A Fortune I Seek

Chapter 3

My feet were abruptly ripped out from under me and I hit the floor hard. My dagger clattered across the floor, I was dragged through the room and flung into the air upside down strung up like a hunter's kill.

I looked down, rather up, to see a thick rope knotted around my ankle, rigged to capture anyone who stepped inside the loop at its end. It had been placed directly in front of where Bellerose was currently standing. That meant he did in fact know that someone was coming after him.

And he executed the lure impeccably. I had been standing too close when I first arrived to kill him, but he drove me back when he stood up. He was repositioning me ... placing me, like a pawn on a chessboard.

"Shit, Val!" Bear began relaying emergency alerts to nearby allies who might be in the vicinity and available to help.

"No, not yet." I breathed out, only for Bear to hear. The last thing we need is more hands in this already boiling pot.

I made a scene to cover my words by swatting violently through the air, swinging myself towards his wardrobe which was only a few feet away but still out of reach. Bellerose laughed at my attempts and slowly walked towards me, one hand in his pocket and the other carrying my dagger from where he had stooped to pick it up. He twirled it between his fingers like a professional, with more talent and control than me even after a lifetime of practice.

Who is this guy?

"Let me down, asshole." I barked at him.

"So you break into my home, sneak into my room, attempt to murder me ... then start making demands when I defend myself?" He pouted playfully, "That hardly seems fair."

It wasn't what he said that irked me. It was the cocky smile that accompanied it, "You cheating son of a bitch-"

"First of all, keep your voice down. My mother is asleep down the hall," He tipped the knife towards the door, "And she would not be pleased to hear you speak of her first born son like that, she is ridiculously defensive of her children. Second of all, how in the world did I cheat?"

"It would have been fair to fight back." I wiggled again, "Traps like this are cowardly."

"So now I am an asshole, a cheat, and a coward?" He bounced my dagger against his leg, "How very judgmental of you, you have only just met me."

The situation was embarrassing enough but it was his provocation, and my upside down positioning, that made blood flood into my cheeks, "I would have killed you in an honest fight!"

"And I most certainly would have lost in an honest fight. I am better at long distance, psychological warfare." He confessed cheekily, "So is it not honest because I exploited my strengths?"

I felt as though I were lecturing a child, "It is not honest because you know you would have lost without your cheats and traps."

"You want to know what I think?"

"Oddly enough, I actually cannot express how much I don't want to know what you think."

He barreled on and mocked arrogantly, "I think you are just upset because you were not clever enough to evade my little cheat. You are meant to be a great Wolfe offspring, and you cannot even kill an untrained pretty boy? How shameful." That is the second time he has mentioned my family ... how does he know us? He tsked at my obvious failure, "It is alright, you win some and you lose some. Well, except for me." He bowed bodaciously, "I win them all."

"Oh really?" My equally arrogant grin must look quite devilish being viewed upside down, "Burying that old man this morning was a win for you, huh?"