Heartless

Chapter 9

Julia's POV

"Yeah?"

He turned around and I realised that this was the first time I saw a glimpse of the real him.

I'd seen a part of him when he opened up to me in the kitchen, but that was only a moment. Although, he was still pushing me away, he still had his walls up.

I knew that if I got through his rough exterior, I could get to know the caring person beneath.

I almost felt sorry for him, his life was so controlled by his leadership position that his true self got lost.

I decided that I needed to get to a point where I saw him in the same way that Jocelyn or Dawn did. I thought I hated him, but I don't think that's entirely true.

All of the closest people in his life told me to give him time, so that's exactly what I'll do.

I'm not sure where we'll end up, but we needed to get past this first difficult hurdle.

"I'm sorry too." I sighed.

"What?" he said, furrowing his eyebrows as he took a small step towards me.

"I'm sorry. I judged you and thought that you were to blame when you weren't...I want us to be friends Reed."

Friends. Nothing more. I had to stop myself from being so attracted to him, he's engaged...and I could never be with a killer. It's against everything I stand for.

"You're not the first person to judge me and you won't be the last." he sighed. "But this doesn't change things between us. We can be civil, but don't think I'm going to become all soft and kind, because that's not me."

"Oh, well thanks for the ice cream i guess." I said sadly.

He then left the room with a stern face. I don't think he's as cruel as he makes out, but he doesn't want to show me that.

Reed's POV

When I left her room, I breathed a sigh of relief.

I thought she hated me. She should hate me.

But I was glad to see that she was okay. I knew that I still had to deal with Jason and Marcus and I was going to spend my whole night making sure that they got what they deserved.

Nobody betrays the king.

I was slightly worried, however, that I was getting closer to Julia. I couldn't afford to be catching feelings.

I'd just proven that I couldn't protect her well enough and I couldn't let myself put her in anymore danger.

Anything I was feeling, had to be pushed away before it got serious.

It's not like I was capable of love anyway, so we had nothing to worry about.

~

I drove back over to the cells, where I'd left Jason and Marcus and I'd told Tris to come over and assist me.

She'd always been the best at torture. She can easily switch to being cold and emotionless, like myself.

Most, if not all, of my men had those qualities to some extent. You have to if you do this job, but I knew that the others would find it hard to harm their 'friends'.

Tris, however, was my most mentally strong fighter and I was lucky to have her in the Vipers.

Her one and only weakness was Kayla.

That alone was proof to me as to why I should not love. Love is a weakness to everybody and that is why I avoid it.

That is also why I agreed to an arranged marriage to Evelyn. I will never love her, I barely even like her, but that will work in my favour in the long run.