CHAPTER TWENTY #3
I take a deep breath and blink my eyes to get rid of my tears.
I keep myself wrapped around the man, the first man I’ve told the truth to, and whisper, “My mom, she lives up in the mountains now. She had a… she had a stroke a couple of years back and everyone keeps saying it was an accident, but I think it was the pills. I don’t know what they are, but they aren’t good for her.
She’s more or less catatonic. She has care around the clock, but they all work for my father so even in this state, she isn’t free.
I go up there every summer to spend time with her, even though she never knows I’m there.
“We tell everyone that she’s out globe-trotting, but it’s a lie.
And I can never tell the truth because if I do, he’ll kill her.
I can never go against him or his wishes, or he’ll kill my mother.
Those men he forces me to go out with, I can never say no to that.
I can never say no when one day, he’ll ask me to marry one of them.
It’ll probably be for more land because that’s why my dad married my mom.
For more land. And maybe the man I marry will do the same thing to me that my dad did to my mom and I’ll never be able to tell the truth about that either.
Because if I did, he’d push me off the horse. And I’d die.”
After I’m done talking, I feel such relief that all I do is breathe.
It feels like the first free breath I’ve taken since I was ten.
Ever since my world fell apart around me and monsters came crawling out.
Real monsters. Who hurt people for money and power.
Like my dad. And it wasn’t until he came into my life, my Phantom, that I realized not all men are monsters.
Some men are good. Some men are gods, kings. And Radisson King is one of them.
I don’t know how much time has passed since I stopped talking, but it seems like a long time and when I come back to myself, I realize something.
I realize that his hold on me is stronger, much stronger, than mine on him.
And I was holding him with a death grip.
I also notice that he isn’t frozen like he was before, no.
He’s shaking. There’s a tremor running through him, and since his body is so large and muscular, thick arms, thick neck, bulging thighs and boulderlike torso, it feels like an earthquake.
It feels like the ground is shaking with him.
I tilt my face up to his ear and whisper, “Radisson?”
I hear a low growl.
And I push myself away from him to look up at his face.
My own must have blanched because I’ve never seen him look like this.
He looks darker somehow, and it’s not his Stetson casting a shadow or his skin being bronzed by the sun.
It’s something else. It’s him. It’s like the blood in his veins is rushing so fast and so close to the surface, painting the harsh lines of his face, his scar flushed.
Even his eyes that are staring into mine are pitch-black, and I thought I’d seen him go dark before.
But not like this, never like this. It’s like his fury is a living thing inside of him.
It has a heart and a thousand degrees of heat.
His fury is fire, and it’s ready to engulf the world in its flames.
I put my hand on his cheek. “What’s wrong? What—”
His arms around me squeeze me hard. “You know, I’m goin’ to end him. For this.”
His voice also sounds darker, lowest of the low and the roughest it’s ever been.
And he says it so slowly, pausing at every other word.
They settle into me, into my bones, heavily.
But I don’t let it slow me down as I shake my head and tell him, “You can’t.
Radisson, you promised your sister. You promised—”
His jaw pulses beneath my palm, his scar twitching and pulling tight. “Goin’ to destroy the very essence of him.”
“No,” I say urgently, trying to get his attention.
“You can’t. Listen, I have a plan. I think I found something.
” At this, he focuses on me finally and I breathe out a sigh of relief.
“I found reports. In Mars’s office, when I was looking through it.
They were bank statements. I think my dad’s involved in some sort of money-laundering thing.
I always knew my dad’s been into some illegal stuff, but I have evidence of it now.
And I know it sounds like my dad’s too powerful and he is.
I know he is. But I think if I’m smart and use it against him, I can get free.
I can get my mom free too.” Then I add even more urgently, “And I want you to know. That night, when I gave you that note and asked you to kill my dad, it was… It wasn’t because of how he is with me or my mom.
I’d never ask you to kill him for me. I did that for you.
Because I thought you needed it. But, Radisson, you can’t break your promise to your sister.
You can’t. It’ll only drive you guys further apart, and you can’t let that happen.
You need to get her back. You need to mend your differences, okay?
I can take care of myself. Maybe… maybe I can show them to my brother, too, those reports.
And he’ll help me like he’s helping you. ”
At least that’s what I’m hoping he’ll do.
And if not, then I’ll just figure out a way to use this evidence against my father anyway.
I’m not an idiot. I know it sounds like a flimsy plan in the face of such an influential man.
But for the first time ever, I have something solid in my hands, and maybe it’s time to grow up.
To grow out of my childhood fears and face the monster under my bed.
Although I realize belatedly that I shouldn’t have brought up my brother. I should’ve known better after what happened at the bar. But I was so busy trying to stop him, to convince him not to go after my father and damage his relationship with Lynnie even more, that it completely escaped me.
He hates the mention, even the thought, of someone else saving me.
“Your brother,” Radisson growls, his arms flexing around me, “isn’t goin’ to save you.
Because you’re mine to save. You’re mine to protect.
Mine to avenge. Mine to kill for; mine to wreak havoc for.
Mine to burn the world for; mine to declare war for.
You’re. Fuckin’. Mine. And my sister, like everyone else includin’ you, is gonna have to live with the fact that I snuffed the life out of a man who didn’t deserve to breathe in the first place, for scarin’ my Princess. ”