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House Bronson didn’t put her in the prison chamber this time. Instead, the man who introduced himself as one of their sons dragged her to their part of the castle, which happened to be on yet another corner that was as far from House Hendricks as it could get. She struggled from the tight grasp, but the warning fangs were enough to stop that ploy.
“Did you think you could sneak into a party and play the spy on the other houses, too? I bet you had a lot of fun blending in with the castle folks and trying to find your next victim.” There was an outraged pause. “I bet you were trying to turn the other houses against us, too. You were about to spread lies about us at that party!”
She noted that he wasn’t wearing party clothes and was getting more agitated every second. She bit her tongue from telling him to let her go, then held herself as limp as possible. The man noticed and didn’t care, only dragging her harder in retaliation. Winter held back a cry when her head was wrenched away to a chest and her body was carried, effectively blocking her from seeing the rest of the layout.
“You will pay for everything you did. You will not get away with this, you silly fool. We thought we got rid of you, but you keep coming back like an itch. You will wish that you didn’t come back here when we are done with you.”
She believed it and didn’t like it one bit. She cursed her luck but couldn’t surmise an escape plan when she was dropped on her butt and had to deal with the aches that came along with it. Winter blinked her vision into clearing, already gearing up for what was next to come.
Darkness surrounded her except for the spotlight on her, which was close to blinding. She whirled, expecting someone from behind, then spun again when a voice came.
“Tell us what you were doing at that party.”
Was it a speaker? Would she die if she ran away from the spotlight? She cleared her throat and lifted her head.
“House Nova did nothing to you and I did nothing to you,” she declared. “You used me to accuse them, and now you are using me as a scapegoat to manipulate the other houses into believing you are the victim. You were never the victim.”
“What?”
“You are manipulative. You are jealous of House Nova and delusional—”
A hand blurred and struck her cheek before she could evade. Stars rang in her vision at the force, but she stopped herself from falling and ducked to avoid the next hit. She didn’t account for a third hand slapping her other cheek and reaching out to choke her neck, but it was gone swiftly as another voice hissed.
“Don’t kill her yet! We need her to confess.”
“I’m not confessing to anything I didn’t do.” She spat out blood, aware that they could smell her. She turned, damned it all to hell, and risked a sprint into the dark, but yet another arm was there, pushing her back to the center. Then a figure was there, brute and severe-looking, eyes glinting with cold determination. There were slashes all over his face
“This is Melony, the guard at the facility you just escaped. He is deeply insulted that you did so under his watch and has been suffering the consequences of your action. Now, he seeks revenge and will try to prove himself by extracting as much information from you as he can.” The voice of the son turned deep. “Don’t let her get away easily, Melony.”
Melony grunted, not even wasting time as his fangs came out. Fear gripped her heart that she was about to be ripped into pieces, so she held out her hand and yelled at the top of her lungs.
“Stop!”
Whether it was the volume or the action itself, Melony stopped.
“Don’t hurt me. You will offend the house I belong in, and you will regret it.”
“What house do you belong in?” the son asked, tone riddled with disbelieving amusement.
Winter shoved away the horror that Melony was starting to sniff her blood and went right for the jugular.
“House Hendricks.”
The amusement faded. The deep voice growled. “Lies.”
“She’s not lying. She belongs to House Hendricks, and I take offense that you are careless enough not to check.”
All words flew away at the next figure that stepped into the light…no, strode in like an angel of death, ready to rip away anything that stopped its path. But Nate only had eyes for her, gray and unreadable as he briefly assessed her. Then all his focus was thrown on a spot she couldn’t see, where a spluttering could be heard.
“Nathaniel! To what do we owe—”
“You owe me nothing except the assurance that Winter Willow, under House Hendricks, is unharmed.”
“But Nathaniel, we can explain why she’s here.”
Nathaniel crossed his arms. “Very well, then. Explain to me why my exclusive mistress and date to the party is here.”
Gasps echoed all over the darkness, catapulting her into the knowledge that there were more witnesses than she had realized. There was hissing, a hysterical cry, and angry bursts of murmurs that rang down her spine and told her they were very confused. But there was also a very angry Nate, bottling it in with a mask of coolness, but she could feel it radiating from him even if she still couldn’t read him. One wrong word, and she knew he was about to snap—for her. Because they hurt her.
