Taken by the Enemy (19 page)

“Get out.” Mathias spoke low, and she waited for any of the other men to stand up for her, waited for
Lucian
to stand up for her.

“Fine.” Emmie shoved past Ben and Lucian and then reached between him and Victor to plant her finger on the map two streets north of where they had planned. “THAT is a clear spot. It’s quiet and no one fucking looks once it’s night. I know that for sure.” Glaring at Lucian once more, she gave him another chance to support her, another opportunity to acknowledge that she
knew
the safest place because it was where she had climbed over herself, but he only looked angry.

“Out!” Mathias roared, and she threw her hands up.

“I’m leaving!” she shouted. “You’re fucking welcome for saving all of you in advance.” Emmie turned before any of them could speak again, ducking out the door and leaving it wide open.

Rage was making her pulse pound at her temples, a headache coming on fast as she ground her teeth together. She had only walked a little ways away when she heard Mathias’ shout escaping the house. “You call that having that little bitch under control?”

His words were like a knife in her side. Lucian had her
under control
?

We’ll see about that
.

Emmie walked for a while, trying to find the sewing group so she could rant to Alice’s sympathetic ear, but she never found them. Instead, she fumed until she wandered into the woods, finding herself at the edge of the drop where Lucian had stopped her on her first night in the village. She stared down at the angry water and it helped a little to see the water turn white as it pounded against the rocks in a torrent towards
wherever
it went. A quieter creek flowed on the other side of the village, but this vantage point served her perfectly.

Angry, loud, and undeniably powerful.

Nothing would survive unbroken if it fell over the drop into the rapids below, and she knew why Lucian had stopped her that night – but then the memory surfaced of him choking her on the forest floor. Leaving her hands tied so she was defenseless.

The villain.

She had seen that side of him again when he snapped at her in Mathias’ house, refusing to recognize that she was trying to help, that she had
earned
the right to help. He had said he believed in her, but when it came down to it, he didn’t. Without her, they wouldn’t even be trying to enter the city! Mathias would have given up!

Emmie chucked a branch into the rapids below, watching it drop and then be absorbed instantly by the rushing water. It was satisfying, and so she reached back to grab another stick and throw it in. Then a rock. A twig. A handful of leaves. Soon she was scrambling to sweep everything within reach into the torrent under her feet, but the storm inside her wasn’t any quieter.

“Dammit!” she screamed, her voice tearing as it echoed off the rocks across from her.

Settling her face into her hands, she hated that there were tears brimming the edges of her eyes. Wiping at them she tried to focus, and even with the recent memory of his betrayal with Mathias, all she could think about was Lucian, the hero,
her
hero. The way he kissed her gently, the way he ran his fingers or his lips over her most ticklish spaces just so he could tell her how much he loved to hear her laugh. The way he smiled at her when he was really happy, when the weight of the entire village wasn’t on his shoulders, when they were just
them
.

She loved that about him
.

Her entire being jerked.

Love?

She wanted to pull away from the word, but it was there, like flotsam floating on top of the river – impossible to ignore. There was no way she could love Lucian. No way she could love the twisted, complicated, dominating man he was.

Could she?

Emmie groaned, dropping back hard onto the ground until all that was visible was the swaying of the trees and the fading light of the sky. Pinks and oranges and gray-blues. Something sharp pressed into her back, but she ignored it. It was fitting that as she thought about Lucian she should look at something beautiful, and be in pain simultaneously. What else was a perfect metaphor for their relationship?

If she could even call it that.

Either way, there hadn’t been much of
any
type of relationship today. He hadn’t had her back, hadn’t supported her, hadn’t been there for her when it mattered.

You didn’t have to out Mathias
. Her mind spoke up, and she wished she could drown it in the river and suppress the truth of that statement. Damn them all. She had just been
so
angry. She didn’t deserve to be dismissed, cast aside, not after it had been her to inspire Mathias to even try. He was acting like it had never happened!

But they were secrets
. Everyone had secrets, and they were important. Vital.

