Chapter One Hundred and Ninety Two
Chapter One Hundred and Ninety Two
RILEY
“How do you like this place?” Axel asked, “I mean, if it’s not good enough for you, we could arrange something else.”
“It is fine” I muttered.
“Do you need…”
“No,” I snapped before he could complete his sentence.
What the hell was wrong with me?
“Okay then, I’ll leave you to get settled,” he says, before walking away and leaving me all alone.
I walked straight to the bathroom.
This would be a very long bath.
I set the hot bath. Gosh, I missed this. I sat in the tube; the warmth was so welcoming; I leaned against the marble and easily fell asleep.
The footsteps woke me up.
There Thane stood, always the pervert, watching me bathe. The bubbles had died down, revealing a little too much cleavage. My first instinct was to wrap my hands around my bare parts, but then that would make him know how his gaze still affected me. Instead, I remained in the bathtub, making no move to cover up.
“Why are you here?”
“I brought some food; you must be famished, just as I am.”
“We are not dining together.”
“No?, then how would we make sure the food isn’t poisoned?” he asked, his signature smirk still on his face.
I rose from the bathtub, very aware of his hot gaze on me.
He whispered something along the lines of ‘Kill me now, Riley.‘
I picked up a robe, wrapping it around my body, before walking to him.
“How I would love to do just that,” I responded.
The tray of food waited on the table; I was going to have to sit beside him. That was too close -closer than I was prepared to be right now.
Still, I took a seat, and he sat beside me. To my surprise, he put some distance between us. Not
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Chapter One Hundred and Ninety Two
that I was complaining.
“I want to ask you a question,” I began.
“Well, ask on,” he says, clearly interested.
“You say you didn’t send those soldiers to those packs; Were you telling the truth?”
“Yes, even if you still don’t believe me.”
“If you can remember, something happened back at the mate ball; it had been that very day I discovered elder Bailey injured in the woods. I had left the party, triggered by what I saw in a particular hidden room.
I don’t believe you were being completely truthful when I asked what those pictures were doing there.”
“You are right,” he says, and for some reason, I felt disappointed; a part of me still hoped I wasn’t right. “I didn’t lie to you but I hadn’t told you the complete truth then. We had considered this plan, what many now refer to as the ‘new era‘, where there would be no Alpha’s but the Alpha King, me. Bailey had brought about this idea before she left on the mission. She had believed she was going to defeat the elder who managed to escape, but the elders wouldn’t be the only threat, to assure the crown remains in the Nightshade packs, she thought that it was a sensible solution to kill every other Alpha.”
“And you agreed to it?”
Thane paused. “This plan would lead to a lot of bloodshed, but I have been born into this; in the world I know, you do anything to stay on top.“‘
“Even if it includes killing innocents?”
“It is never my intention, but people would always die, simply because they were in the wrong at the wrong time. Still yet, I never did go on with the Bailey plan; we had disagreed on it because it wasn’t worth it, Riley. I am not the one behind all these.”
I believed him. I hated how easily I believed him, but I did. When Zed’s men had come in here, they found nothing, not because the clues were hidden but because there was nothing to be found.
“Have you considered the possibility that Bailey masterminded all this?”
