Page 60 of The Broken Elf King
When we neared, my eyes went to the name scrawled across the top.
Molly Rae.
I let out a whimper and Reeves loosened his hold. Maybe he thought he was hurting me. Being this close to him, to Molly’s body, it was too much for my empathic gift to take. I’d been pushing against the overwhelming feeling of grief coming off of him, but now it crushed me under its weight. I went limp and he lowered me to my knees as I broke into sobs before the small grave.
“Please. Please bring her back.” Reeves let go of me and picked up the shovel that was beside the mound of dirt.
He was insane with grief. Dig up a body that had been dead a month? No one wanted to put life into a half rotten corpse even if itwaspossible.
Reeves stuck the shovel into the ground just as a booming voice ripped through the backyard.
“Stop! On the order of the king.” Raife’s deep timbre resonated from behind me and Reeves froze, seemingly snapping out of what he was doing. Two Bow Men rushed to either side of him and took the shovel from him, pinning his arms behind his back.
I was still on my knees. The feelings of loss and grief were still freshly running through me. They quickly gave way to anger over Raife. My anger.Betrayal. He left me, broke up with me through someone else, and then basically imprisoned me in the woods alone. Why the Hades was he here?
“Arrest him.” Raife’s voice was closer now, and as much as I didn’t want to talk to him or deal with him, I couldn’t let them arrest Reeves for this.
“No.” I stood, and the Bow Men froze. It was Cahal and Ares, and I knew I’d gained their respect.
I spun, prepared to glare down my fake husband, but when I saw him it was like a punch to the gut.
Here’s the thing about falling in love. Once it happens, you can’t take it back, you can’t slow it down or stop it. It’s like a runaway horse with a mind of its own. I’d fallen for Raife, and even though I wanted to kill him right now, I couldn’t deny how handsome he looked, how safe he made me feel, and how much his protective blue-eyed gaze affected me.
“He didn’t hurt me.” I looked into Raife’s eyes. “He’s grieving. Have a heart.” I reached out and touched Raife’s chest as if saying,You, too, remember what this loss is like.
“He kidnapped the queen of Archmere—”
“Queen?” I placed one hand on my hip. “Is that right?” I held up my ringless hand and Raife’s cheeks went pink.
The Bow Men exchanged a look and started to move Reeves inside, giving us the garden alone. Four more Bow Men were perched on the fence, arrows drawn, but they were out of hearing distance.
Raife sighed. “I haven’t made a public statement yet about your condition.”
It was like he’d reached in and yanked out my heart.
“My condition?” I snapped. “So you’re breaking up with me? You’ll tell everyone I died or I’m in a coma and never talk to me again?”
I felt stupid, because this was a sham from the beginning.
He actually had the decency to look stricken.
I doubled down. “You didn’t even leave a note, Raife. I saved your life and I didn’t even get a note!” I snarled, stepping closer to him. “You at least owe me the decency of a goodbye.”
The closer I got to him, the more I felt the emotions coming off of him. It was like I’d stepped into a windstorm of feelings. Shock, adoration, fear, protection, anger, desperation, grief.
He took a step backwards, as if sensing what I was doing.
“It’s for your own good, Lani! Everything I do is to protect you. Can’t you see that?” Raife said, and then gestured to Molly’s grave. “Look at this. Five more minutes and you’d have been wasting your final breath on a rotting corpse. Yourlastbreath. You’d be dead.”
I swallowed hard. “You don’t know that,” I said, fingering the darker chunk of my dyed hair. The last chunk I had.
“I didn’t ask you to save me, you know,” he said, lowering his voice. “I would never want you to die for my expense.”
I glowered at him. “Now who has a death wish?”
He reached up, rubbing his temples. “What am I going to do with you?”
I shrugged. “Let me try to bring back their daughter and then you can be rid of me,” I said morbidly.
