Chapter 42
YELENA
“And to think there was a time when I actually wanted you.”
My pulse feels heavy as it thuds its way through the zip-ties binding my wrists.
Lightning flashes in the distance, and I shiver when I feel the waves pick up a little, making the boat we're in rock more aggressively as I watch Kyle stumble across the lower deck.
“Coulda had you, too,” he slurs, taking a big swig from the whiskey bottle in his hand. “Basically did.” He grins lecherously, making my stomach heave.
“No, you didn’t.”
Months ago, I’d never have talked back to Kyle like this. I would just have sat here, being scared, and pathetic, and weak.
But I’m stronger now. I don’t scare so easily anymore.
“You never had me, you pathetic motherfucker,” I hiss. “You think slipping something into my drink and then trying to sexually assault me is having me?” I bark out a laugh. “How weak a little bitch of a man do you have to be to—”
My head snaps to the side as Kyle backhands me across the mouth. The taste of copper floods my tongue, and I wince, turning and spitting blood on the floor.
“Real men,” he snarls, “take what they want. We’re fucking conquerors.”
I bare my teeth at him and spit more blood on the floor. “You didn’t conquer shit, baby dick.”
Pure rage suffuses his face, and I brace myself for another hit. But he just glares at me as he takes another swig of whiskey.
“I could have you right now if I wanted.”
A chill ripples down my spine.
“But no fucking thank you,” Kyle spits. “Like fuck do I want Achilles’ sloppy seconds. You got a thing for Para Bellum presidents, hmm?”
No.
I have a thing for one Para Bellum president.
A big thing.
So big that it terrifies me and has had me hiding in my room for the past week. Not because I’m scared to see Achilles on campus. But because I’m scared of what that big thing I feel for him will do to me when I run into him.
I still want to hate him for all of it. But I just can’t. I’ve tried to look at it objectively, removing the rose-tinted glasses, ignoring the mind-blowing sex, and setting aside the way I feel just thinking about him.
But it’s impossible to disassemble your connection to a person and only choose the pieces you want to include when you put it back together.
I am still angry at him for the manipulation, and the stalking, and the wildly unfair advantage he had over me before our paths ever crossed.
But I just can’t hate someone I know in my heart I love.
“Let’s practice again,” Kyle mutters, holding up his phone. Mine is smashed and still in the bushes by the cliffside path I was jogging on when Kyle grabbed me and dragged me to the trunk of his car.
“When I call your daddy,” he growls, “you’re going to say what?”
I glare death at him. “Hi Dad, it’s me. I’m on Kyle’s shitty shrimp-dick-energy boat in Hawthorne Hollow harbor. He’s going to try and shake you down for—”
I’m fully expecting the hit. But I’m still not ready for just how bad it hurts when I get knocked sideways across the deck of the boat.
Kyle bends down, grabbing a handful of my hair and twisting my head painfully, forcing me to look into his leering face.
“Try that on the real call, cunt,” he snarls, “and I will have you, sloppy seconds or not. Daddy will listen to you scream as I make your ass bleed for me. Got it?”
I nod, all the fight flooding out of me.
Kyle stands, exhaling heavily.
"You know the funniest part?" He turns, swinging the bottle in a wide, sloppy arc.
"I had everything." His voice cracks slightly on the last word from all the booze he’s put down.
"The fund, the real estate deal, connections…” He shakes his head ruefully.
“And then your fucking father," he slurs, pointing the bottle at me, “decided he was too good for my family. "
He laughs bitterly.
"Do you have any idea—" He takes yet another sip from the bottle, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. "How many people I borrowed from to keep that fucking fund liquid while the deal was being structured? Do you know what kind of people they are?"
When I don't answer, he takes another drink.
"Bad people, Yelena," he mutters. “People who send their kids to Knightsblood. People who aren’t very patient when their investments go to shit!”
He drops onto the bench across from me, the boat lurching on another wave as the storm rumbles again, closer this time.
"Let’s try this again,” Kyle slurs, learning forward, his elbows on his knees.
“You're going to sit there and be quiet while I call your father. I’m betting that Daddy Dearest loves his daughter more than his pride.” He grins at me drunkenly.
“And I'm hoping that after he hears you’re alive, he wires the hundred million that I ask for to the account number I tell him.”
“And then?” I half whisper.
He shrugs. “That’s it. I disappear, and you go back to being Achilles’ whore if you want.” He grins and takes a drink. “Simple, elegant—”
“You forgot one thing.”
