Empire of Desire by Rina Kent

She runs toward me and stops a breath away. “Are you okay?”

“I’ll live.”

Her fingers touch the cut on my brow and I wince. Tears glisten in her eyes and she starts to remove her hand, but I grab it, flattening her palm against my cheek. “I’m fine. I expected this.”

“I hate this. I hate Dad like this. He almost drowned you out there… You almost died, Nate.”

“I would’ve done the same if I were in his place, except the killing part, because that will land him in prison.”

“Nate!” She pushes at my chest, straight on the bruise, and I groan.

“What’s wrong?” She starts to inspect my chest and gasps at the view. “Oh, God.”

“It’s nothing.” I button my shirt and she helps me, her fingers trembling when they reach the top. “Hey, this is nothing. We had worse fights than this when we were young.”

“Maybe you should leave, Nate. For now, just go and I’ll talk to him—”

“No, you won’t. I will.”

“But—”

“I’ve known him longer than you have and I can deal with him.”

“What if he hurts you again?”

“He won’t. I can protect myself.”

“Promise?”

“I promise. Now, where is he?”

“In his office, I think.” She digs her nails into my shirt, not wanting to let me go.

So I lower my head and claim her mouth. I suck on her bottom lip until she opens with a moan. My hand fists in her wet hair and I feast on her taste, a mixture of vanilla and whatever she’s feeling at the moment. Right now, it’s despair. And I take that for myself so she doesn’t have those negative emotions anymore.

I never liked kissing. Never engaged in it either, but I want to keep kissing her until I’m out of air and she’s the only oxygen I breathe.

I want to keep feeling her body clinging to mine, her softness molding against my hardness and her moans filling the air.

Those moans and sounds are for me.

Only me.

I almost died because I kissed her not so long ago, but I will still repeat it. I will still risk death for her.

But I don’t want her to risk anything in case King sees us again.

So I begrudgingly pull back, relinquishing her sweet lips.

She’s panting, her eyes darkening with a bright green color, but she doesn’t look to be on the verge of a breakdown like earlier.

“Be careful,” she whispers and lets me go when I coax her to step aside.

“I’ll be fine,” I tell her and stride out of the kitchen without a look back. Because if I do, I’ll be tempted not to leave her side.

If I do, I will take her away from here and give King the middle finger.

But that’s just not the smart thing to do in a situation like this.

I take the stairs slowly because my ribs ache with each step I take. The crazy fucker probably bruised some of them.

I barge into said asshole’s office without knocking. Because fuck him and his crazy ass.

When we were teens and I decided to fight him, everyone told me not to challenge the “King.” That it was stupid and reckless and I’d get my ass whipped.

But I did. The best way to become a king is to slaughter one.

And I was out to do just that.

Yes, he used me as a punching bag the first few times, but I didn’t give up until the king himself fell at my feet.

Until I became his worst friend and best enemy.

And right now, it feels like we’re back to those times where he’s the king and I’m out for his throne.

He’s sitting in the chair at his window that overlooks the front pool. This is probably where he was when I was kissing Gwyneth earlier and decided to use his fists.

But now, he doesn’t look like he wants to touch me, because he has a gun in his hand.

“That’s smarter,” I say, locking the door behind me so Gwyneth doesn’t have the chance to come in. “Better than your clear jealousy of my looks that you tried to ruin.”

“Explain yourself before I fucking kill you.”

I might have lied to Gwyneth just now. I don’t think I’ll be fine.





33





Kingsley





People spend their entire lives avoiding crime—or try to.

Not me.

I knew that I’d do it one day. That at some point, the crazy genes, as my father and his bitch of wife called them, would catch up to me and I’d snap.

That’s why I chose law. It definitely wasn’t out of a warped sense of justice. I just had to learn law to get around it and apply self-restraint so that I didn’t end up murdering someone accidentally.

Or intentionally.

It’s been easier with Gwen around, because I have someone to focus on, someone not to get caught for. I had to raise her, to be the parent my own parents weren’t. I had to be the person who protected her from the world.

But I couldn’t protect her from my motherfucking friend.

Ex-friend because I’m going to blow his brains out in about five minutes.

I always knew I’d kill. I just didn’t know it’d be the man I considered a fucking brother.

Nate and I didn’t start our friendship the conventional way. We were rivals for way too long, then we saw similar traits in each other. So for the sake of our ambitions, we decided to put our differences aside and partner up.