Chapter Ten #2
“Andrei, you have never done anything that would put our country at risk. You’ve never done anything that would put Emerald at risk.
And so I am asking you, what insanity overtook you that you would steal her from the altar?
Was Lucian a threat to her? Because I can accept that.
If Lucian had put her in danger, then you did what you had to do.
But there is nothing else short of that which justifies your actions. ”
“He was not a threat to her,” Andrei said. “But she’s mine.”
“This is what I feared. Are you telling me that you… Did you lay a hand on my sister?”
“I laid more on her than a hand, Onyx, and I will admit that before a firing squad if it comes down to it.”
“I trusted you.”
“And I was trustworthy. Until I was not.”
“This doesn’t explain anything to me.”
“I can’t explain it to you. What happened on the yacht is between Emerald and me.
The decisions that were made… You are a good friend, and a good king, Onyx, but you don’t know everything.
Not about your sister, and not about me.
We have our own relationship, and have all these years.
” It felt disingenuous for him to say that now with all of the acrimony swirling inside him where she was concerned. But that was his business too.
“Are you going to marry her?”
“I haven’t decided. There is the complicating factor of her pregnancy.”
“What?”
“She’s pregnant. The baby is mine. She was going to marry him and keep the child from me. I think you can see where that has put Emerald and me in a difficult position personally.”
“If you harm one hair on my sister’s head—”
“I won’t harm her. But whether or not I marry her remains to be seen. But I will have my child, Onyx, and I will not let anyone or anything interfere with it. Until the child is born, Emerald stays with me. I will not have another man claim my son or daughter. Do you understand me?”
There was silence on the other end of the phone. “If you were here, I would cut off the offending member myself. I hope that I’ve made myself clear.”
“You have. And I wouldn’t blame you for it.
In your position I would do the same. At least, I would if I had family.
I don’t. This child is the only family that I have.
The only one I will ever have. She tried to take that from me.
She knew that she was pregnant. She was going to allow Lucian to claim my child as his heir. ”
He knew Onyx enough to know that he was struggling with that. To know that he would find that as much of an affront as Andrei did. To know that he would not let that stand.
Whatever he said.
“You would claim your heir. Whatever the cost, you would claim your heir, and we both know that.”
“You’re a bastard who should never have gotten my sister pregnant in the first place.”
“What happened between she and I is our business, but I will not allow you to labor under any sort of delusion that she was taken advantage of. I would never have touched her.” That tasted like a lie.
Because as they had gotten closer to Alabria, he had been tested to his breaking point.
Emerald had pushed, and he had given in, but what would he have done if that hadn’t happened?
He couldn’t say for sure, not now, not given what had happened in her room at the palace in Alabria, that he would’ve kept his hands to himself.
“I don’t think that you would force yourself on her,” Onyx said finally.
“Of course I wouldn’t.”
“Are you in love with her?”
“Whatever I felt for Emerald is clouded at the moment.”
There was another long pause. “Where are you?”
“I cannot tell you that.”
“For God’s sake, Andrei, is there no trust between us?”
“No,” Andrei said. “I can trust no one and nothing. Where we are is none of your concern.”
He’d thought he could trust Emerald. He’d given her more of him than he had ever given to anyone. He’d sacrificed his honor at her altar to discover she’d betrayed him in a way he hadn’t even fathomed.
“I can have your phone traced.”
“You can’t, actually, because it is blocked, because I am the head of your security, and not even you will be able to get the permissions to do that.”
“Emerald is my world,” Onyx said. “You would keep my sister from me, even now? She is pregnant with your baby and if she wants you, and doesn’t want Lucian, then of course we can discuss this.”
“I cannot. I won’t.”
“You are dead to me,” Onyx said. “There is nothing complex about that.”
“Then you can forget that either Emerald or I exist.”
He hung the phone up and threw it down onto the floor, crushing it beneath the heel of his shoe.
He did not think that Onyx would be able to track it.
It was a completely blocked and protected phone.
But if he was able to somehow break that, and find a location for it, Andrei wasn’t going to assist him.
