Chapter 20

CHAPTER TWENTY

Ryker

I didn't look at her as I walked past her toward the woods. After this exchange and more of her lies, I was pretty sure I could finally fuck another woman and had every intention of finding out.

Ellery was the past, and she would stay there. I was done with her and the Hooded Robber; I'd take down the king and every other aristocrat in this realm. Until I figured out how to do that, I planned to stay inside women and drunk… very drunk.

I was fifteen feet away from her when I felt the swell of electricity in the air, and something smashed into the tree beside me. The air crackled with so much electricity that it zapped across my skin, drawing my power forth as it sought to connect with it.

The tree had a black, smoking hole in the center of it. Despite the sizzle of electricity around me and that smoking hole, my brow furrowed as I tried to understand what happened.

It can't be.

It was only us in the woods… unless someone else had arrived. I spun, prepared to unleash my lightning on whoever was there, but it was Ellery.

She stood with her legs braced apart and loose strands of hair waving around her face as little bolts of lightning zipped between the fingers of the palms she'd turned toward me. Lightning danced through her black eyes.

I couldn't move, and my breath caught in my chest as I stared at the magnificent, awing sight. In all my many years, after all the things I'd seen and endured, this was the one thing I never thought I'd see.

A female lightning bearer.

It had never happened before. How has it happened now?

I didn't have an answer, but there was no denying the truth. She controlled lightning as effectively as me, meaning… she is the Hooded Robber .

The truth was a blow to my gut. It radiated up into my chest and gripped the air in my lungs.

She was the one who'd taken my money and led me on a hunt through the woods, all while knowing it was her I sought. She claimed to have fallen in love with me, but she'd made a fool of me.

This woman had worked her way into my heart while knowing she was lying to me. Before her, I was so battered by the war, the ophidians, and the loss of my best friend, King Leo, that I'd believed it impossible to care for anyone again.

She'd helped me heal before tearing apart the pieces and throwing them away. And the whole time we were together, she'd known she'd have to tell me the truth or walk away… she'd chosen to walk away.

My father had been the escape she'd been trying to figure out, and she leapt at the chance. Shit.

I hadn't believed it possible to hurt any more, but she'd proven me wrong… again. Fuck!

I almost doubled over to rest my hands on my knees while I tried to get my tumultuous emotions under control, but I couldn't fall apart here. Not in front of her.

But the true depth of her betrayal was sinking in. I'd been plotting ways to have a future with her, and she was lying to me… the whole time.

She'd always known she'd end up walking away and never said a word… until now, when she sought something from me.

Everything between us was a lie.

"I am the Hooded Robber," she stated.

No shit. But I didn't speak as I tried to process this. However, there was no figuring it out.

I had to get away from her. I couldn't stand to be near her anymore.

"I don't fucking care."

With that, I turned and walked away.