7. QUEENMAKER
“ Not happening,” Sy says, passing me with another stack of steel pipes. It’s not just Sy’s answer, but more how he says it, throwing me this look that’s somehow both amused and annoyed. Like I’m Archie.
Like I’m his pet.
My jaw tightens. “Excuse me?”
Pausing in his struggle to lever the rusty valve from the wall, Remy glances at me. “Come on, Vinny. That rule is older than their parents. Hell, it’s older than their parents’ parents.”
I hold up the DKS pledge book, which—yes, okay, halfway falls to tatters because it’s ancient. I found it buried among a stack of administrative paperwork and crude doodles in the basement storeroom. It’s a few rubs from being hamster bedding.
But still, I point to the page. “It says here that for a true Queen of West End to earn her crown, she has to prove herself in public, physical combat against her King. To the victor go the spoils. It’s very clear.”
Perched on the old metal desk beside me, Nick grasps one of the pipes, testing it in his grip like it’s a weapon. “You and Sy in the ring together? I think it’s a good idea.”
Outside the doorway to the little office that’s going to eventually become Remy’s private inking room, the clatter of steel pipes hitting the floor rings out. Sy stomps back into the office with a glare. “That is fucking ridiculous,” he says, yanking off his heavy gloves. It’s mid-December, and given that Royal Ink’s future new furnace install is on backorder, Sy’s huff emerges in a vapor cloud. “No Duchess has ever bested her King in the ring. You do realize if that’s ever actually happened, he just let her win.”
“I know.” Beside me, Nick releases a slow, velvety chuckle. “You see, Little Bird? You’re asking my brother to throw a fight.” He points the pipe at Sy. “Or you’re asking him to beat his woman’s ass.” Pausing, he offers me a considering look. “Or you’re asking him to get his ass beat by his woman. Any way you slice it, there’s no win in this for him.” Tapping the pipe against his temple, he concludes, “Like I said. Great fucking idea.”
Reaching over, I snatch the cold pipe from his grip. “You all underestimate me.”
Pulling me into his side, Nick arches a brow at his brother. “Come on, Sy. Think of how many tickets we’d sell.” He gives my arm a brisk rub, sensing my shiver. “People would come from all four corners. We’d be fucking rolling in it.”
“We’re rolling in quite enough, Nick. And also,” Sy flips him off, “shut the fuck up.” Pinning me with his blue eyes, Sy adds, “I call you my Queen, Lavinia. Other people call you my Queen. Mama B defers to you, for fucks sake. Even Story sees you as her equal.”
I argue, “But…”
Only, I can’t quite place it. I just know something inside of me chafes at the thought of not being official. Getting the brass Bruin burnt into my flesh was awful, but beneath the agony, rage, and humiliation, at least there’d been the knowledge that I was a proper Duchess now.
Sensing my uncertainty, Sy steps between my legs, framing my face with his big, warm hands. “What’s this about?”
Surprisingly, it’s Remy who answers. “It’s the mauve she saw at the Palace the other day,” he grunts, shoving down on the pipe wrench.
“Mauve.” Sy frowns, and I know that, much like me, he’s struggling to connect the color association. Remy’s been adding them to his color wheel lately. Or, maybe more accurately, mixing them. The look Sy passes between me and Nick says, “ What colors make up mauve ?”
We both shrug.
“With Verity?” Remy clarifies, giving up on the wrench. Wiping his hands, he rolls his eyes. “At the coronation.”
Sy’s mouth tilts. “Mauve is… jealousy?” Eyeing me skeptically, he hedges, “Envy?”
Remy groans. “Respect, Sy.”
Oh.
Oh .
That’s it, I realize. It wasn’t just watching her get on that throne with her son, either. It wasn’t even the way the Princes—the whole frat—treated her; like she was someone they knew they could count on to fix the rot in their territory.
It was how Verity used that power to change East End for the better.
It’s the same thing Sy did when he became King. Maybe even Killian, too. But watching everyone look at her the same way they look at Kings made me wonder, why not?
Why shouldn’t a Queen be just as important to her territory?
Sy frowns, nudging my chin up. “The frat respects you. You know that. How many times have we had to keep Nicky from burying a bullet into whatever new pledge tries to worship the ground you walk on?” Smiling softly, he bends down to brush a kiss against my lips. “If anyone ever showed you disrespect, you know what we’d do to them. So do they.” The kiss isn’t as sweet as he means it to be because there’s a truth in it that bristles.