Lucian had kept her secret, as far as she knew, but she had just blown the top off of Mathias’ in front of his most trusted group – which she was clearly not a member of.

Opening her eyes she stared up at the sky and wished for a moment that she hadn’t told them about his past, about his son, because maybe now they wouldn’t even listen to her. Maybe now they’d land in the laps of the guards just to spite her, and who would die because she’d wanted to make a point? Would Lucie lose Evan? Would Alice lose Quentin?

Would she lose Lucian?

Her chest ached and she hated herself for it. Hated that even the idea of him being hurt made her stomach turn. Seeing his smile in the early morning hours as he leaned over to pepper her with kisses – for
that
not to happen again would be a crime. A crime worthy of banishment, except she
would
be the offender this time.

“Fuck.” Emmie muttered, pushing her hands into her loose hair. It was probably full of leaves by now, but she didn’t have the energy to care. She hadn’t worn it in a braid for two days because Lucian had said he liked her hair down, and
this
was the consequence. She was a mess, outside and inside, because of him. “This is what happens when you —”

Love someone
, her brain tried to fill it in, but she pushed that idea back and locked it away in the darkest part of herself.

“This is what happens when you try to help someone,” she finished to spite herself.

Her stomach growled and she laid her hand over it, hoping to silence it with a touch, but once her body had recognized the absence there was no fixing it. She was too used to steady meals, to the help of the village – because she sure as hell had never contributed, either here or in the city. She was useless, inside or outside the walls.

Emmie sat up and kicked her feet against the ground, the underbrush cascading over the edge of the rocks to tumble down into the river below, but not even that could make her feel better now. With a growl, she pushed herself off the ground, staring down into the roiling waters below once more before she turned and headed back towards the village center. The last time she’d made this walk her hands had been bound, and Ben had been dragging her. This time her head was up, her hands free, and all she wanted was to eat and sleep.

Away from Lucian.

When she stepped up to the serving table, Amandine was on the other side, and her forehead creased as she caught sight of her. “Emmie? Are you okay?”

“I’m fine.”

“Are you sure? You look —”

“I said I’m fine! Can I just get something to eat?” Emmie snapped at the woman and she flinched, pulling back, and while she instantly regretted it, no words surfaced to smooth it over. Still, Amandine gave her more than she should have received considering her position in the village. “Thank you,” she mumbled and started to turn away.

“Come back if you want to talk, Emmie. Really, I’ll listen.” Amandine’s kind words were a twist of the proverbial knife inside her, and she sought out one of the smaller fires to sit down and eat alone. The heat bled into her skin slowly, but her core was still cold and Emmie knew that nothing external could fix that. She was hollowed out by her anger.

If she could just sleep, put some space between her and the disastrous meeting at Mathias’, she might be able to think more clearly. Currently her head was a thunderstorm, full of whip crack lightning strikes where she remembered Lucian telling her to
sit down
. Each of those memories were followed by the deep, rolling thunder of his kisses, his touch. The way he made her body shake and tremble.

Two halves of the same person. Villain and hero – and she couldn’t see clearly enough through the haze of every day life to decide which side of him was stronger.

“Emmie!” Lucian’s voice broke through the static in her head, and she turned towards him on instinct. “Come sit with me, let’s talk.”

Of course he would show up to confuse her even more.

Instead of the angry, brash Lucian she had expected to find after she had stormed out of Mathias’, he was smiling. At her. And as much as she wanted to scream at him, to tear him apart, to demand he explain himself – the offer to talk, to hear him explain, was too tempting. Especially with a calm, happy Lucian. “Okay.”

He grinned and beckoned her to follow him. With a sigh, she stood and walked after him, but instead of going somewhere private, Lucian joined a group of men around a larger fire.

So much for talking
.

There were too many people around to have the kind of discussion they needed to have, and part of her felt relieved that she could put it off, but the other half was furious with him for calling her over like a dog only to ignore her.

