Read Online StoneHardPassion by Anya Richards - Free Book Online

Crossing her arms she tried to smile, but gave up when the
motion faltered on her lips.
    “Not quite the evening I thought it would be.” Was it just a
few minutes before that he’d come through the door? It felt like a month.
“Thank you for your help.”
    “Not that you really needed it.” There was no inflection in
his voice, but his eyes stayed riveted on her face. “What are you going to do?”
    “I—” Glancing around, feeling the gazes directed their way,
she suddenly couldn’t bear it a moment more. “I can’t talk to you here. Come.”
    Leading the way across the room, she was aware of every eye
on her, sensitive to it in a way she hadn’t been for a very long time.
    “Shit.”
    She said it under her breath, but Vidar obviously heard, and
understood.
    “They’re worried about you.”
    “I know.” Jasmina sighed, wishing she could smile, make it
look like everything really was fine. But she just couldn’t dredge up the balls
for that, even approaching the acerbic Ula’s desk. “Doesn’t mean I have to like
it.”
    “Well slap my ass and call me blonde.” Ula was grinning, but
her fingers thrummed a tense rhythm on the desk. “I guess you were right,
jinn-girl. Definitely not ogre ugly after all.”
    Jasmina sent the goblin a grateful smile for breaking the
tension, then slanted a glance at Vidar. He was looking at Ula, a little frown
between his brows.
    “What was that all about?”
    She chuckled. “Nothing to concern you. Ula’s a little nuts.”
    “Huh.”
    He didn’t sound convinced, but she was glad when he also
didn’t pursue the subject. Impatient to get away from the stares she could
still feel burning into her back as she went up the stairs, she was tempted to
translocate away. But Vidar wouldn’t forgive her if she did. Damn him for
disliking one of the most basic of faie abilities. Most beings, like trolls,
who couldn’t do it weren’t averse to being translocated by others. What the
hell was his problem with it?
    Pushing open the door to her private room was a relief, but
she still felt as though she were walking through a fog. So many questions
swirled in her head, all clamoring for attention, but she couldn’t seem to
concentrate on any given one.
    Turning to face Vidar, she didn’t even try to smile. “I have
to get away from here for a while. I need some space to think.”
    Something flashed in his eyes, but was quickly gone. “I’m
sorry about your father.”
    She shook her head, more in negation of the tears suddenly
pricking her eyes than at his words. “I hardly knew the man, and what I did
know tells me I was more of a commodity to him than anything else. I’m sorry
he’s dead, but I can’t say I’m really hurting over it.”
    Vidar stepped a little closer. Reaching out, he touched her
shoulder, his fingers brushing the bare skin of her arm and making it tingle.
“No matter what they are, the loss of a parent is always hard. You’ll feel it
later, believe me.”
    Torn between wanting to move away and get closer, Jasmina
stayed where she was. “I doubt it, Vidar. What he did was unforgivable, when
you look at it objectively.” Her voice was rising, and she tried to bring it
under control. “If I were what he thought I was, sweet, innocent, defenseless ,
when he locked me in that bottle with Mahmud I would have been traumatized. I can’t
forgive him for that. I won’t forgive him.”
    His fingers tightened, as though to steady her, and she
heard him sigh. “But according to Mahmud he also tried to protect you after you
ran away. Maybe he regretted what he’d done?”
    She shrugged, rubbed her forehead, trying to release some of
the frustration and anger. “I don’t know. I feel like everything I thought I
knew was a lie. My brother Ahmet and I were close. I always thought the
messages I received, letting me know what was happening at home, came from him,
but now I don’t know. Why would he send Mahmud, of all people, to tell me of my
father’s