Black Knight (Royal Elite 4)

“It’s like a belly dancer. Is that what you practice late at night?”

My head snaps up. “How do you know that?”

He can’t possibly be watching me, because his room always has its dark curtains pulled down.

“I think we’ve established that I know a lot of shit about you.” He pushes off the tree, and my body instinctively tightens.

The way he stalks towards me is nothing short of a predator. Someone with the need to hurt and destroy. Someone who’s after me, not anything else, just me.

Still, I speak in the most neutral tone I can afford. “Why?”

“Why?” he repeats, lifting one of his brows.

“Why do you know a lot of shit about me?”

“That’s the question of the century, isn’t it? Why?” He stops when his chest nearly brushes against mine.

This close, I can breathe the stench of vodka on him, strong and unyielding like everything else about him.

He’s drunk. No, he’s wasted. I’m surprised he was able to walk that small distance from the tree to here or even sound relatively normal.

Usually, if someone were to stare at me the way Xander is right now for more than five seconds, I would be compelled to run away. It’s sinister and filled with so much anger, it’s physically wounding. But I can’t run away from him. I did it before and it ruined us for fucking good.

“Why green?” he asks.

“Huh?”

“You heard me. Why is it fucking green?”

“My favourite colour?”

“I hate your favourite fucking colour. I hate you, Kimberly.”

Ouch.

I try to think that I already know that bit of information, that he’s always made his feelings crystal clear, but hearing him say the words is equal to inhaling black smoke straight to my suffocating lungs.

I couldn’t breathe if I wanted to.

“I hate your eyes and your fucking hair.” He clutches a strand and strokes it between his thumb and forefinger as if he’s memorising it – or thinking about burning it. I can never tell with him.

He’s that dark well that’s been abandoned for years. You never know if you’ll find a treasure or vengeful ghosts in it.

“Then stop touching me,” I breathe out. “Stop getting in my way, stop invading my life and knowing so much shit about me.”

Most of all, I need him to stop seeing me. Because if he keeps doing that while pushing me away and letting other beautiful girls into his bed, it’ll only make the fog worse.

Why can’t he leave me alone until we part ways at the end of the year?

Just why can’t he do that?

“I should.” He releases my hair with distaste. “But you keep being this sore thumb, making yourself noticeable all the fucking time. Don’t ask for my attention or I’ll suffocate you with it.”

“I n-never asked for your attention.”

“You want me to believe that?”

“I didn’t.” I push away from him. “Go away, Xander.”