Page 18 of Crown of Death
His voice sends an echo reverberating throughout my entirebody.
It snatches me around the chest and draws meclose.
My entire body trembles. And I can’t even breathe, much less say aword.
“You did well in calling me, Edmond of the House of Valdez.” The man steps inside, slowly, one controlled step at a time, across the concrete floor. “She does look just likeher.”
Who?I mentally say.Who is it you think that Iam?
The man’s eyes flick over to Eli and a little smile curls on his lips. “Oh, that clever little whore. Thinking she can send her father’s man-servant to hide and protect her child for all these years.” He looks over to Edmond, who steps into the space. “How much longer until Rathawakens?”
Edmond looks down at his watch. “Any moment now, yourMajesty.”
Majesty?
My head is spinning again. My heart seems to have taken up residence outside of my body. Like it sits in this man’s hand, as he slowly, so very slowly, paces around the room, looking meover.
Finally, he comes to a stop, standing directly in front of me. His dark eyes bore into me with such intensity that I’m pretty sure I’m just a bare, bone white skeleton now, shackled to thischair.
“Is it true that you have no idea who Alivia Ryan Conrath is?” heasks.
His lips. Oh, lord, why can’t I look away from his lips as hespeaks?
“No,” the word squeaks from my lungs as I finally look up to his eyes. “Though I’ve heard that word—name—Conrath, said several times since I was…broughthere.”
The man continues to study me and my breath catchesagain.
Power. Dominance. Fear. It radiates off of him inwaves.
“I was told you were adopted,” he says. “How old are you, mylove?”
A shiver crackles its way down my core at his last two words. I try to speak; only the words catch in my throat. This is bullshit. All of it. Last night. This space. These people. I lick my lips, holding his eyes warily. “I just turned twenty a few weeksago.”
His only reaction to that is that his eyes narrow slightly. I can practically see the gears turning in hishead.
Whatever this is, he’s piecing it together aswell.
But my eyes fall downward. And I see his fingers curl intofists.
“Release her,” he commands, and that’s exactly what it is. Acommand.
Edmond scrambles forward. With a key, he releases me from the chains. I rub my wrists and stretch through the soreness in my entire body from sitting in one position all night. I remain sitting,though.
“What of your birth father?” he asks. His voice is low. Intimate. Words meant for only the two ofus.
I shake my head. “Nothing. My parents never knew anything at all about either of my birth parents. I was placed with them when I was three daysold.”
His eyes narrow again, trying to puzzle this, whatever this is, together. “And what of him?” the man says, nodding his head toward Eli. “I assume Rath has been watching over you in some form or another since you were…” He pauses, mentally calculating something. “Four yearsold?”
I blink three times. “Four? I…I didn’t meet Eli until I wasfourteen.”
The man looks over at Edmond. “You’re sure your contact at the House of Conrath said sixteenyears?”
Edmond nods. “That’s what shesaid.”
“Why do you keep calling him Rath?” I ask, looking from Edmond, to the man staring atme.
“What is it you call him?” he asks, genuine curiosity in his eyes. “Eli?”