That’s not respect for me.
It’s respect for my men.
“So you won’t do it.” Pulling back, I search his eyes. “You won’t get into the ring with me.”
He thumbs my bottom lip, his eyes heavy in that special, lusty way. “Not for a match.”
I duck out of his grip–and Nick’s–whirling to fix him with a steely look. “Then you don’t respect me.”
“What?” Sy blinks, and I’m not sure if the stunned confusion in his eyes is meant for the accusation or the smooth maneuver I just pulled. “Of course I respect you. I love you.”
“You love me, but you don’t respect me. I know you.” Still wielding the pipe, I grip it hard, my knuckles going white. “You’d never respect someone who couldn’t beat you. Not really.”
“That’s not even remotely true,” he insists, but it takes a moment of aborted breaths for him to offer up, “I respect Mama B.”
Remy snorts, sharing a look with Nick. “Bro, Mama B would noose you with your own dick.”
Unable to argue with this, he grimaces. “Well, I respect my mom, too.”
Nick gives him an unimpressed look. “I’ve seen mom beat you over her knee.”
“When I was nine,” Sy snaps.
Nick shrugs. “Point stands.”
“Okay, this is stupid.” Reaching for me, Sy says, “Lavinia, you’ve beaten me in a hundred different ways since the first night I met you. Why can’t that be enough?”
I use the pipe to nudge him back before he can distract me with his scent and rippling muscles. “Because only one way matters to West End.”
He blinks down at the pipe, jaw tightening. “You can’t actually be serious about this.” He meets my gaze, and for a flash of a moment, he looks absolutely miserable. “Baby, I’d fucking demolish you.”
My jaw drops. “Big words coming from the guy who’s backing down from a challenge.”
Nick and Remy suck in a unison, sharp inhale, and I don’t need to ask why. Sy’s eyes go all flinty and hard, because he can be accused of a lot of things, but backing down from a challenge? Not one of them.
Until now.
He raises his chin, gazing down at me. “What challenge would that be? The challenge of pummeling a girl?”
Looking into his eyes, I realize the whole idea was genius. Whoever made these rules, however long ago it may have been, knew exactly what the King of West End should be. A rock-hard protector, obstinate and unyielding, who’d fight for every win as if his life depended on it. But they also knew who its Queen should be.
His fury.
“Not the challenge of beating a girl, Big Bear,” I say, gentle as I reach up to cup his cheek. “The challenge of losing to one.”
An hour later, I can tell it’s still getting to him.
Every now and then, his back will… flex beneath his jacket. Almost like he’s angering himself over it internally, in dribs and drabs.
Remy’s too distracted to notice. “We can put a door here to the boutique,” he says, inspecting the hole in the plaster he’d just jubilantly created. The chill of the room doesn’t seem to bother him. He’s in a tight tee, dirty gray jeans, and heavy black boots, and damn . The whole manly laborer vibe looks surprisingly good on him, his tattoos shifting with every tug of his muscles.
The idea of turning this place into his own studio has him completely obsessed. We’d spent some time renovating the loft upstairs before we moved in. Even before Verity came to stay here every month, seeking a little West End refuge from the East End coldness. But we’ve spent far longer on the downstairs, knocking out walls and refinishing everything from the bones up. Each day, Remy’s feet hit the ground running, the intense focus turning him into this whirling dervish of spirit that’s almost too fast to catch.
Nick isn’t dressed to work, though.
He’s in a leather jacket, the collar pulled up to hide the scar on his neck beneath. He’s also painfully restless. “Should be out there,” he mutters, squinting as he peeks out the frosty window. This will be our third holiday spent together, and it’s difficult not to let my memories wander back to our first, all locked up in the Crane Motor Inn.
He scratches at the puckered scar on his neck almost absentmindedly. I wonder if he even realizes he fidgets with it every time he feels cooped up. “I heard Ashby—I mean, Sinclaire—is going to see Ballsy today.”
None of us need to ask which newly annointed Sinclaire he’s referring to. Ballsack and Pace have formed an odd friendship. Him and Sy are the only visitors Ballsy will see these days. His trial is looming on the horizon, and although Sy and the Princes combined could probably make his bail, he keeps refusing to take it. Verity and I have no idea why.
He won’t call us, either.