He buttoned up his black jacket and walked out of the bedroom, heading down to dinner.
His mood was black. And he almost felt sorry for Emerald that she had to deal with him. Except, she had created the situation.
He walked down the stairs, surprised at how much memory of this house was inside him.
He hadn’t realized. He didn’t think about his home in Romania, at least he hadn’t done so until he had needed it.
Until he had needed to call upon the strength and ruthlessness of his father to save them both, and he’d thought that she would be happy.
He’d thought he would be, but the baby made it a betrayal in a way it hadn’t been before.
And now… He knew it had been there all along.
He had suppressed it, for honor. For the sake of duty.
Because he felt that he owed Onyx fealty.
Now? He would owe no one but himself. It was a devil’s bargain, this.
Embracing the poison of the Ardelean blood.
Yes, it was a trap. And now that he had snared himself in it there was no going back. He had chosen this road. This path.
He walked into the dining room, and Emerald was already sitting there, dressed in green. He had specifically requested that they make as much of her clothing as possible green. He loved her and that color. At least he had. When he didn’t look at her and see half enemy half lover.
“Your brother called,” he said.
Her eyes went wide. “Is he…”
“Furious.”
“I want to call him.”
“Well, that will be difficult now, because I destroyed my phone. And so the two of us find ourselves here without a means of communication to the outside world.”
“You’re insane,” she said. “I’ve known you for all these years, and you have never… You have never behaved this way.”
“And you were going to pass my child off as belonging to another man. So, I suppose these are unprecedented times for us all.”
“I didn’t know what else to do,” she said.
“And what you did was the wrong thing,” he said.
“How nice of you to have such a clear view of it, as it affects you.”
“And what other view should I have?”
“I asked him if he’d set me free. He said no. And as far as I knew you were gone, so what else was I supposed to do, Andrei? Free myself? Run past a gauntlet of guards?”
Her words affected him, and he didn’t want them to. He wanted to stay in this space he’d gone to when he’d decided to capture her. This place that was filled with anger, justification for his actions. For his hurt.
“I’ve given up on duty. It’s done. I burned it all to the ground.
I made my choice. So you can sit there, in all your piety, and reflect on the good works that you would’ve done.
And what good works they would have been.
Pleasuring King Lucian, standing as his queen, bearing my child for him, and then more children for him besides.
And did it make you feel good? Because you might think that you need a sense of satisfaction for your honor to get off, Emerald, but you and I know differently.
You were well able to get off just with me.
Knowing that it contributed to nothing, no good, greater or otherwise except the explosive desire between us. ”
“You are the most difficult man.” Her face was red, her whole body rigid, vibrating with anger.
“And I can be more difficult, if it comes down to it. I would suggest that you don’t try me.”
“Do you think I’m going to make this easy for you?
You don’t get to take away my agency, my free will, my choices, and then have me simper at your feet.
Is that what you think? That because of all this long-standing history between us I’ll get on my knees and give you pleasure, thank you for rescuing me from my own choices? ”
“You would, if you had any real idea of what I saved you from.”
“Is that going to be what you use to make yourself feel better about all this? You’re going to pretend that he’s the monster everyone says he is.”
“I don’t care. He could be the best and kindest king in the history of the world—though we know he isn’t—but you don’t want him.
I know what it’s like to sleep with someone and to feel nothing but cold afterward.
To feel further away from yourself, and who you are, and from any other person than you ever have.
Because when you try to fill the deep, unending hole inside you that wears into you over time from unrequited need, all that you do is fill it with acidity and disappointment. Ask me how I know.”
“So you claim you’re saving me from a lifetime of bad sex?”
“You’ve only had good sex, Emerald. See, you don’t actually know what a gift I’ve given you.”
“Bastard.”
“No. My parents were married when I was born. My mother was forced into it by my father. I won’t force you into marriage. So our child very well could be a bastard. I would learn to keep my judgment to myself. Otherwise, look at what you’re calling your own child.”
“I don’t know that I want to have dinner with you,” she said, standing.
“Sit,” he said. “This is not your brother’s palace. It is mine.”