My forearm brushes over Bianca’s shoulder, and our fresh markings gently touch.
“Don’t be scared, myszko,” I whisper into her ear.
The sun has started its long descent towards the horizon. The thick border of black trees that surround this cabin cast long shadows. The darkness crawls towards us.
“I’m not scared,” Bianca responds, and I believe her.
“Then why are you hesitating?”
“It… it just feels like overkill.”
Pressing my throbbing bulge into the small of her back, I position her arms with my hands.
“You can never practice enough,” I state, lining up the barrel of her gun with Luis’ rotting corpse. “Aim for his heart.”
“His head’s in the way,” she points out.
It’s true, the drug dealer’s neck is still cranked down from when I put a bullet between his eyes.
“Do you want me to tie his forehead to the tree, or do you want to blast through that thick skull yourself?”
Bianca’s slender fingers tighten around the handle of her gun.
“Blast through it.”
“That’s my girl.”
A quick kiss to the neck eases her nerves as she steadies her weapon.
“Ready?” she asks, the question clearly directed more towards herself than me.
“Whenever you are.”
Every new breath gets deeper. My grip around her wrists gets tighter.
Then, to my surprise, she pulls the trigger.
The recoil knocks her back into me, but her arms don’t drop. I keep my grip trained around her wrists as smoke rises from the barrel.
But Luis’ corpse is still completely intact.
“I missed,” Bianca mumbles.
“Try again.”
Pushing herself off my chest, she straightens her back and flexes her forearms.
“Head?”
“Head,” I nod.
Another round of deep breathing pulses through Bianca’s perfect body as she aims for the dead man’s skull.
“Three… Two… One…”
The crack of her gun cuts through the peaceful afternoon and the bark just above Luis’ hanging neck is obliterated by the speeding bullet.
“Shit!” Bianca curses.
“You’re getting closer.”
I’m about to retrain her wrists when Bianca suddenly pulls the trigger again.
This time, her bullet rips into Luis’ stomach, shredding through his tattered, bloody clothes.
“I hit him!”
Her excitement is addicting. My hands drop from her wrists and wrap around her waist.
“Think you can do it again?” I tease.
“Just watch me.”
Three more shots tear out of her muzzle in quick succession. The first hits the ground, upending the earth at Luis’ twisted foot, but the next two both hit the corpse. First, in the thigh. Then, in the bicep.
“This isn’t so hard,” Bianca huffs, her shoulders lifting and falling with every elevated breath.
“You still haven’t hit your target yet,” I gently remind her.
“What are you talking about? I just put three bullets in his body.”
“But none in his head. Wasn’t that what we were aiming for?”
Bianca’s shoulders twitch as she re-trains her gun.
“You’re right.”
I feel all of the fear and hesitation drain from her as she focuses on her new goal. But before I can watch her achieve it, I feel a familiar vibration come from my pocket.
“Keep shooting, myszko. I’ve got a call to make.” Reaching behind my back and under my belt, I pull out three fresh clips. “Do you think you can handle reloading that thing?”
“I’ll figure it out,” Bianca mumbles, without looking back. Her gaze is fixed squarely on her target.
Without saying another word, I place the clips at her feet and step away to take my call.
Pride swirls in my chest as I step around the nearest corner and press the phone to my ear.
“Yes,” I answer coldly, unsure of who I’ll be speaking to first.
“Are you sure this is a good idea?”
It’s just Roz. Static crackles behind her voice, but I can still hear the hidden anxiety in every word.
“No. But it needs to happen. The truth has been put into question. I need to see what Drago says when I tell him that I know about his lies.”
“He’ll probably just lie to you some more.”
“Maybe, or maybe he’ll try to salvage his relationship with me by letting the smallest bit of truth slip.”
“You know Drago better than that,” Roz warns.
“I thought I did.”
Roz’s sigh is clear even through the background static.
“I’ll patch you into him now. Tytus has made sure he’s expecting your call. I know I don’t have to say this, but I will any way. Drago doesn’t know that Tytus has chosen sides yet. He also doesn’t know that Tytus is in a van driving down a dirt road right now with two dark priests in his trunk. All he knows is that you and I have drawn a line in the sand. If he crosses it, there’s no saving him. Not from me.”
“Not from me either,” I grunt.
“Ready?”
“Do it.”
The line cuts out and even the static hiss disappears as I pace a few steps backwards.
