THE CRIMSON HEIRESS

Chapter 4. Midnight

Liana

At midnight the lock turned from outside.

I was still awake.

Logan stepped in and closed the door behind him. He stood there in the dark like he had rehearsed this on the way over and forgotten everything the moment he saw my face.

"I just need five minutes," he said.

I said nothing.

He took that as permission.

He ran his hands through his hair. "I owe you an explanation."

"You owe me a lot of things," I said. "Start with the explanation."

He exhaled.

"It started as a bet."

The room went very quiet.

"Me and three others. Two years ago. Before we met." He said it fast. Like speed would soften it. "They dared me. Said I couldn't get close to the Crimson Alpha's daughter. The one who kept everyone at arm's length. The one nobody could read." A pause. "I took the dare."

I looked at him.

He wasn't looking at me.

"It was supposed to be nothing. A few weeks. Prove a point. Walk away." His jaw moved. "But then I got to know you and I..."

"Don't."

"Liana..."

"Don't finish that sentence."

He looked up.

"You got attached," I said. My voice came out flat. "Is that what you were going to say. You got attached. That makes it better?"

"I'm not saying it makes it better. I'm saying it's the truth."

"The truth." I laughed. One sound. No humor in it. "Logan the truth is you dated me on a dare. For two years you looked me in the eye every single day knowing that's how it started and you said nothing."

"I wanted to end it." His voice dropped. "Every day I wanted to end it. I knew it wasn't fair. I knew what I was doing to you. But every time I tried I couldn't. I hated myself for it and somehow hated you for making it so hard."

The last part landed like something physical.

"You hated me," I said quietly.

"That's not what I..."

"You hated me for making it hard to leave." I looked at him. "Hear what you just said."

He stepped forward.

"I'm asking you to forgive me. That's all. It doesn't have to be a big thing. We move on. You go to Midnight River. I marry Mia. Everyone gets what they need and we just..."

"Everyone gets what they need."

"Liana."

"You came here at midnight," I said. "To ask me to forgive you so you can feel better about marrying my sister tomorrow. And you're telling me it's not a big thing."

"I'm trying to make this easier for both of us."

"Get out!" I yelled.

"Just listen..."

"I said get out Logan."

He moved fast. Faster than I expected.

His hand closed around my throat before I understood what was happening. Lifting me slightly. Feet barely touching the floor.

My hands flew up to his wrist. His face changed, darkening instantly.

That was the thing that scared me most. Not the hand. The face. Something behind his eyes I had never seen in two years of looking at them.

"You think you can just dismiss me." His voice came out low and controlled. Worse than shouting. "You think you can stand there with that look on your face like I'm nothing and just tell me to leave."

"Logan." My voice came out smaller than I wanted.

"I gave you two years." His grip tightened slightly. "Two years and you can't give me five minutes of forgiveness. You know what my father can do to your pack. One word from me and your pack collapses."

I pulled at his wrist. He didn't move.

"Let go," I said.

"Say you forgive me."

"Let go of me."

"Say it."

I opened my mouth.

The door exploded inward.

A figure stormed in like he owned the space. Before I could process what was happening the man grabbed Logan and slammed him against the wall with brutal force. A hand twisted in his collar holding him there like he weighed nothing.

A voice. Low. Lethal.

"Get the hell away from her. You piece of shit."

My heart lurched violently in my chest.

Logan scrambled. He was shoved free. He looked at the figure once and something flickered across his face I had never seen before.

Fear.

He left without a word. No backwards glance.

I stood against the wall with my hand still on my own throat where Logan's had been. My back pressed flat against the stone. My legs deciding whether to hold. My breath coming in uneven pulls that I couldn't smooth out no matter how hard I tried.

The figure turned around.

Tall. Built in a way that had a cost behind it. Dark eyes sweeping the room once before they landed on me.

I tried to focus.

The stranger crossed toward me. Stopped a few feet away. Close enough that I could see his face properly now.

Sharp jaw. Dark eyes that were completely still. The kind of face that had made difficult decisions and stopped apologizing for them a long time ago.

Something in my chest loosened without my permission.

Not because I knew him.

Because he looked at me like I was worth looking at. Like I was the only thing in the room that mattered. Like pulling someone off my throat was something he would do again without a second thought and without needing to be asked.

Nobody had ever looked at me like that before.

He looked at me.

"Are you hurt," he said.

His voice was low. Grounding.

I shook my head.

He held my gaze one more second.

Then he turned and walked back toward the door.

Stopped in the frame.

"Lock it this time," he said.

And he was gone.

I stood in the middle of the piano room with my hand still on my throat and the room still carrying the weight of everything that had just happened in it.

Logan's face when that door came open.

The specific sound of a body hitting a wall.

Three words spoken in a voice that didn't ask permission for anything.

I pressed my back against the door after I locked it and slid down slowly until I was sitting on the floor with my knees to my chest and the cold wood at my back.

My wolf was completely silent.

Not the silence of nothing.

The silence of something so certain it didn't need to make noise about it.

My mate.

I didn't know if that was the most terrifying thing about tonight.

Or the only thing that had felt true.