“Hey, Vinny,” Remy grunts, his arm buried in the plaster of the office’s wall. “Go grab me that mallet from the toolbox, would ya? This stud needs some serious percussive maintenance.”
Resigned to another night of us all washing plaster off each other in the shower, I get up and walk out to the front lobby, crouching to root around in the large toolbox. I’m not sure when it happens. I don’t hear anything . Not the door. Not footsteps. Not even a breath.
But when I stand up and turn, a loud gasp escapes me.
A man is leaning against the column right in fucking front of me.
At first, all I see is the dark shape of him, but then I register his finely tailored ensemble. He’s wearing an overcoat—long, black, double-breasted—that offers only a peek at the waistcoat beneath. The slender curve of his posture is casual yet intentional. Pale skin, stormy eyes, and his styled, inky hair should be enough to clue me in, but there’s also the gleam of silver in his lip and nose, and the sharp, spiky script tattooed above his eyebrow.
Mori.
Baron .
Flinching back, my foot knocks the toolbox into the wall. Loudly . But I still have the mallet in my hand, so I grip it tight, raising it.
But I’m only met with the unimpressed curl of a perfect, dark eyebrow. “As if you could,” he sighs, glancing around the dusty space with the air of someone who’s horrifically bored. “I know corpses with better situational awareness. You’ve gotten far too comfortable in this district for a viper. Back in my cub days, we would have razed this whole block looking for a poor, defenseless Lucia.” Rolling his eyes, his head tips back and I gasp again.
His throat has a thick, gnarled scar. It’s nothing like Nick’s, which is puckered and rough, but even though the sight of it always makes my gut twist with the phantom memory of him almost dying, it’s downright tiny in comparison to this .
This Baron’s scar, thick and stark, stretches from ear to ear.
“What are you doing here?” I snap, keeping a stance that makes it clear I’m anything but defenseless.
Fortunately, Nick takes that moment to march into the lobby.
Or maybe unfortunately .
He has his gun drawn instantly, the barrel pointed toward the Baron’s head, and even stalking closer from yards away, I know he’d make his mark. “DK. You’re gonna want to take two-hundred and thirty-seven steps away from my woman.”
Beneath his gray eyes and aloof expression, the man—DK—looks vaguely amused. “Mayhem? Seems a bit overboard considering I just walked right into your new bear den. Feels like anyone’s welcome.”
“I always knew Barons had a death wish, but you coming through my doors is next level suicidal.” This voice belongs to Sy, low and full of such threat that even I shiver as he approaches me from behind, his breath like dragon fire against the crown of my head. “You lost the privilege of being on my streets the second you pledged to the wicked path, so what ,” he snarls, “do you want?”
I lean into my King’s body, giving DK a dubious once-over. He has strangely hollow cheeks, which throw his sharp features into full relief. His cheekbones could cut glass–and not just because of the silver stud adorning each of his cheeks.
I didn’t even know you could pierce a cheek.
“I want what’s owed to me,” DK says, jaw tight as he straightens. Perhaps the biggest offense of his entire visit is what he does next.
Twisting, he turns his back to them as if he doesn’t have a care in the world for the gun Nick’s got trained on him. And maybe he doesn’t.
Nick and Sy both tense, but just as Remy waltzes into the lobby, DK reveals something that makes all of us pause in shared bafflement.
A pet carrier.
“Remington,” DK begins, setting the carrier between us, “I think you know that I’ve been feeding the feral colony next door since freshman year.”
I glance at Remy, confused. “Freshman year?”
Remy frowns at the carrier, offhandedly explaining, “We roomed together for a bit back when Damon was a pledge.”
My eyes bug out, glancing from my Dukes to him. “You used to be DKS?”
“Pledge,” DK corrects, shrugging. “Never got my paw.”
Sy answers with a growl, “Now he’s just DK.”
DK releases a low, lazy chuckle. “You blood West Enders take shit so personally, don’t you? Saul wasn’t a King I wanted to follow. Evidently, neither did you.”
Sy raises his chin, blue eyes scalding. “But only one of us turned our back on the mission.”
All the mirth floods from DK’s expression, leaving hardened, dark eyes. “I never turned my back on the mission. I’m just fighting for it on a different front.” The crackle of resentful tension is shattered by the long, mournful cry of the creature in the cage. DK’s eyes drop to the carrier and he straightens his lapels. “No use in dwelling on mixed loyalties. Like I said, I’m here to get what’s owed to me.”