Out the corner of my eye, I see Bianca. She’s back in those sweats, the ones that cover her entire perfect body. Yet she’s sexier than ever.
Maybe it’s the gun. Maybe it’s the determination.
Or maybe it’s the excitement that exudes off of her as one of her bullets rips through Luis’ hanging skull.
Her little fist pump nearly makes me explode with joy—until the static returns to the phone and a familiar voice breaks through any happiness I feel.
“Where are you?”
Drago’s voice barely sounds human. A devastating fury flickers through every word.
“That’s not important,” I bite back, turning away from my warrior princess.
“It’s not important?” Drago booms. “The priests are set to arrive any day now and I haven’t heard a single word from you since you failed your last mission.”
The fool. Roz was right. He really doesn’t know what’s going on.
“Maybe you shouldn’t have sent me back to the Byrne family. Not if you had ever wanted to see me again.”
“What? Did they recruit you?” he accuses.
“No. But they sure did torture me,” I growl. “Not that we weren’t expecting that.”
“I warned you,” Drago responds, unmoved. “What more do you want?”
“The truth.”
A moment of silence follows my declaration.
“I’ve always told you the truth, Gabryjel.”
“Bullshit,” I sneer. “You were foolish to send me anywhere near Ray Byrne. Unless, of course, you thought they’d kill me.”
“Why the fuck would I want that? Even if I hadn’t raised you like a son. Even if I hadn’t put food on your table and clothes on your back, you’d still be crucial to obtaining the power I’ve been chasing for decades.”
“Tell me one more lie and I hang up,” I spit.
“How dare you accuse me of telling lies, boy!”
A tsunami of rage crashes through me as I turn and punch the nearest cabin wall. The varnished log cracks and splinters against my fist. The entire structure seems to sway.
“Then why does it seem like you don’t want me alive anymore? Why the fuck does it seem like you want Bianca dead? First it was that fucking reckless ambush. Then you sent Kuba fucking Krol into my inner sanctum to take my fucking girl, and you nearly got Roz killed in the process. Who among us isn’t expendable to you, Drago? Clearly, it isn’t any of your ‘children’, is it?”
I can hear the dragon fuming on the other end of the line. He’s not used to being challenged so brazenly—at least, not without being able to rip the motherfucker’s throat out the moment they close their mouths.
“Plans change,” he finally admits, viscous hate lining every word.
“I’ve figured that out,” I snarl. “But tell me this: did you actually want Rian Kilpatrick, or did you just send me back to the Irishman to die?”
“Rian Kilpatrick is why the plan has been able to change,” Drago simmers. “Dead or not, the Byrne princess can be used to draw the Irish lion to me, without having to rely on the radical whims of my treacherous subordinates.”
“Why do you want the lion so badly?” I press, ignoring the jab.
“Why would I tell you?” Drago hisses. “It sounds like you’ve become my enemy, and you know all too well that you never reveal secrets to those who oppose you.”
“That’s what you think,” I shoot back. “But Ray Byrne thinks differently. And when he had me hung from his cellar ceiling with fucking barbed wire, he let all kinds of secrets out of the bag.”
Another wall of static lifts a veil between us, as Drago hesitates to respond again.
In the distance, I hear another round of gunfire roar through the dimming evening air.
Bianca has taught herself to reload her weapon. Good. We might be at war soon.
“What did Byrne tell you?” Drago finally asks, not sounding so confident anymore.
“Wouldn’t you like to know.”
“I would.”
“He told me so many things.”
A harsh wind creaks the thick trunks bordering this property.
“You’re bluffing.”
“Who is Sonia Caruso?” I growl in response.
This time, there’s no hesitation.
“Don’t you dare say that name with such vitriol!” Drago rages.
The rawness in his reply is so unexpected that I nearly stumble backwards. But I quickly recover.
“You don’t get to tell me how to talk about my own mother,” I growl, phone squeezing beneath my clenching fist.
I can practically hear the air being sucked out of Drago’s lungs.
That’s all it takes to confirm the truth. Ray Byrne wasn’t lying. Sonia Caruso was my mother.
An Italian.
Fuck.
Does that mean he was right about her as a person too?
“Whatever Ray Byrne told you, you don’t know the full story.”
“Enlighten me.”
“No.”
“Then there’s nothing else to say.”
I’m about to hang up when I hear Drago roar through the receiver.
“Wait!”
There’s an unfamiliar desperation in the dragon’s plea.