“So, like I was saying, Theo said they were near that grove of trees that has the weird bend in it, the ones by the curve in the rough river.” Lucian nodded when a few of the men recognized what he was saying. “Right, so he said they had Paul walk around the other side to spook the deer, and out came three does and a buck! They missed two of the does, but their spears caught the buck and a doe right on target. I’m thinking if that’s where they are bedding down, we should go back next hunt, don’t you think?”

“It sounds like a good idea, we’d need to leave a bit for them to feel safe again, but with that many you have to think it’s a common spot.” One of the other men spoke up, and as Emmie finished the last of the food on her plate she had to fight the urge to hit Lucian with it. Hadn’t he asked her to talk? Did he really think the earlier situation was over? Did he really think she’d just forget about it and be willing to listen to him talk about hunting?

“I agree, but maybe in a few weeks we can send a group that way again. I’d be happy to lead that one.” Lucian reached down and lifted a bowl up, holding it towards her. “Em, can you grab me some more water?”

His hand hovered in the air, and she dropped her plate on the ground. “Are you kidding me?”

Lucian turned to look at her, surprise flitting across his face. “What?”

“You’re asking me to get you
water
?” Emmie laughed, standing up. “Fuck you, Lucian! Why don’t you have one of your friends here get you water, because I sure as hell am not getting you
anything
.”

“Emmie.” Lucian’s voice was serious, and the area near her had gone uncomfortably quiet. “Sit down, and let’s talk.”

“You just asked me to fucking talk to you, and you brought me over here to listen to you talk about hunting deer! I’m not going to just
sit down
every time you or Mathias demand it.”

He stood up, facing off with her and she hated that to meet his eyes she had to look up at him. “Don’t do this,” he whispered, but her rage overflowed from that hollow place inside her, filling her to the brim.

“Shut up, Lucian.” Emmie turned to walk away from him, and the collective gasp from a few people around her should have been warning enough that she’d gone too far, but it was made clear when he yanked her back by her hair.

“You do
not
get to speak to me that way.” Lucian pulled her back against him, his fist twisting in her hair until the pain made her eyes water. “I warned you,” he hissed into her ear, and she remembered his threats from a few days before.

“No, no, Lucian —”

“Quiet. You’ve lost the right to speak. You’ll earn it back once you’ve been punished.” His voice was like iron as he pulled her with him through the gathering of people to a nearby tree. “Someone bring me some rope!”

“Lucian! Don’t do this, don’t —”

He shoved her forward against the tree and pressed himself against her back. “Be glad I’m not stripping you naked for this.” Lucian spoke low, and she could hear the anger in his voice. Someone must have brought him rope because he grabbed one of her arms and a rough loop slid over her wrist. “Move and it will be worse, I promise.”

When he stepped away from her, her first thought was to run, but he was already wrapping the rope around the tree, and then he had her other wrist in his grip and the rope was being pulled tight. Emmie couldn’t see what he’d done, but when he appeared next to her, she couldn’t move back. “I’m sorry —”

“No. You’re not.” Lucian’s voice was hard as he reached between her and the tree to unbutton her pants, jerking them down along with her underwear despite her efforts to close her thighs. “But you might be after this.”

“Please…” A furious blush made her whimper, but he didn’t even react as she twisted to look at him.

Ben brought over a narrow piece of wood that had something that resembled a handle at one end, which Lucian took. It shone in the firelight, clearly smoothed from use, or someone had spent a good deal of time making it look like it was. “Count each stroke, Em.”

“What?” she asked, and then the wood landed in a hard swat across her ass. The pain was unlike anything else, both brutal and sharp, and she howled and scraped her arms against the tree in an effort to break free. There was silence all around her, and then she heard Lucian sigh.

“You have to count. Each strike, say the number.”

“Why are you doing this to me?” Emmie screamed.

“Because you were disrespectful. You earned this punishment. Now count.” Lucian’s voice was steady, but the next swat of the paddle-like implement made her scream through gritted teeth. His voice rose up sharply. “Count!”

“Two!” she cried, and she heard a few laughs in the crowd, which only made the tears burn her eyes.