helets me go anyway, rolling agilely to his feet. He tosses a small ring of keys onto the floor beside me. “Unchain yourself.”
I try to pick up the keys, but my hands are shaking, and they rattle between my palms.
Corrick can surely hear it, but he moves away, toward a low table near the door. There’s an array of bottles and glasses that sparkle in the light. He takes a glass and pours an amber liquid into it.
I’ve unchained my ankles, and I knot the fabric at my shoulder, but when he turns around, I coil the chain between my hands and glare up at him defiantly.
He raises his eyebrows, then drinks whatever he poured in one swallow. “Would you rather be thrown into the Hold?”
No. Yes. Maybe. I don’t know.
Perhaps he can read that flicker of indecision that crosses my face because he nods. “Fair enough.” He pours another glass. “Put the chain down.”
I tighten my fingers on the links.
The corner of his mouth turns up, but he looks more disappointed than amused—and again, just for the briefest moment, he reminds me of Wes. “Lord, Tessa.” He tosses back this drink just as quickly.
“Was it you the whole time?” I whisper.
“It certainly wasn’t me half the time.” He pours another drink. “Put the chain down. Now.”
That cold tone of command has reentered his voice, and it speaks to a place inside of me that wants to flinch—but also wants to rebel. My palms have gone slick on the links, but I don’t let go. He might have backed off for now, but he certainly wasn’t gentle in the throne room, when he must have known who I was.
Betrayalburns in my chest—but it’s also wrapped up in shock and disbelief. Wes is too kind, too compassionate, too . . . ?not this man.
“Prove it,” I say, and my voice wavers, but I square my shoulders and keep my eyes locked on his. “Prove you’re Wes. Prove you’re not tricking me.”
I expect him to refuse, because I’m in no position to make demands, but he sets down his glass and moves across the room to a low chest. He burrows through it for a moment, then draws out a length of black fabric and a hat.
He ties the mask into place, then eases the hat onto his head, giving the brim a tug in a way that’s unequivocally Weston. My breath catches. The length of chain slips out of my fingers to rattle against the floor.
I don’t know what this means. I don’t know what to do. I press my hands against my mouth to keep from crying out. Too many emotions are warring in my chest. Relief. Fury. Despair. For days, I’ve been grieving Weston’s death, and now, to discover that it was all a trick . . .
This is an entirely different kind of grief. An entirely different kind of loss.
When Wes died, I lost the hope of . . . ?of any kind of future with him.
With this discovery, it’s like losing all of our history, too.
He takes off the hat and removes the mask, burying them down in the chest again. When he’s done, he returns to the side table and picks up the glass with the amber liquid.
I expect him to toss this back as quickly as he did the others, but to my surprise, he approaches me and holds it out. “You look like you need this more than I do.”
Idon’t want to take it—but he’s not wrong. When he releases it into my hands, the liquid is trembling.
I close my fingers around the glass and breathe. I want to throw it at him.
As if he can read my thoughts, he says, “If you throw it at me, I’ll cut your hands off.”
I keep my hands clutched tightly around the drink. If he were Wes, I’d know he was kidding. But he’s not Wes, he’s one of the most feared men in all of Kandala, and I know for a fact he’s done worse. I don’t have to look farther than the men hanging from the sector gate.
I stare up at him and wonder who he killed to make this secret last.
I wonder why he kept this secret. Why he did this at all. Why he killed someone else to fake the death of Weston Lark. For as betrayed as I feel, the confusion about all of it is almost worse. What did he have to gain?
He’s looking back at me without any hint of emotion on his face, offering no clues. So I keep the glass and I take a sip, and the liquor burns a path all the way down to my belly.
And then, because all of this fury and loss and anger and disappointment has to go somewhere, I draw back my hand and throw the drink right at him.
