non-chase chaise in the middle of the non-drawing drawing room, but he doesn’t. He just...stands there.
“Shit,” I say, sitting up and tightening the towel over my chest. “What’s wrong?”
“How do you know something is wrong?” he hedges.
“Uh, because you’re not ravishing me right now, obviously. And I’m naked under here.”
He shakes his head with a smirk, but then he sighs. “We have a situation.”
My back straightens at the look on his face. “What kind of situation?”
I can tell he doesn’t want to tell me. I narrow my eyes. “You knew about this situation this morning didn’t you? When you said you had to leave and handle some lounge business.”
I can see that I’ve caught him. “Yes.”
I stand up and punch him in the arm. “Ow,” he scowls, rubbing the spot. “Mean little thing.”
“Don’t keep things from me!” I demand. “Tell me right now.”
“Fine. It’s your mat.”
“What about her?”
“She issued a challenge.”
“Oh my God, what an idiot!” I tip my head back and laugh. “I knew it! I told you as soon as she found out that I was actually happy here, she’d get pissed off and do something shitty. She has no idea how lucky she is that you paid her debts and that you L worded me and decided not to kill her and take her lounge. But nope. She always has to push it.” I shake my head incredulously. “She’s so dumb. How can she possibly think she can fight and win against you in a challenge?”
Rook says nothing for a moment and just watches me carefully. I stop my rant to study him, and a cold rock of realization slides into the pit of my stomach. “Fuck,” I breathe. “She didn’t issue the challenge to you, did she?”
He shakes his head no.
My eyes widen, and I begin to pace back and forth inside the room. “Fuck!” I curse. This is bad. Really, really bad.
“She knows, Rook. She knows I can’t shift,” I say in a panic, pointing to my stupid, useless anklet that I’m still stuck with. “How the hell did she find out?”
“West,” he growls.
My brows dip down with confusion. “Um...like, the direction? Or is West supposed to mean something to me?”
“West is the prison guard. The one that assaulted you.”
“Ohhhh, Sandbag,” I say as I make the connection. “That dude seriously needs his ass beat,” I observe, making note to track him down and return all the favors he bestowed upon me while I was in prison.
“Oh, I took care of that before I left,” Rook announces casually. “He was thoroughly fucked up. I was just dragging him into a particularly nasty cell in the basement when I was told that the Warden had booted you out.”
My eyes widen at his ruthlessness. “Which cell?” I ask, a shiver running up my spine at the thought of the terrifying basement I got lost in.
“One that’s magicked to make you live through your worst fears.”
I smile at him, my heart all kinds of warm and fuzzy and my mind forming a plan of all the ways I’m going to reward him for this. “You’re too good to me,” I tell him dreamily.
“I always will be, too,” he answers without missing a beat, his turquoise eyes softening and radiating love and protection.
“So what’s her plan?” I ask, bringing our focus back to the issue that’s now breathing down our backs like a good for nothing Drake. “Kill me in a challenge while I can’t even shift to defend myself? She hates me worse than I thought, but this seems a little extreme, even for her. She never puts this much effort into her daughter. Why start now? Why go through all the trouble to trade me to you just to turn around and take me out?”
“Think, Sinclair,” he tells me. “You accepted the contract. You’re here, living in my lounge. You’re my mate in the eyes of the law, and based on the laws of our people, in issuing a challenge to you, she’s issuing a challenge to a matriarch.”
My eyes nearly bug out of my head, and I start to pace. Holy shit. “But...But that means…”
“That if you lose, she becomes the matriarch over this lounge,” Rook finishes for me.
I stop in my tracks as the dread sticks to the soles of my feet. “She’s gonna win,” I whisper, feeling panic start to grip me. “She’s gonna win, and then I’ll be dead, and your title will be stripped because of me, and then she’ll take over