Chapter 158 Silence Louder Than ...
Chapter 146
Rosa's POV
"Jax, I am talking to you!"
My voice erupted like a lightning strike which hit every wall and corner of the room and came back to hit my chest.
I could feel the screaming right on my throat, hitchy like a demon scrapping life out of it.
The heat which had once cooled down, but temperature in the room had suddenly spiked like someone had switched on the furnace.
I had held the door knob, clasped firmly in my hand and was ready to leave the room but the melt felt like it had been sitting in the sun all day.
I gave out a slow and shallow breath. Then I walked back into the room. This time not rushing, but with careful and deliberate steps. Like I was marching into a battlefield I didn't know how it started.
Jax didn't move like he had always been doing all day. His head hung low, into the book flipping through pages. He moved across the letters in it like he was a pup who was learning how to read.
Like I wasn't standing in the room with him. Like I was completely irrelevant and useless. Like I was not the one who just shouted at the top of her voice just a moment ago.
I stopped right in front of him.
My hands fell to my side and balled into a fist fingers dug into my palm like I wanted to taste my own blood.
I felt my whole body vibrate like some dosage of electricity had been passed into me.
My jaw tightened together in anger. I tapped my shoes repeatedly on the floor. The sound was sharp as it resonated into my ears like the ticking of the clock.
Still the idiot didn't look up.
Not even a little. Not even a tiny glance to let me know he could hear me. His head stayed down. His eyes stayed on that book.
One of his hands rested beside the pages, while the other was used to flip the pages.
Jax looked relaxed and unmoved as he flipped through the pages while I remained in front of him like buzzing flying hovering in the air.
I was mad, I wanted to do something stupid, charged at him and reaped his soul.
He had just told me something that turned my world upside down. He had dropped a secret on me like dropping a boulder from a cliff. And then he had gone quiet. Just like that. Picked up his book and went quiet like none of it happened. Like I was supposed to swallow what he said and walk away and figure it out by myself.
I pressed my lips together hard.
Say something,” I thought. “Just say anything.”
I needed him to hear me. I needed him to understand that I had not sent Brielle to hurt him or to make trouble. Even though it was lie at least to feel that I am a saint , not the devil Jax thought I was.
Brielle had served me faithfully for a long time. She followed my instructions because she trusted me, and I had trusted her, and now she was sitting in a cold cell because of it. Because of me.
That thought sat heavy in my stomach like a stone.
"So you are not going to respond?" My voice came out quieter this time. Tired. "Am I speaking to a statue?"
Jax lifted his head up once more into my face. He slowly shook his head, not one filled with anger, or confusion but someone would pity like a small child who didn't understand something the grown ups already knew.
That look confused me. That looked like it broke me. It stuck my breath in my nose.
Because behind those eyes of his, something was lurking a danger. I could see like a shadow of a dangerous being plastered to the wall.
Because behind his eyes, behind that calm and unbothered face, something was hiding. I could see it sitting there like a shadow behind a curtain. He knew something.
In addition, he had passed the message that whatever expression behind that steady expression of his was bigger than letting out or speaking to me and so he deliberately chose not to utter any words.
But Jax's silence is killing me. He should have let out something to give me a hint.
Fine, if you don't want to talk to me,” voice out my frustrations. My voice cut through like a thin blade cutting through the air. “Fine,"
I turned around before my face could betray how frightened I actually was underneath all that anger.
I walked out.
I walked out of Jax's room and the embarrassment walked right alongside me, step for step, like a shadow I couldn't shake off. My face felt hot. My chest felt tight. I pulled my dress straighter and lifted my chin and moved through the corridor as fast as my legs would carry me without actually breaking into a run.
By the time I reached my quarters and closed the door behind me, only one thought was sitting at the front of my mind.
Brielle.
She was still in that cell. She had been in there since this all started, and I had not gone to see her. Not once. I had stayed away and told myself it was safer, smarter, better for both of us. But the truth, the real truth that I didn't like looking at directly, was that I was scared. Scared that visiting her would make things worse. Scared that someone would see me and understand exactly what my visit meant.
But now I imagined her in there, sitting on a cold stone floor in the dim light, waiting. Wondering if I had forgotten her. Wondering if I had abandoned her. Wondering if the queen she had risked everything for had simply decided she wasn't worth the trouble anymore.
My chest squeezed painfully at that picture.
And then a different fear crept in, slithering through my thoughts like something cold and fast. What if she stopped waiting? What if she got tired and scared and desperate enough to talk? What if she told them everything, including the part where I was the one who asked her to plant the listening device in Jax's room in the first place?
I pressed my hand flat against my chest and breathed.
She won't,” I told myself. “She is loyal. She will hold on.”
But I needed to get her out. Tonight. I couldn't leave her in there another day and hope that loyalty alone would be enough to keep her quiet and keep her safe.
I moved to my wardrobe and changed quickly. I chose clothes that were plain and dark. Nothing that would stand out. Nothing with bright colours or fancy details that would catch somebody's eye from across a courtyard. I needed to move through the prison grounds like I was part of the shadows.
When I was dressed, I left.
The prison building sat at the far end of the compound.
I walked towards it like the way I had walked towards it earlier. My eyes straight and steady ahead, my heart was doing something unsteady inside my ribcage.
I spotted the guards from a far. The were standing in front of the gate.
The moment they saw me coming, their whole energy changed. I watched it happen like a slow wave moving through all of them at once. The ones who had been leaning straightened up. The ones who had been talking stopped talking. Their eyes found each other quickly, and I could read what was passing between those glances without hearing a single word.
She's back. She's got more money. She here to give us more money.
They remembered this morning. They remembered the heavy envelope their boss had tucked into his drawer after my visit. And now here I was again, walking toward them with purpose in my stride, and every single one of them assumed I had come to do the same thing again.
One of them moved before I even reached them. He stepped forward and pulled the gate open, sweeping his arm slightly like he was welcoming me somewhere important.
I walked through without slowing down.
Two of the guards fell into step behind me, following at a respectful distance, their boots quiet on the ground as I led the way straight to their boss's office like I had been there a hundred times before.
I pushed the door open.
"I need Brielle. Now."
My word landed hard in the small office room. The prison chief who was sitting behind his large desk. I could see some paper spread across his t
able.
He looked at me. Once. Twice. His face folded with meaning I couldn't read. My eyes quickly directed to the half cup of ale on his desk.
"Now?" he repeated.