The Taming: Book 3 in the Tribe Warrior Series by Imogen Keeper (romantic novels in english TXT) 📕

Tor turned and saw her at the moment. He went still. His eyebrows quirked slightly and his whole body shuddered. A weird little whimper sounded in the back of his throat.

Her father’s back was to her.

Could she stab her own father?

Tor stared back at her. No one else had seen her yet. She held up her hand and showed him the knife. He shook his head tightly.

How far would she go for Tor?

He shook his head harder.

Very far.

Her father stood only a few feet away, a rezal in his right hand.

She flexed her grip around the knife, tested its weight, frowned at the angle, imagined the motion she’d need to raise it.

With her hands gripped tight around the handle, she tiptoed up, moving silently, closer than she’d been to him in years, close enough to smell the herbal tonic he used when shaving. She couldn’t even remember the last time she’d been this close to him. Many, many years. Throat clogged with tears, she shoved the blade against his neck, maybe a little harder than necessary.

“Put down the rezal, Father,” she hissed, and because old habits die hard, she couldn’t suppress the involuntary, “please.”

He bucked against her, but she’d expected it. She sank her fingers into the wool of his jacket, right over his arm, acutely aware that it was the first time she could remember touching him.

The guards jerked their weapons at her.

“Klymeni? Wh—”

“If you think I won’t do it,” she said, pressing harder with the blade, and a fat drop of red blood slid down the flat of it, “I’ll ask you to remember what I did to escape Spiro. And he never shot me.”

“You would choose them over your own father?” Her father’s whole body went still. “They murdered your mother.” His voice was so low, she barely heard it.

“Not Tor.” A second drop oozed down the blade like a crimson pearl to wet her palm. “Put down the rezal.”

He let out a protracted wheezy sigh. “You won’t stab me.”

Tor grunted behind his gag, and she couldn’t tell if he was in favor of her stabbing him or not. His whole body had gone still. She’d never noticed it before, but he was always in motion, vibrating with energy and life, stroking her plant, stroking her, twitching his fingers, bouncing his leg, squeezing her waist, toying with her hair, a hundred tiny motions, as if he were testing the fiber of the universe around him. But not now. He was so still it was as if he’d stopped breathing.

“Are you so certain?” she whispered. “I’m not.”

He lowered the rezal so its point faced the floor. “When you were little, you used to sit on my lap sometimes while I worked. You always did exactly what was asked of you. Such a good girl.”

She didn’t remember that. Couldn’t imagine a child being brave enough to go near him. “You allowed that?”

The muscle of his shoulder tensed. “And you look so much like her. It was like looking at a ghost. And you were always so lonely.” He moved slowly, lowering the weapon to the floor, and she moved with him, keeping the blade against his throat. “The Bonding will make you happy. It will give you a family.”

“I have a family,” she whispered, staring at Tor. “On Vesta.”

“You don’t understand. With the Bond, you’d never be alone again. Trust me.” His voice broke on the last word, almost plaintive.

“You just shot me.”

“To protect you. Throwing away the chance to have a Bond is like throwing your life away. I had high hopes for Agammo, but he didn’t turn out as I’d expected. Spiro is one of the finest men I know.”

“He’s a good man.”

Tor didn’t move a muscle. One of the guards shifted, and the creak of his boots was as loud as a scream.

“There are lots of good men, Father. And only one I want. And you want to torture him.”

“They killed thousands of women. He has information.”

She locked her knees to stop them from shaking. “Twenty-two years ago, the Alliance ordered an attack on another planet. Tor wasn’t there. He wants to stop them. Order the guards to drop their weapons, too.”

He shifted against her, so she sank the blade a little deeper, grabbing a hold of the back of his jacket for purchase, so he couldn’t twist away.

“Once you’re Bonded to Spiro, you’ll forget about him.”

“Would you want to forget Mother?”

A shudder racked through his body. “I’ve been holding on for two things since the day she died. Revenge against the Vestige and the promise that someday you would be Bonded, and I could stop.”

Her knees shook in the awkward position, on tiptoe with a knife jammed in her father’s throat, the preternatural calm she’d felt in the hallway eroding.

Stop. She knew what he meant, and the thought made her heart twist. He’d been holding on for her. How hard must it have been for him, all these years. She’d seen it on his face in the cell upstairs. She looked like the ghost of a woman he’d loved and lost. And if it hadn’t been for her, he’d have given up long ago.

As if he’d heard her thoughts, sensed her softening, her father’s muscles bunched.

She twisted her grip on the knife.

She met Tor’s eyes, bottomless and black. She thought about what he’d said to her about finding someone who wanted her enough to come for her. He had. She thought about how her entire life, she’d wanted someone to stand up for her, to have a family, and she remembered the holo of the people of the Roq standing up for her to Pijuan. She had a family. A real one. A man with way too many not-wives and a mother like a lizard and insane politics. People who laughed and danced and a man who made her whole body come to life. And they weren’t perfect. They weren’t organized or gentle. They were raucous and rough.

Tor’s brows