Ruins of Chaos (Legacy of the Nine Realms #3) - Amelia Hutchins Page 0,41

Monster. No wonder your creature wants to eat me. You’re starving.” He ran his hand over his mouth, uncaring that we were both covered in the blood of his kill.

“You want more?” Brander asked. Knox growled, turning to pierce him with a feral look. “To feed her with, asshole. You killed the damn thing, so feed your girl, Knox. When a bitch is hungry, you feed her. It’s what men do.”

Knox exhaled, turning to look at me as I sat back, eyeing him carefully while considering what the creature within me had said. She’d known he had hurt me, and she’d let me choose our path until he’d tried to mark me again.

We argued a lot, and we disagreed on most things simply because she had basic needs, and mine ran deeper. Knox had the same issue, which meant he fought the same internal battle, yet he made it look easy. My monster and I were a work in progress, trying to find common ground.

I now knew he could force me to disclose my family’s location and that he’d always had the ability. It was the one thing he could have used to control me, but he hadn’t. Why not? He hadn’t used it because he knew it would hurt me deeply. In his own way, he didn’t want to see me hurt unless he needed something to inflict pain upon me when he was hurting.

Knox wasn’t as ruthless as I’d assumed him to be. He had limits to what he was willing to use against me. He hadn’t ever forced me to fuck him, and it was as simple as rattling until I begged and pleaded for it to happen. He’d pulled back from physically hitting me because if he hadn’t, it would have inflicted actual damage. Knox would have caved in my head had he used his full strength, but he’d barely tapped me.

This creature was more complicated than I wanted to admit. When Knox softened, he got harder to protect himself. He blamed himself for betraying the memory of his wife and son. And hurting me wasn’t just to force me to back off. It was to hurt him, too. He needed to remind himself what was happening, which meant I was getting under his skin, chipping through the wall he’d erected to entomb his heart.

I smiled at him, causing his lips to tug into a frown while his eyes narrowed to slits.

“That almost looks like she’s imagining eating you next, doesn’t it?” Lore asked softly.

“It’s not an innocent smile, that’s for sure,” Knox agreed.

“It’s almost sinister,” Killian whispered as if I couldn’t hear him. “I’d hide your cock for a bit, Knox. She looks like she is going to shred it with those pretty fangs.”

“Dude, she can eat mine. Dislocating jaws are so hot.” They all turned to stare at Lore as if he’d said something wrong.

I pulled the covers over my head while they were distracted, settling into the mess I’d made. The blankets offered me comfort with Knox’s scent clinging to them. I was about to sink my claws into his freaking heart and make him face reality.

Whatever was between us, it went past bare-bones, right into the genetic make-up of our beings. It was as if I felt the man to my soul, and he felt me back. I was about to rattle his world on an entirely new level he wouldn’t see coming.

If he thought all he had to do was feed me, he was dead wrong. He needed a reminder of who and what I was. I wasn’t some basic-bitch you fed a cheeseburger to make up. I was a monster, like him.

So what if he was questioning his marriage, his reason for going to war, and, well, basically his entire life? I hadn’t been a part of it, and I was done being his punching bag. I was about to punch back, and being a woman, we had so many ways of getting beneath a male’s skin. I released the hold on my scent, allowing it to drift to him. I heard his rattle and smiled, pulling it back, making it seem as if I’d slipped up instead of tempting him with it on purpose.

Game on, asshole.

Chapter Ten

We made camp before darkness settled over the area, and much to my displeasure, they erected no tents. Knox’s men had built fires and placed bedding surrounding them as the wagons packed with tents moved ahead to the next location they planned to