Kyle is so wasted that his reaction time is slowed. But when I hear that low, smooth baritone, my head immediately snaps to the side.
My pulse skips.
He came for me.
By the time Kyle realizes what’s happening and turns to look at Achilles standing in the doorway, it’s too late.
“You forgot what happens when you lay your hands on my girl.”
There’s no big showdown. Kyle is beyond drunk. And Achilles is, well, Achilles.
He slams into my abductor, grabbing his throat and lifting him up off the bench.
Kyle squeals as Achilles whirls and literally throws him into the galley kitchen.
Glassware and pots and pans go scattering as Kyle bangs into the little stove and refrigerator with a dull thud and then slumps to the ground.
“Yelena.”
Achilles is on me in a half a second, cutting the zip-ties binding my wrists with his knife. The second I'm free, my arms wrap tight around his neck as I choke out a cry before slamming my mouth to his.
Fuck. Yes.
Everything else falls away. The nightmare of the last few hours. The questions in my head.
None of it matters except this moment.
“Baby,” he chokes out, pulling away. His eyes search mine wildly, a look in them I’ve never seen before. “There’s so much I have to say to—”
“It doesn’t matter,” I say, tears filling my eyes as I cling to him and kiss him again and again. “I don’t care about any—”
“But I do,” he murmurs, cupping my face. “I told myself I was building you a fantasy, but instead I put you in a cage. And I will never forgive myself for that. For taking away your ability to choose--”
“But I forgive you,” I choke as I grab him and kiss him again. “And I’d choose you every time, choice or not.”
A pathetic whimper pulls our attention to Kyle as he tries but fails to pick himself up off the floor.
Sheer malevolence oozes across Achilles’ face. I shiver as he lets go of me, crosses the cabin, and grabs Kyle by the throat. Kyle gurgles and sobs as Achilles drags him over to me by the neck and dumps him at my feet.
My heart skips when I see the knife in Achilles’ hand as he holds it out, the hilt facing me.
The enormity of what he’s offering me hangs heavy in the air, igniting my skin.
He’s offering me vengeance.
I eye the knife uneasily, then Kyle, then the knife again.
My gaze slowly lifts to Achilles’.
“I…” My throat bobs. “I don’t know if I can.”
He nods, complete understanding on his face as he pulls me to him.
“Because you’re not a monster, baby,” he murmurs quietly as he kisses me softly. “But I can be one for you.”
He pulls back, and our eyes lock. I see the question lingering in his gaze.
Yes or no.
Thumb up or down, like a Roman emperor deciding a gladiator's fate.
…And I feel nothing when I nod my head.
Nor do I look away when Achilles turns and kneels astride a sobbing Kyle.
“You put your hands on her,” Achilles growls. “Terrorized and assaulted her.”
His lips curl viciously as he bends close to Kyle’s terrified face, twirling the knife in his hands.
“You hurt what’s mine.”
The knife blade presses to Kyle’s throat.
“I will never abide that.”
I don’t even blink as Achilles’ arm jerks, slicing the blade cleanly through Kyle’s jugular as a torrent of blood pours from the wound.
He’s dead even before Achilles carries me off the boat.
“Stay here a second, baby.”
Achilles steps back onto the boat and disappears into the main cabin. On the dock, my nose wrinkles when I sniff the air.
“What's that smell?” I ask when he re-appears a minute later.
Achilles just looks at me, wrapping one arm around me as he lifts a lighter with his free hand. He flicks it open, the flame dancing as he glances at Kyle’s boat.
“Gasoline.”
My eyes are riveted on the glowing flame as he holds the lighter out to me. Achilles doesn’t say anything. But he nods quietly when I gently take the zippo from his hand.
“I’m right here, baby,” he murmurs quietly.
I run my thumb over the smooth metal of the lighter before my gaze slides to the boat where the monster that my monster just vanquished lies dead.
With one flick of my wrist, the lighter lands on the deck. Instantly, the whole boat goes up in a roaring pillar of flame that takes my breath away.
I turn, looking into Achilles’ eyes as the fire roars beside us, casting dancing firelight and twisting dark shadows across our faces.
“There’s still so much I have to say,” he growls, cupping my face with a gentleness I don't think I’ve ever felt from him before. “But first, I have to tell you that I love you.”
“And I love—”
My words fade to a moan as he crushes his mouth to mine, kissing me fiercely as the fire roars, then sputters, and finally goes out as the boat sinks beneath the water, taking my vanquished demons with it.