I hush her with a flick of my wrist, pushing through his office doors. My eyes fly to that same white wall. “You need to redecorate, Kij. That wall is awfully boring. It could do with some” —I bring my eyes to his—“color. May I suggest red?”
“Hmmm,” Kij murmurs, rounding his desk before leaning against the front. Time hasn’t been kind to him, and neither will I. “Tell me, Little Doll. Why are you walking around Patience like an untrained horse?”
I allow myself to explore his office space. No photos on the walls, no books. Nothing but that damn blank white wall and a stench that could only be described as stale. “A stallion, at least?” I graze the palm of my hand over the stone inbuilt gas fireplace, smirking at him over my shoulder. His eye twitches, but he straightens his shoulders. “Truth is, Kij, I am Lilith fucking Patience, and I’m the last heir to this” —I wave my hands around the place—“shithole.”
“Eh, wrong.” He begins walking toward me and I grin. Perfect. “I held fifty-one percent of the shares in this place, your father only forty-nine.”
“And?” I spin to face him, shocked to find him already so close. “You don’t have any spawn. Unless you got one of these poor bitches pregnant.” I chuckle, and then I pause. I spin back around, eyes narrowed. “You got one of these poor bitches pregnant, didn’t you?”
The smile that widens on his face reels inside my head.
I shake my head. “No. There’s no way you would have done that.”
“Actually, yes, there is, and that’s because I knew this conversation would happen one day.” He leans into me, curling my hair around his finger. “Don’t worry, you’ll always be my favorite Little Doll.”
I whack his hand away, but he rears back and slaps me across the face with the back of it. I fall to the ground in a blink, pushing up with my palms.
“Get out, Lilith. I’m finished with this conversation.” Picking up a tumbler glass, he pours honey-colored whiskey into it and swallows in one shot. “And enough of the brave act. Get back in line or I’ll throw you back out the back exit.”
I slowly rise from the ground, swiping the blood from my lip. “What’s Cartier Nero doing here? She’s of no importance to me, so why?”
“Not you,” he said, his eyes now twinkling. “But to bait her brother. I knew you wouldn’t be enough to get him here. You’re good” —his eyes fall up and down my body—“but you’re not that good, and because of the fact it was him who dropped you right back into my lap, I doubt he would give a fuck about rescuing you.” Kij lowers himself onto his chair. “Ah, but that Eli? Now Eli has a heart below all of that coldness and hostility. He would, but I also know that Kyrin would fill his head enough so that he wouldn’t.”
“Why did Kyrin give me to you?” The doors open behind me and I rear forward, slamming my hands onto his desk. “Why is she here?”
Kij raises his index finger to his head. “Hmmm, isn’t that a question of many…”
Hands are around my arms, yanking me backward before I can get out of them. Kij flicks his wrist. “She’s not a Doll anymore. Lock her with the blue one. I’ll deal with them both later.” I shove myself out of one’s grip, spinning around and shoving my elbow into the other’s face before roundhouse kicking the first man. My foot just clips his jaw when a sharp pinch stabs into my arm and everything moves in slow motion, like a fuzzy TV connection, before slowly… everything goes black.
I’ve done a lot of fucked-up shit in my life. Questionable? No. Fucked up? Yes. Do I regret anything? Fuck no.
Except maybe this.
Coming back to Kiznitch is never without some fucked-up bullshit that happens, but not even I was prepared for a truce between Patience and me. Lilith fucking Patience pulled a fucking blindfold over all of us.
To be fair, I knew.
“You know, those villains…” Killian jokes, flicking a cigarette between his teeth and winking at me.
I clench my teeth. “She is nothing like Saskia. Sass wasn’t a real fucking villain. Lilith is. She was well aware of what the fuck she was doing and did it anyway.”
“To be fair, she is my cousin, so maybe the crazy runs from my side.”
“No, it fucking doesn’t,” King answers, leaning back in his chair. We’re bungled up at the Nero house, looking out to the hedge maze that fills the backyard. “It’s her. Saskia told us she didn’t operate the same way that normal people do. We were warned. We did it anyway, despite it. This is the consequence.” King sighs, running his hand through his hair. “Our glorious parents will be here in five minutes, and I’ve got nothing to tell them other than we fucked up. Our parents aren’t going to give a flying fuck about us fucking up, but a truce with Patience? Something tells me they’re going to care about that more.”