Nick’s lips curl in disgust. “Some mangy black cat? Go ahead and take him.”
“She’s a ‘her.’” DK’s correction is laced with impatience. “And I don’t need your permission to take her, Bruin. In fact, I’ve been feeding and trapping them for years now. Getting them fixed and then releasing them. Nine, so far.”
Taken aback, a single question escapes me. “Why?” Barons don’t care about cats . As far as I’ve always been able to tell, Barons don’t care about anything. They aren’t made to care. They’re made to follow. To worship. To fix.
To clean up Forsyth’s ugliest messes.
DK’s unsettling eyes land on mine, and for a second, something electric and unhinged flows through them. “It took me a long time to trap this one,” he says, smoothly turning to Remy. “She’s suspicious. Feral. Barely a year old.”
It takes me a long moment to realize he’s just ignoring me.
Now that is a Baron trait I’m used to.
Remy scoffs, glancing at the cage. “Much like my new step-mother, she looks pretty trapped to me.”
DK smirks, and a chill runs down my spine at the way his face transforms. He’s got dimples. They might look sweet and disarming on anyone else. On him, they just look like a mockery of the feature, twisted and malicious. “Yeah, I got her. Took her in for a spay and treatment too, which inconveniently makes her my legal responsibility. Just one problem.” His eyes flick to Sy. “She’s already stuffed full of your little Archduke spawnlings.”
“Yeah, right,” Sy scoffs, eying the cage with disdain. “Any tomcat could have nailed her.”
“But only one tomcat is out there every Friday night, like...” DK releases a raspy chuckle, “Well, like clockwork.”
I step in, ignoring the way Nick inches in front of me. “Okay, sometimes Sy lets him out when we’re doing Friday Night Fury, but him knocking up another cat? That’s not possible.” I gesture to Sy. “Archie was neutered over the spring.”
DK doesn’t even blink as he nods to the carrier. “Didn’t look too neutered when I found him banging this one.”
The anger rises, my tone growing clipped. “Maybe you don’t know what ‘banging’ looks like, because—” But when I glance at my men, none of them are meeting my gaze. There’s a shiftiness about them that makes me pause, comprehension dawning like a brick to the head. “No fucking way,” I growl, jabbing my finger into Sy’s chest. “I told you to take him in! I made the appointment. I saw you leave the clock tower with him. So what the fuck?—”
“It’s not his fault,” Nick cuts in, tucking his gun away. “We put it to a vote. The whole thing was perfectly democratic.”
I gawp at the three of them, my head swimming. “Put what to a vote? Him being neutered?!”
Remy clucks his tongue. “He’s the Archduke, Lavinia. He’s royalty.”
Nick agrees, “You can’t cut a Royal’s balls off.”
“His swimmers are, like,” Remy scratches his temple, “sacred or whatever.”
I can’t even believe what I’m hearing. “So the three of you just decided to?—”
Sy stands to his full-height, cutting me off. “Forty-three, technically.”
My eyes bug out, the scale of the betrayal galling . “Are you seriously telling me that the whole fucking frat voted on whether or not my cat gets neutered?!”
“Yeah,” Nick says in a slow tone, as if it’s the most natural thing to do. “We used our DKS pins.”
“Wait a fucking minute here.” Sy balks, uncrossing his arms. “Since when is he your cat?”
My jaw cannot possibly drop any wider. “Since I’m the one who rescued him from Nick’s murder scene!”
“Not only am I the one who scoops his boxes and plans his diet, but you named him the Archduke,” Sy snaps back. “Face it, he’s the DKS mascot now. And that kind of title comes with responsibilities.”
The whole thing is so absurd that it possibly breaks my brain because all I can think to respond with is one simple truth: “You lied to me.”
Some of that fiery outrage in Sy’s gaze melts away, but it’s not shame that replaces it. It’s a plea . “A man needs his balls, Lavinia.”
“And come on, you’ve seen them. You’ve had to.” Nick gives me a wry look. “Archie has some real fucking gonads on him.”
I gape at him, completely lost. “What?”
Remy nods. “He swings those beans around like kettlebells. You’d have to be blind. We all pretty much figured you knew but were letting it slide.”
The truth is, that’s a part of Archie I don’t pay much mind to. Sure, I pet him and brush him, but I’ve never thought to raise his tail and check the state of his testicles. Why would I? Suddenly I feel foolish, like I’ve been far too easily duped.