Chapter 9.

*****

I groaned as my temple pounded while I sat up.

"Slow down. You took a pretty hard knock to your head." Arthur's voice came. I opened my eyes and saw him sitting at the edge of my bed. I noticed Maximilian across the room standing with his back leaned against the wall.

I looked at him trying to recall what happened. I sighed.

"He's dead." I mumbled. I hated killing... It was always a last resort. I didn't mind injuring...

"Yes." Arthur said.

"Does she know?" The utensils must have made a sound loud enough for them to hear through the music.

"No," Maximilian shook his head, "I kept her busy, said it was a scratch in the music." He said.

"She believed that?" I muttered in disbelief before I looked at him, "Why would you keep her busy? You could have been in danger." I said.

"I was, but I also knew that it was either you taking care of someone or someone you were about to take care of anyway." He shrugged.

Right...

I lifted my hand to my face and winced as it brushed a rough bruise. It must have been bleeding. That bloody pan...

"Oh, by the way, you look like shit." Maximilian said.

I flipped him off before apologizing to Arthur seeing as he was older than us, he just chuckled as Maximilian walked out laughing.

"My head feels like sh – uh... it feels terrible." Arthur laughed.

"There," he pointed at the glass beside my bed, there were some pills there too, "You need to heal, some rest will help... Your father went crazy in my ear." I rolled my eyes. Besides the line of work we were in, he always got upset when we got hurt – which was a lot (Mostly me, my sister and brothers said it was because I was the baby, I hated that), "Stay in bed tonight, Jessica." He said pointedly before he got up and walked out.

I sighed drinking the pills and water before I fell back against my pillow, resisting the urge to get up and go downstairs to train.

A few hours of me drifting in and out of sleep and staring at the roof later, I couldn't stay in bed any longer. I climbed out of bed and changed out of my school attire to a pair of track pants and a sports bra. I noticed a slightly blue part of my stomach where he had kicked me. Great. Did he bruise? Do dead bodies bruise?

I shook my head to stop thinking about the fact that I killed him and tied my hair back into a neat bun before I shoved on some trainers and went downstairs.

I walked into the gym and began warming up in the dark. It was just past midnight again. I sat down to do some meditating; I was about fifteen minutes in when I heard the door open. I ignored it. I knew that if it was Arthur he would have scolded me for not listening to him so I knew it wasn't him.

The person's footsteps stopped somewhere before I heard their sock-covered feet across the floor and onto the mat. I still didn't stop meditating. They sat in front of me and were silent. I mediated for the next ten minutes ignoring the person; I finally decided to let myself figure it out who it was when I finished. My eyes were wrapped closed, but judging from the weight of the steps, it was a tall, built male. I knew Maximilian kicked off his school shoes when we got home and walked around barefoot until the next morning, Edgar did the same so that ruled them out. The male was built, so Edward was out as well because he was really skinny.

Adrian.

"Adrian?"

He chuckled.

"You have to teach me that." He said as I pulled the cover from my eyes.

"What are you doing here?" I asked raising my brows.

"Do I really want me to make another excuse for wanting to talk to you?" he asked.

I smiled looking down. Was he joking? No...

"Fine. I was hungry, so I went to the kitchen and ate some... ice cream." He said.

"We don't have ice cream." I laughed.

What did he want from me?

"How do you even know that? You were out since they brought you home." He said. I froze as he reached out and his hand took my jaw, I winced as his thumb touched the bruise on my cheek gently before it touched the one on my temple as well.

"It was a guess." I shrugged laughing. Not really. I had been looking for a snack yesterday, there was no ice cream in the fridge and I knew the cook only bought food on Fridays...

He pursed his lips raising his eyebrows, his eyes still focused on the bruises on my face. "Hurts that much?" he mumbled when I winced again as he touched it.

"No." I lied as I got up, in turn making his hand drop to his side.

I walked over to the punching bag and began hitting it before I stopped after ten minutes and turned to Adrian who had been sitting watching me.

"I've never fought you." I stated.

"And you will not. I do not fight women and I do not fight unless I need to." He said.

"But it's just for fun." I said. He just smiled shaking his head. "Are you afraid I'll do to you what I did to your brothers?" I smirked, he gave a chuckle.

"No. Trust me I am not." He got up and began walking to where I was.

"It's not abuse..." I mumbled.

"I know. I just would not want to hurt you." I snorted and looked up at him as he stood in front of me now.

"You won't. Fight me now?" I asked.

He laughed. "No, Sweetheart." He said patting my shoulder, "If I am going to break a rule that big in my book, I want something when I win." He said.

"'When' – huh," He chuckled at my reaction, "Well, it doesn't matter, fine. Let's wager, if you win, you get whatever you want and if I win, I get whatever I want – but it's only one thing and a re-match is ruled out." I said.

"Deal. But I'm not putting my hands on you right now, you're hurt. We'll wait until this is healed." He said as he took my chin and looked at the bruises again, "And that." He looked down at the bruise on my stomach.

"I'm fine right now." I said.

