Born of Silence (25 page)

“I’m so sorry,” she breathed. No one deserved the indignity they’d put her through. Never mind what had been done to him. At least the women hadn’t dragged her naked through public grounds.

Yet.

There’s always tomorrow.

But that wasn’t what she wanted to think about. Instead, she closed her eyes and remembered what it felt like to be held in the arms of someone who loved her.

“I want you to marry me, Zarya. I need you in my life. I know it sounds weird, but when I’m with you, I’m the man I always wanted to be. And when I’m not, it’s like I’m lost to someone else, and I don’t like him anymore. I can’t keep living the lie that was forced on me.”

Now she knew the lie.

And it broke her heart.

But tomorrow, no matter what it took or how hard it was, she was going to try and find that man he’d spoken about.

She’d found him once.

Now it was time to bring him home…

9

Darling came awake to the worst pain in his skull imaginable. His head felt like it weighed five hundred pounds and that his uncle had bounced it off the marble floor a few dozen times.

Damn, it hurt.

He pressed his hand to his forehead and went cold as he felt skin on skin. What the hell? He hadn’t removed his gloves since Syn had released him from the hospital.

Panic tore through him. How could he be in his bed without his mask and gloves?

What happened to me?
He couldn’t remember anything from the night before.

Who’d undressed him?

“It’s all right, Darling.” Maris came out of the shadows to stand next to him. “You passed out last night. I carried you in here and put you to bed.”

Thank the gods for that.

But his relief was short lived. Frowning, which made his head throb even worse, Darling did his best to recall something from last night.

Everything was a fog. It was like trying to chase down a phantom wind.

How flagged had he gotten?

Yeah, okay so he’d started drinking on a stomach filled with nothing but painkillers around lunch, and hadn’t stopped until he must have passed out. Still…

“I don’t remember anything.”

Maris snorted. “I believe it. You were pretty wasted. I haven’t seen you like that in a very long time.”

“How long was I out?”

Maris turned the clock to face him.

Darling cursed as he noted the time. “It’s the middle of the afternoon?”

“You haven’t slept in days, probably weeks,” Maris said simply. “You were exhausted.”

He’d lived his whole life exhausted. Sleep had always been a stranger to him. Peaceful sleep even more so.

Squinting against the faint light in the room that pierced his brain, he grimaced at Maris. “What about you? You look like shit, buddy.”

“You keep sweet talking a girl like that and you’re liable to get lucky.”

Darling didn’t comment on that. “You haven’t slept, have you?”

“No. I kept watch for you while you slept.”

Of course he did. Maris was the only one who fully understood his lunatic idiosyncrasies and paranoia…

And the fact that a sleeping governor was usually a dead one.

“I appreciate it. Thank you.”

Maris inclined his head. “You know, you might want to think about showering at some point today.”

“Why?”

He rolled his eyes. “You really don’t remember anything from last night, do you?”

Darling tried to think through the throbbing haze. He saw images, but he wasn’t sure if they were real or imagined or dreamed. One thing that he did vaguely recall was Maris holding and rocking him… at least he thought he might remember it. “Did you kiss me?”

“Only on the cheek.”

Darling wasn’t so sure about that given the evil light in Maris’s dark eyes. It was a look he knew all too well. Maris had a secret he was hiding from him.

Something that would make him mad when he found out.

Gods, I hope I didn’t respond to any official e-mails…

If he had, he might be on the brink of war today.
Better check on that soon.
If there was an armada coming, he might want to rally some troops before they arrived.

Then again, in his current mood, a war might not be such a bad thing. Yeah, he wouldn’t mind tearing into a few of his enemies.

His thoughts drifted to the night before when he’d been in his office. Someone had been there dressed in white. It was a color Maris despised on himself for several reasons.

Maris would only wear it if he were dead…

Closing his eyes, Darling wasn’t sure what his mind was trying to tell him. But one thing tugged at his memory…

The smell of a woman’s skin. Something he hadn’t been near in a long time. And then, he saw an image of someone standing behind Maris in his office.

He looked at Maris and scowled. “Did you bring me a woman?”

“I did.” Now his expression and demeanor were completely unreadable.

Suddenly, Darling caught the scent that was still on his clothes from the night before. One that seemed to have permanently
attached itself to his very skin. Unforgettable and as individual as the woman who bore it, he knew that scent better than any.

It hit like a kick in the crotch.

Still, he didn’t want to believe it was what he thought. Surely, Maris had more sense than that.

“Zarya. She’s here?”

Maris nodded.

Raw, unmitigated fury exploded through his entire being. Never had he wanted to kill anyone more than he wanted to kill Maris in that instant. “Goddamn you! How could you do that to me!” He winced as the pain in his head sharply intensified, but right now he had more important things that hurt him.

