Regal Queen by Ivy Mason

Seventeen

A calmness washed over me,so scarily similar to the way I felt before I knew I had to kill a man.

Except this time, death wasn’t mine to mete, but to take.

Giving Rose the choice to walk away from me was the hardest thing I’d ever done in my life. It made my heart tremble, my breath shorten, my very bones ache.

I honestly didn’t know if she would come back to me, and I felt like I was facing the guillotine, waiting for the blade to come down. My stomach was churning with nervousness, it was like a billion tiny worms squirming around in there.

And now, she’d texted me about an hour ago, letting me know she wanted to talk. She would be here in exactly... one minute.

I'd instantly cleared the house, knowing that if she rejected me, if she even gave a hint that she was going to walk out of my life and never return, I wouldn't be able to control myself.

I wouldn’t be able to hide the raging emotions I'd been holding off for so long.

I needed this woman as much as I needed to breathe, and she would break me if she walked away from me.

I took in a deep breath, knowing that she might not be on time, preparing for the possibility that she'd show up a couple minutes late.

And then, I felt her.

I didn’t know how I knew she was here, but I could feel her through the door, even though it was closed and my back was to it.

Even though she hadn't knocked and even though no one had alerted me of her arrival.

She was fucking here, and my future was in her hands.

I turned, not wanting to wait any longer.

I would show her what she meant to me, get down on my knees and fucking beg if that's what it took.

I opened the door and the first person I saw was Knight, leaning against a car, his hands crossed over his chest defensively.

His eyes were sharp, his gaze shrewd and discerning as he took me in. I suddenly realized that he felt the need to protect her from me. The fucker.

And the car he was leaning against was the stereotypical piece of shit car that a lot of Cubans drove around here. It was completely unworthy for Rose's skin to grace. He probably used it to blend in but the sight of it still offended me.

Rose deserved wealth and opulence, diamonds and silk, and my fucking arms around her.

She may not want all that shit but she ws going to get it.

I met his gaze with a hard one of my own, promising retribution if he dared hurt her. Then I jerked my head to the side, telling him to fuck off.

He stood and, to my amazement, instead of leaving right away, he turned and leaned down, opening the door for her. She climbed out and they spoke for a few moments. Then she began to walk down the pathway and his gaze lingered protectively on her backside for a moment before digging his keys out of his pocket and walking around the car to get inside.

I instantly forgot about him to take in the beautiful sight emerging before me.

She was wearing a simple outfit: a white tank top, dark blue jeans, and matching white canvas shoes. It was modest in contrast to the heavily made up women who swarmed both Coulter and I everywhere we went, but I’d never seen a more beautiful woman in my life.

Except now, her clear jade eyes had a steely strength in them I’d never seen before, even if they were still open and unguarded. Beautiful and entrancing. I wanted to thread my fingers through the tresses of her dark chestnut brown hair and drown in her gaze.

Only now did I notice now how much she was a study in contrasts. Soft and strong, simple but complex, gorgeous but so sweet and simple that it took my breath away.

As our gazes caught, we didn't move for a moment, both frozen on opposite ends of the path. She stood across from me, only several yards away but it was like an eternity stretched out between us.

Was she changing her mind about coming here? Or maybe trying to figure out how to tell me the harsh truth? That I’d been an asshole and she wasn’t coming back to me. That I would never be good enough for her, something I already knew.

My stomach churned, my chest tight in dreaded anticipation of what she would do.

Would she choose me?

Then her face softened, and she took a step towards me, and suddenly I could breathe again.

She was coming to me.

To. Me.

She kept her promise. Returning to stay by my side.

The sight of it made my heart fucking growl, possessive and territorial.

This woman was fucking mine.

I rushed forward, ready to be eat up the space between us, and within seconds, we were standing before each other.

I ached to reach out and touch her. To pull her into my arms, to feel her pressed against me, to listen to her precious heart pound in her chest.

But, she didn’t reach out to touch me and her reservation made me hesitate.

She needed to be the one to initiate contact, as the connection between the two of us needed to be her choice.

I slid my hands into my pockets to keep from touching her, but when I spoke, my voice betrayed the agonizing emotion I was feeling inside. "Rose.”

“You trusted Knight more than me,” she blurted out. I rocked back on my heels, surprised. “When we attacked Dimitri’s ship, you weren’t going to let me come, until Knight vouched for me. Why do you trust him more than me?”

I shook my head, staring at the ground. “It’s not about trust, Rose.”

“What is it then?”

I looked into her eyes. “It’s about fear.”

Her throat bobbed, and her lips parted, but she didn’t say a word.

“It may seem easy to you to do what we do. To go in and kill a man. But it’s not. The first time I did it, I had nightmares for days.” I reached for her, catching myself before my fingers touched her face, then I shoved my hand back in my pocket. “I was afraid, Rose. Afraid that you would become like me, a hardened shell. Afraid that I—that I wouldn’t be able to protect you.”

She took another step forward and, closing the distance between us, she reached up and tucked my hair behind my ear, a glimmer of a smile in her eyes. Then she ran her hand down my neck, resting it on my chest, and a shiver raced down my spine at the contact.

“The great King was afraid.”

I clutched her side, holding her to me. “Yes, Rose. You make me weak. And that scares the shit out of me.”

