The Alpha King Marked Me. I Still Haven't Told Him I'm A Girl novel Chapter 144

Chapter 144: One Hundred & Forty Four

Valka

It only gets progressively worse when he begins to experience aches in his back. He swears his age is finally catching up to him, groaning dramatically every time he bends. He grumbles about my cravings, only to eat all my food. He sleeps way more than I do and wakes up grumpy. His moods are fragile at best with everyone else.

But whenever he’s around me, he’s a bubbly ray of sunshine--an insane one that won’t stop talking.

The questions start first.

"Is it safe for you to walk on that floorboard? It creaked. I don’t trust it."

"Do you think they prefer the left side of your womb or the right?" He began pulling off his robe. "Should I rearrange your organs for comfort?"

One time we were walking back from a council meeting and he lifted me up so suddenly, I shrieked. Violet eyes searched mine with such intensity, I wondered if there was something wrong. Then he asked, "Should we ban the stairs from use?"

Another time, he came out of the shower and went straight to my feet and began massaging them. He’s been doing that a lot. Then his voice trembled, worrying me. "I feel... odd. And violently emotional." His eyes flicked to mine, genuinely troubled. "Do you still think I’m pretty or have you grown weary of me?" A pause. "I looked in the mirror and I do think you were right. My ass looks fatter."

Then come the suggestions. Gods, the suggestions.

"No more clothes with waistbands. They’re restrictive. Offensive. I’m burning them. Actually, no more clothes at all."

"You think if we fucked, we could add a fourth? I don’t think that’d be very healthy. The fourth, I mean. Not the fucking. Definitely not the fucking. Do you want to--"

"Get out, Lucien."

He had scurried out of our bedroom like I’d flogged him with a cane. Every single thing he does is deranged and so damned hilarious, my cheeks hurt from laughing.

And then, there were days when it felt like I was being haunted.

Days when my muscles seized up and I woke choking on my own breath, fingers already clawing at my neck. My nails caught the raised flesh of the brand, scraping as if I could dig hard enough, deep enough, to peel the memory off my skin.

Some mornings, the scent of burnt iron lived behind my teeth. Some nights, I still felt the heat, the pressure, the hands that held me down.

And that’s always the moment, right there, when my breath seizes and I cannot tell nightmare from reality that Lucien stops being ridiculous. When he cradles me to his chest and reminds me that we are safe. He becomes the one who found me.

The one who swore he would never let me hurt again.

"Valka," he murmurs now, brows pulled tight in concentration. "Stop scratching."

My fingers curl and I set them back down beside me. I’m laying half-bare on the edge of our bed, a sheet half-draped around my hips, my hair pushed to the side.

Lucien’s straddling me, the silver needle in his hand glowing faintly with heat. Ink pools in the little bowl beside him, dark, red-tinted, steeped in crushed roses, glistening water and some other weird mixtures.

His hands, so steady when they’re wielding a weapon, shake only once. Only when his thumb brushes the edge of the brand and he feels the flinch I try to hide.

When I’d asked him to help me get rid of the brand, I’d known it would hurt. And I had wanted to feel every bit of the pain.

But Lucien wouldn’t have that.

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