My Ruthless Prince Read Online Free PDF Page B

seemed. "What the hell do you want me to say?" he whispered harshly. "You had no business coming here!"
    "You think I wanted to?" she whispered back. "I risked my life to come here for you--and this is my thanks?"
    "I told you not to follow me. Damn it, I knew you were going to do this."
    "Oh, sorry. Why don't you just put a knife to my throat again, you madman?"
    He narrowed his eyes. "I apologized for that."
    "Well, I'm sorry that you're so unhappy to see me, but I'm here now, so what are we going to do?"
    He shook his head wearily. "I haven't the slightest idea."
    Emily searched his face. "At least tell me if you got your memory back. You had that headache for three days the last time I saw you. Remember the poultice I made for you? The sage tea? When we walked in the forest at your estate, it was all starting to come back to you."
    He just looked at her, more stubborn than a whole team of mules.
    Emily wanted to throttle him. "All right, I understand, you're angry! Believe me, but I had no choice. I had to come and warn you. You do realize the Order is authorized to kill you? That agent in London, he would've shot you if not for my good aim!"
    She had thrown a potato at the agent from her bag of supplies for the journey. A rock would have been more convenient, but he was an Order agent. She hadn't wanted to hurt him, just to give Drake a chance to get away.
    Drake was shaking his head at her. "It was Jordan, Emily. I've known him forever. He wouldn't have shot me."
    "He had a pistol aimed right between your eyes!"
    "Never mind that. Listen to me." He grasped her shoulders, leaning down a bit to glower in her face. "Right now you need to forget ever seeing him or Rotherstone or any of those men. Forget their names. I mean it. You must wipe them from your mind. Anything I ever told you about the Order or the Prometheans, erase it from your memory right this moment. You know nothing. Understand?"
    "I know nothing," she repeated with a nod.
    "I was a fool ever to have told you about any of it."
    "You were a boy," she said softly, gazing at him. "You were excited about your great destiny. "
    The reminder seemed to pain him.
    "You needn't worry," she added. "I've never told a soul."
    "Good. Because if the people here thought they could get any information out of you, they would--" He stopped himself with a shaken look, released her, and turned away. "But I'd kill you myself before I'd let them take you down there," he whispered.
    She froze, her gaze suddenly riveted on his back. "Down where?"
    "Never mind. Just stay in this room, keep your head down, and don't talk to anyone. It'll all be over soon."
    "What do you mean?"
    "Don't worry about it," he mumbled. "I have to go."
    Frightened, she followed him toward the door. "Drake--wait."
    He paused, regarding her from the corner of his eye. "What?"
    She stepped in front of him so he couldn't escape and stared into his eyes. "Tell me the real reason you came here."
    He almost, but not quite smiled. "It's none of your business."
    "Why did you escape from Lord Rotherstone and return to James? Please."
    He just stared at her in mute defiance, his jet-black eyes guarding inscrutable secrets.
    "You cannot have chosen the Prometheans over the Order!" she whispered.
    "Can't I?"
    She shook her head slowly, holding his stormy stare. "No. I'll never believe that. Never you. The Order has been your whole life. You cannot have turned against your brother agents and Virgil. You came here to get revenge, didn't you?" she challenged him in a barely audible tone.
    He held her gaze for a long moment. "Life is pain, Emily. The Prometheans understand that."
    "No." She shook her head in refusal of his stark words. "Life is beauty and light, Drake. Look out there. The trees, the mountains, the sky." She touched his cheek tenderly. "You mustn't give up. You've known hatred and suffering as few men have, but there is also love, and goodness."
    He flicked an indifferent glance toward the balcony, as she had