Things that cut a lot deeper.

Maris gave him a droll stare as if he couldn’t care less that he stood one wrong answer away from death. “I’ve been up for more than forty hours, and I’m too tired to fight with you right now. I’m going to bed. You dumped her in the kitchen, and abandoned her there for the others to humiliate. Just so you know.” And with that, he left the room.

Darling lay completely still as his emotions ripped him apart. Rage. Hatred. Revulsion. And an effing headache that rode him with spurs.

But underneath all that was a need so deep and compelling, he wanted to claw it out of his heart.

Zarya was in his home. She was
here
. Close enough to touch…

Don’t be stupid. She’s a lying whore who slapped you. Twice.

Just like your mother. Throwing you to the wolves to save her own ass. Hauk’s right. All women do is take and forget everything you did for them. Every sacrifice you made. You were never anything to her.

Nothing.

Just a means to an end. A tool to be used. Dirt beneath her feet.

And he kept coming back to the reality that she was in his home. Just down the stairs and one long hallway…

His stomach heaved. Darling rolled from the bed and stumbled to his bathroom. He barely made it to the toilet in time.

His body was really not happy with him.

Gah, he’d drank himself stupid last night. He felt like complete crap.

Maybe Maris was right.

It was time for him to finally shower.

“What is taking so long? Are you an idiot retard or just lazy?”

Zarya counted to ten so that she didn’t grab one of the knives on the nearby table and cut the cook’s throat with it. She was getting really tired of the offensive insults and abuse dealt to her. Not just from the cook, but by all of them.

She was a trained soldier, not a domestic. Since they’d eaten mostly table scraps since her father had been branded a traitor, cooking had never been a skill she’d had an opportunity to pick up.

The ability to kill bitches…

That was something she was more than proficient at.

Calm down, Z, calm down. They’re not worth a death sentence.

But if they didn’t lay off her, she might reconsider.

And now that she had clothes again, she’d be able to escape tonight. One way or another, she wasn’t about to spend a single second longer as a slave than she had to. Collar or no collar, she was out of here. And damn anyone who came after her because they wouldn’t live long enough to regret it.

Part of her wanted to stay for Darling and keep the promise she’d made last night, but at this point, she was done. He didn’t want her and she wasn’t going to put up with this kind of abuse, waiting for him to come to senses he most likely didn’t have anymore.

Screw him. If he didn’t want her, she didn’t want him—plain and simple.

His life might not mean anything to him, but hers meant something to her and she’d be damned if she would spend it waiting on a man. Any man. She might be a lot of things. Stupid wasn’t one of them.

The kitchen bitches had been riding her since they’d dragged her out of her closet at dawn. Nothing she did was right and she was done with the pinches, slaps, and insults.

No man was worth this.

She tightened her grip on the extremely heavy tray of vegetables that the head cow wanted on the cook’s prep table. There was no reason in it being piled so high…

Suddenly, she hit a really slick spot on the floor. Before she could catch her balance, her feet came out from under her.

No!

But the gods weren’t listening to her right now. Apparently they needed entertainment and lucky her, she was their chosen buffoon. The vegetables flew everywhere as she slammed down on the hard floor. Her elbow hit first, then her head bounced off the tile.

For a minute, the unexpected pain stunned her as stars dimmed her vision.

“Get up, you lazy, worthless whore.” The cook viciously kicked her in the ribs. “Clean this mess up. Now!”

Zarya clamped down tight on the desire to physically retaliate for that. The cook was a freewoman. She was a slave.

If Zarya attacked her…

She’s not worth your life.

Tell that to her base anger that didn’t want to listen to her brain. It wanted blood…

Rolling over, Zarya pushed herself up, then hissed as she realized she’d sprained her ankle in the fall. Yeah, that was just what
she needed.
Let’s make running from here as hard as possible on me, shall we?

“Crap,” she breathed, trying to put weight on it in spite of the pain. By the gods, she wasn’t going to give these cows the satisfaction of knowing she was hurt.

“What now?” The cook slapped her. “I’ve never seen anyone so worthless. No wonder the governor threw you to me.” She grabbed Zarya by the hair and started pulling her across the room.

“Let her go.” Those growled words came out in a deep staccato beat that emphasized the fury and unspoken threat beneath them.

The cook freed her instantly and bowed low. “Yes, Your Majesty.”

Everyone in the kitchen immediately stopped what they were doing to follow suit.

Stunned, but refusing to bow down to anyone, Zarya straightened to see Darling just inside the kitchen doorway. From behind his gold mask, those merciless blue eyes cut her to the bone. It was obvious he wanted blood, too.