Forty-Five: The Blood Tower

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*Rush*

It was that evening when his mother decided to surprise him.

A dinner, she'd declared. She wanted to have dinner with her beloved son and his bride at the Blood Tower which she'd destroyed for the most part the night she brought her soulless bastards into his territory. At first, Rush was vehemently against it, but Maddox wanted to take the time to discern her next grandeur scheme she had under her sleeve. So Rush had agreed, but he didn't wish to take his mate. He didn't know what harm would come to Aletha if he brought her to his mother and so many of the soulless purebloods. But Aletha, to his shock, wanted to go.

"Dinner is harmless," she claimed.

"Aletha, it's not really a dinner, my naïve female," Rush said, fixing her a pointed stare. "It's about intention. There is a reason to her actions, and I'm going there to know exactly what she wants."

"I know it's not really a dinner," Aletha said, thinning her lips. "So don't call me naïve. I know Vicera. She wants to talk. And if you already know there's a reason to her actions, you must also realize that there's a reason she also wants me there as well."

"Sometimes I can't argue with your logic," he grumbled.

She mouth twitched upward. "I'm tough to counter when I'm right. And anyway, if you're worried about me, then don't be. I'll be fine. I've been in many dangerous situations, and this doesn't even begin to compare."

"I know that, love. It's just that I hate jeopardizing your safety in any way," he told her softly. "I don't want my mother anywhere near you. She's murdered your pack, and there are things she's said that I can't even say to you. They're not for your ears, Aletha. Taking you there is like taking a child to a den of wolves, and I mean it."

"Rush," she began, her voice firm.

"No, hear me out. I'm not calling you incapable, but now that you're truly bonded to me, there are risks that fall on you that would never have existed."

"Then I'll remind you again that I chose this fate," she said, taking his hand and squeezing tightly. Her dark gaze was unwavering as she watched him with the confidence she'd never had before. "I have a duty, and I'm not failing this time. I've been denying everything for the longest time, but I won't do it again. I won't deny you again."

At her words, he softened. She was growing on him, and when she said sweet things like this, all he wanted to do was keep her in his room and do dark, sinful things to her. "This isn't about me this time, Aletha. This is about you."

She shook her head. "No, this isn't about me or you. This is about her. We know she's hiding something and we know there's a reason she's called us. We just need to find a way to weaken her defenses, catch her off guard. I just need that one moment of lapse—that's all I need."

Now that was news to him. His mate never mentioned she was the observant type. But now that he thought of it, she was a scholar, and she was cunning. How else would she have been able to escape his castle her first nights here when she'd never once ventured around the halls? She'd been playing a dark game all along, a sharp game of deception all by herself for as long as she lived in the Darklands. And that was admirable. That was how she was still alive here, and he was damn proud of it. "Leave that to me," Rush told her, pulling her hand to his lips. Her wrist was warm where his mouth touched her skin.

"So I can go?" she asked, and he caught the sharpness of her breathing from the way his touch affected her.

"Mmm, yes," he murmured. "But you must stay close to me. If not me, then with one of our men. Never get too close to the soulless purebloods."

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