Ruthless Empire (Royal Elite #6) by Rina Kent

Running to him, I wrap my arms around his waist. “Papa, have you had a successful party meeting?”

“Aside from Cynthia challenging every point I suggested?” He strokes my hair. “Sure.”

“I’m sorry.”

“That’s just her and she’ll never change. I’m starting to think she’s double-crossing us using the Labour Party.”

“You know she’d never do that. Your principles run in her veins.”

“Only when I don’t voice them.” He watches me. “Are you going over to hers?”

I nod slowly. “I’m spending the weekend.”

“Do you have to? You can always stay. There are no custody laws that we need to obey now that you’re an adult.”

“She’ll just end up coming here.”

“Let her,” he says in a dispassionate tone. “We can continue the debate.”

“Papa.” I stroke his jacket. “I want to spend time with her. She’s my mum.”

There might have been times in the past when I disliked her choices and her decisions and what she turned me into, but as I grew up, and after I saw her in that tub, I realised just how fragile Mum actually is. Deep down, she’s being this strict with me because she doesn’t want me to end up as a shell like her, no matter how proud she is that I look like her.

“I understand.” Papa kisses my temple. “Do you know why she’s been grumpier than usual lately?”

“I don’t know.” Mum would kill me if I said something to him about her personal life.

That day she slit her wrist, she made me swear not to humiliate her and said that she’d do it again if I disrupted our oath. I cried as I begged her to go to the hospital. She didn’t, because that would have humiliated her and put her name in the headlines.

I watched her suture herself by following online tutorials. I’m pretty sure she had an infection, but she self-medicated with antibiotics and tranquilisers. She did everything herself and refused to have any medical staff take a look at her.

Since then, she wears thick watches to hide the scar.

“Is it because of that French businessman she’s seeing?” Papa raises an eyebrow. “Poor bastard. Maybe I should warn him that she’ll challenge him every step of the way and eventually suck the life out of him.”

“Papa, no. Lucien is great. They actually get along.”

“They do, huh?”

“Yeah.” I stop myself before saying, ‘They don’t fight like you two’, and instead I tell him, “You just take care of Helen, okay? She’s on a deadline.”

“Fine.” He kisses my temple again. “Have fun. Though I doubt Cynthia will let you in the midst of nagging about everything.”

Shaking my head, I kiss him on the cheek and wave at Derek before I get in my car.

On my way out, I watch the entrance to the house, searching for that familiar black car. Not that Cole comes home this soon.

He has late practice before the game tonight.

Ever since the day of his dad’s anniversary a few weeks ago, something has changed between us.

I can’t put my finger on it, but I feel it in the way he watches me, the way he seizes every chance to kidnap me somewhere out of view, yank my skirt up, and fuck me.

It’s as if he can’t get enough of me. And the more he does that, I can’t seem to get enough of him either. It’s like I’m caught in a maze with no way out.

He still sneaks into my room every night, no exceptions. He still takes me to that club. My favourite part about it isn’t the watching — though I love that — it’s the fact that we wear masks where no one can tell who we are.

At first, I looked over my shoulder, expecting someone to recognise us, but that anxiety withered away with time.

In La Débauche, I get to touch Cole and even let him kiss me in front of other people without worrying that we’ll be on the headlines the following day.

If anything, Cole recognises most of the people we watch. Even though they wear masks, he sometimes plays a quiz with me to guess that politician’s/influential figure’s/CEO’s name.

The game is simple — with every wrong guess, he gets something from me. Since I always lose, I usually end up against one of the sofas as he eats me out or fucks me until my voice turns hoarse.

Needless to say, all of Cole’s games lead back to sex. Seriously. He comes up with all sorts of schemes that result in me naked and splayed out or tied up.

If he’s sick and I secretly love the devious ways he takes me, what does that make me?

I guess we’ll never know, because I would never tell him I enjoy what he’s doing to me. It’s not about him and me; it’s about Papa, Mum, Helen, Frederic — who would kill me if Papa doesn’t — and the world, basically.

Cole and I are in a particular category and we simply can’t jump to another one.

As much as I’m careful so no one picks up on our relationship in public, I always feel like maybe someone will. Maybe someone will notice the way I absentmindedly watch him when he’s practising, or when he’s reading alone in the school’s garden.

Maybe someone will know I don’t shoo all those girls away because of the family image, but because the idea of him touching anyone else makes me a red bull.