"No." He shook his head, "So instead of fighting – why do you love that so much?" he didn't give me time to answer the question, "You do not seem to have had time to explore yet... Let me show you another place to work out."

He didn't give me an option as he took my hand and began pulling me towards the door.

"But our shoes –" I began.

"Shh, you will not need them." He pulled me through the first floor, we passed familiar rooms like the kitchen and living room but then there was a row of doors I had yet to open. Yes, I needed to do some exploring, I hadn't even done the first floor and there were four stories to this house.

The hall seemed to darken when the windows stopped because now there was nothing lighting our way. I was about to ask him where we were headed when he stopped at double doors. He pushed them open pulling me with him and I smiled as he let my hand go to shut the doors behind us once he had pulled me in. I gasped when I heard him click something and the pool was lit by blue lights from the bottom.

"Here comes the best part," he pointed the remote at the wall across the room and I watched the black covers slide open to reveal the back yard which held a bigger pool. The room was now lit by the moon and I could see the stars.

"Wow..."

"Come on." He began unbuttoning his jacket and it dropped to the floor, I didn't look at him.

"B – but we didn't bring anything to swim in –" I was saying as he pushed his pyjama pants off.

"We don't need them. Come on." He motioned for me to follow as he ran up to the pool and dived in; I knew which side was deep now.

"It's one in the morning – are we allowed to?" I asked rubbing my arms nervously.

"No. Not really, security reasons. But we can take care of ourselves and there is an army upstairs if we need them." He said, I laughed at the army bit. "Jessica." He laughed as he swam towards the edge and just stared at me as his arms rested at the side of the pull.

The water was tempting. I bit my lip thinking back to class a few days ago when the boys were teasing me about rules.

'And even if they are, it will not be much fun here if you obey every single one, Jessica.' That was Maximilian, 'I am telling you, cousin, it is much more fun to just –'

'Break them' Gabriel's voice played in my mind.

I let out a breath. "Look away."

He laughed but sunk beneath the water. I pushed off my track pants leaving me in my sports bra and bum shorts. I ran over to the pool and dived in. The water felt amazing, it was slightly warm.

I surfaced and was immediately splashed in my face. I yelled at Adrian and swam after him as he laughed swimming away. I caught him and shoved him into the water.

We were in the pool for about an hour and a half, just playing around and swimming before we both just swam over to the shallow side of the pool and sat on the stairs, our bodies still submerged in the water.

I looked at him, his black hair was a mess and it stuck out in every direction. He fixed that by running his hand through his hair, pushing it all back.

"We should get back, a lot of the guards wake up at four to use the gym and run errands, some earlier." He said turning to me. He lifted his hand and ran his fingers through my hair pushing it behind me, it had gotten loose some time ago, I felt my heart beat hard against my chest at how close he was to me. "I'll get you a towel." He smiled at me as he got up.

It was the first time I actually saw his body as opposed to feeling it when we were messing around. He looked good, as most of the men in the agency did. His chest was sculpted and so was his six pack. I tried to move my eyes but they stuck to little droplets that rolled from him into the water as his body reflected the light from outside. I heard him chuckle and felt my face heat up realising he had noticed me staring. I turned to look back into the water contemplating sinking down and drowning.

"It's alright, everyone has the same reaction." I could hear the smirk in his voice as he walked out of the pool. There was his little bit of Edgar.

I turned in the pull hearing him open a door; he came out of the room a few minutes later and made his way to me drying himself as he held out an identical white towel. I took it but stopped when he ran his towel up his leg and I spotted some black.

"Is that a tattoo?" I asked shocked.

"Uh – Tat – what? Oh..." he pulled his boxers over his thigh quickly before letting out a sigh, "Yes, um, it is." He said wrapping his towel around his waist.

I climbed out of the pull and dried myself quickly before I wrapped the towel around me.

"You have a tattoo?" I asked. I wouldn't expect Royalty to have tattoos, it was like an unspoken law or something, I would much less expect it to be Adrian. Maybe Maximilian or Edgar but Adrian? He seemed like the brother who always... obeyed the rules.

"Yes," he said slowly, "I uh – Please do not tell anyone. I am not – It will ruin the image... of my family. I just... I wanted one... so I got it where I knew no one could see it." He said.

"No one knows?" I asked surprised.

"Well... The artist and... Max knows... he was with me." Adrian shrugged.

"Does Max have one?" I asked.

"No, he is absolutely terrified of needles. He had to keep his eyes shut the entire time. Towards the end, he opened them and fainted." We laughed, "Do not tell him I told you that... and don't tell anyone about the tattoo... please." He said.

I smiled biting my lip.

"Your secret's safe with me." I said.

He smiled lifting his hand to run it through my hair again but he stopped at the back of my head and pulled me forward before planting a kiss on my forehead. I froze as he pulled back, his smile still as big as ever.

"Come," he said turning to fetch our clothing off the floor.

I lifted my hand to my forehead before letting out a breath I didn't know I held. My heart was beating like crazy. What was this?

He turned around to look at me once he had opened the doors and I jogged over to him so we could go back to our rooms.

*****