She cupped my cheeks, her beautiful jade eyes dancing as they stared into mine. “I never thought I’d live to see the day. The Great and Mighty King of Nevada is afraid of his own shadow.”

I scowled, though a part of me was pleased to see the teasing side of her come out. “Sometimes our own shadows are the scariest thing out there.”

“And sometimes they only reveal our weaknesses so that we can turn them into strengths.” She rubbed her thumb over my cheek. “Let me become your greatest strength, Bourbon. Let me show you how to turn love into power.”

“And how would I do that?”

“Because you face your greatest fears when you are willing to do anything to save someone else.”

“Am I your greatest fear, Rose?”

She hesitated, her throat bobbing, then she tilted it upwards. “Yes. Because I’m afraid to let you in. I’m afraid that you’ll stomp all over my heart at the first sight of trouble.”

I shook my head. “I swear to you that I won’t.”

“Then prove it to me.”

I pulled in a breath. “How?”

“I want you to call Nero.”

I stilled, blinking in confusion. “What does he have to do with you and me?”

“I need to save my sister, and the only way I can do that is for you to call him.”

“Why?”

“If you call him, will he betray us to Dimitri?”

“Probably.” My chest was tightening again with the thought. I hated that about him. He was only living up to everything he ever told me, but the truth of his words were a hard pill to swallow. He really didn’t care about me or Coulter.

It was crushing to know that the person who gave you life would also just as easily take it away.

“Do you think you could face him? For me?”

I nodded my head. “If you ask me to do it, I will.”

She bit down on her lower lip, chewing on it, formulating her next thoughts. “When Dimitri comes, I want to be here. I want to look into his eyes when he dies.”

“I will be the one to pull the trigger.” She opened her mouth to protest, but I cut her off. “We will do it together. When he comes, you and I will fight him together. And you will look him in the eyes as I do it.”

She snapped her mouth shut, her gaze penetrating and piercing, searching me for the truth of my statement.

I wrapped my hand around the nape of her neck, digging my fingers in tight. “I swear to you, Rose. You will watch the life drain from his eyes.”

She exhaled a breath, and I knew that she believed me. “Okay.”

My breath caught and a thrill of warmth flowed through me. “Does this mean you’ll come back to me? That you want me in your life?”

She didn’t answer me.

"Rose I…” I prepared myself to grovel, "I need you to know that I would do anything in my power to keep you safe. Protected. Even if it meant throwing myself in front of you to stop a line of bullets." I licked my suddenly dry lips, “And even more, I want you to be happy. To have anything and everything you could ever want. I want everything for you. So, tell me, what do you want to be happy? Tell me what it is, and I will give it to you."

She took in a deep, even breath. "Even if I ask you to never speak to me again?"

Oh, god. An anvil landed on my chest. I couldn't breathe. I forced myself to nod. To croak out the words that I hated but that I needed to say. “Yes."

Her eyes lightened and she leaned into me, burrowing her face into my chest. I surrounded her with my arms, holding her, clinging to her, hoping that she wasn’t about to crush me.

"Do you love me?" She didn't look at me as she said it, and I rested my chin on top of her head, curling my fingers into her hair.

"I think I've always loved you, Rose. You are my achilles heel. And that's dangerous to a man like me."

“Maybe for the moment.” She peeked up at me and a smile spread across her face. It was so beautiful. I wanted to see it every day.

She looked so perfect there, her body tucked into my embrace like God himself had created her to be there.

My thumb slid up to her lips to part them and a flash of her tongue flicked out, brushing against it.

This woman. She made me fucking weak in the knees.

“If I want to walk away after we save my sister, you will let me go. Without question or hesitation. You will help me without asking for my heart in return.”

I frowned. “Why?”

“Because if I give myself over to you, I want it to be because I love you, not because I owe you.” At the word, ‘love’, my heart pounded and my breath hitched. Even the word from her lips was like manna to my starving soul.

“Okay.” I conceded the word easily because I’d practiced saying it several times already. But the word was still rough and sticky. It tasted like acid and glue and dust in my mouth. But at the pleased noise she made, I was glad I’d said it.

I didn’t really mean it.

Not fucking likely.

There was no way I was letting her go.

I would give her her freedom all right, but then I would chase her to the ends of the fucking earth.

I would tear down anything in my path, burn it all down to be with her again.

But right now, she needed the door to her cage wide open, and despite everything inside me wanting to lock that cage up and throw away the key so she could never leave me, I was flinging the door wide open. “I will do anything you want me to do, and let you walk away from me when this is all over, but I want something in return. Right now. Not your heart, but payment for helping you take down Dimitri.”

She took in a deep breath, steeling herself. “Okay, what do you want?”

I looked down into her face, possession and need filling me. I loved this woman, and if she was going to walk away from me, I was going to take this one day to taste every inch of her skin, to touch her and feel her, to show her how much she meant to me.

So that if she walked away from me, I could cling to the memory for the rest of my life.

“You,” I growled, tightening my hold over the nape of her neck as I leaned down to kiss her. “I need to fuck you. I’m not asking for your heart, Rose, just your body, and for tonight only. Can you give that to me?”

She was already kissing me back, and she nodded her head, breathing out her answer in between kisses. “Yes.”