“Are you ready to be fucking honest with me?” I reply, mercilessly.
“Only if you’re ready to be honest with me, boy. What else did Ray Byrne tell you?”
“He told me my mom wasn’t a good person.”
“There are no good people in our world,” Drago grumbles, clearly gritting his teeth. “Your mother did whatever it took to survive.”
“But she didn’t survive,” I suddenly choke. “She tried to kill Bianca’s mother. That’s why Ray killed her. Not because she represented the last remnants of some crumbling empire. My mother wasn’t even Polish, was she? I’m a half-blood…”
“That’s still enough to wear the crown.”
“And that crown will be enough to crush you,” I grunt. “But only if it ever gets on my head. Who is my father, Drago? Tell me, or prepare for war.”
“I raised you. I am your father.”
“No, you’re not,” I respond, unphased. “You’re the man who’s used me. The man who was ready to throw me aside when another young prince came along. Don’t mistake my youth for stupidity, old man. You’ve tried to have me killed twice. No father does that. So, tell me. Who is my real father?”
“Gabryjel…”
“Coward,” I rumble. “At least tell me what you know about El Blanco.”
“El Blanco?” I can hear the shock in Drago’s voice. “Who the hell told you about El Blanco?”
“That name is courtesy of Ray Byrne too. You really should have had the guts to kill me yourself. Sending me back to him was the biggest mistake you could have made. That man isn’t the monster you’ve made him out to be. He—”
“He killed your mother!” Drago roars, so loudly that his voice distorts against the static.
“He did what he had to do,” I hear myself say, not quite believing it.
On the wind, I can hear a tiny cheer. Bianca has hit her target again.
I’d kill anyone who tried to hurt her. Anyone.
Women. Children. It doesn’t matter.
Ray killed my mother to protect the love of his life. I won’t ever forgive him for that. But I do finally understand it.
Because I’d do the same for Bianca.
“You’re losing yourself,” Drago warns me. But his warning falls on deaf ears.
“No,” I shake my head. “I’m finding myself.”
“Are you willing to risk losing everything your owed just because of what that man told you?”
But I’m done entertaining Drago’s lies.
“Tell me one truth before I hang up,” I offer, ignoring his question. “Here, I’ll even give you an easy one. Did you get me into Westwood High, or did Ray?”
“Why would Ray Byrne have tried to get you into Westwood?” Drago deflects.
“Because he fell for the façade I had created for myself. Because he thought I was the poor street orphan I pretended to be. Sure, if he had found out about me four years earlier, he would have been right. But you and I both know how I changed my fortunes around. You—”
“We changed your fortunes around,” Drago interrupts. “Or have you suddenly forgotten all of the support I gave you in those lean years?”
“Don’t think I don’t know about your own fortune,” I test him. “Don’t for a fucking second think I don’t understand how easy it would have been for you to actually pull me out of that squalor instead of forcing me to dredge through it for your own benefit.”
“I taught you to work for your money. To seize your power!”
“Well, you did a good job, because now, I’m going to take everything from you.”
My fingers are clenched so hard around the phone that it creaks and groans as I stare into the dark, swaying forest ahead.
“You will never get anything without me,” Drago hisses.
“Wrong. The priests are in my possession,” I reveal. “In a matter of days, I will be handed the keys to the empire that was stolen from me—that is, unless that’s a lie as well?”
The air swirling around me seems to pause as I drop the hammer on all of Drago’s plans.
“It’s not a lie,” he grits, clearly still coming to grips with what I just told him, but unwilling to show how much it’s effecting him. “Your mother may not have been of royal blood, but your father ruled.”
“And will you tell me my father’s name now, or will I have to ask the priests?”
“They won’t tell you.”
“The second I put a baby in Bianca, they will do whatever I say.”
“No. You still don’t understand, boy,” Drago spits, disdain flickering from his voice.
“Call me boy one more time,” I snap back.
“Watch yourself… boy.”
I’ve had enough.
Before I can crush the phone beneath my hand, I hang up.
I got what I wanted. Confirmation. With this marriage, I will inherit all that I was promised. For all of the lies, one thing seems to remain true.
An empire awaits me.
All I have to do is take it.
And that means marrying Bianca.
Then it means pinning her down. Fucking her raw. Filling up her tight little pussy with my seed.
It means making her the mother of my heir.
It means making her my queen.
It also means war.
