Defiant Prince
An Enemies-to-Lovers Romance
A.G. Henderson
Copyright Ⓒ 2021 by A.G. Henderson
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning, or otherwise without written permission from the publisher. It is illegal to copy this book, post it to a website, or distribute it by any other means without permission.
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
All persons in this story are 18 or older.
Cover art by Jacqueline Sweet
Created with Vellum
Contents
Blurb
1. Emily
2. Emily
3. Emily
4. Ambrose
5. Emily
6. Emily
7. Ambrose
8. Emily
9. Emily
10. Ambrose
11. Emily
12. Ambrose
13. Emily
14. Ambrose
15. Emily
16. Emily
17. Ambrose
18. Emily
19. Emily
20. Ambrose
21. Emily
22. Ambrose
23. Emily
24. Ambrose
25. Emily
26. Emily
27. Ambrose
28. Ambrose
29. Emily
30. Emily
31. Ambrose
32. Emily
33. Emily
34. Emily
35. Emily
36. Emily
37. Ambrose
38. Ambrose
39. Emily
40. Emily
41. Emily
42. Ambrose
Epilogue
Acknowledgments
Broken Throne
Also by A.G. Henderson
Connect with Me
Blurb
Ambrose LaCroix is Death.
Mysterious. Inevitable. Out to get me.
I hated him before I knew his name.
And trust me, the feeling was mutual.
I never wanted to see him again. Too bad fate had other plans.
An invitation to Black Rose University is priceless—a golden ticket.
It’s the key to everything I want.
I can’t turn it down just because of him.
He can take his ego, his secrets, his smolder, and shove them where the sun don’t shine.
Except this heat between us isn’t all hate, even if it is all the way distracting.
He wants a taste. I’m not afraid to give it to him.
He might rule this campus, but he doesn’t rule me.
I’m sugar mixed with spice.
Take a bite, LaCroix.
Cross me, and I’ll give you a cavity.
Defiant Prince is a 130k stand-alone, enemies-to-lovers college romance. HEA guaranteed. No cliffhangers. Each book in the series features a different couple and can be read in any order.
1
Emily
I had my first conversation with the devil over cupcakes.
“You’re doing it wrong,” I told the chocolate-haired boy sitting with his legs dangling over the edge of the pier.
He didn’t take the bite he’d opened his mouth for, but he didn’t acknowledge me either.
I tugged at the frills of the dress Mom made me wear, waiting for him to do...something. He had to know I was here. This pier was the oldest thing on the property; it creaked and groaned and shifted beneath every step, no matter how soft.
I knew that better than anyone because this was my spot. His butt was parked right where I usually sat when the yelling inside the expansive, white prison I called home got to be too much. The only difference was that his legs were longer, allowing the heels of his black boots to almost skim the edge of the water’s surface.
“There’s no wrong way to eat a cupcake,” he said finally, still not looking at me.
His voice was softer than I expected, a sharp contrast to the volumes I usually listened to. Mom and Dad always got louder and louder, especially when they were talking to each other. My twin brother, Erik, didn’t have an inside voice either.
By contrast, I found myself leaning towards the chocolate-haired boy when he spoke, compelled to listen. And that same, soft tone didn’t hide his annoyance.
Leave the rude kid alone, I told myself. Go back to Erik’s party and pretend to smile some more.
Except I couldn’t just...walk away.
He was in my spot. Eating my favorite dessert the wrong way. Taunting me with how good the yellow sponge-cake looked between his long fingers.
I glanced at the house behind me, hoping my absence hadn’t been noticed, and sat down beside him.
He didn’t stiffen up or so much as sigh, but I could tell he didn’t want me there. That was fine. I didn’t want him here either.
I’d come out here to be alone. To keep from making small talk with a hundred people I didn’t know and who didn’t care about me. To nurse my sorrow at being unable to sneak a cupcake before Mom hid the rest of them away from me.
But here he was.
“You’re wrong,” I told him, brushing strawberry-blonde hair off my cheeks when a warm breeze caught them. “There’s definitely a wrong way. More than one, actually.”
He didn’t ask me to explain.
I did so anyway.
Pointing to the cupcake, I said, “You were about to make the most common mistake. Taking a bite straight-on is a great way to get frosting up your nose. Since your nose doesn’t have taste buds, that’s a total waste.”
He picked invisible lint from his dark jeans. “Only children can’t eat without half the food ending up somewhere besides in their mouths.”
“Maybe,” I said. “Maybe not. There’s always a chance. The second mistake is to start eating it from the bottom or the top. You either end up with not enough frosting by the end or way too much at the beginning.”
His sigh sent a small thrill of victory through my veins.
“You’ve given this too much thought,” he said.
I really smiled for the first time that day. “Cupcakes are my favorite. It’s not possible for me to give them too much thought. Now...third mistake.”
A dark brow lifted above darker eyes. The sunlight bouncing off the placid surface of the lake made them glitter. I squinted at his profile, taking in the thin slice of his lips and the curve of his jaw.
His slight tan continued evenly up his arms, unbroken by the edge of his sleeves. I wondered what his summers usually looked like when they didn’t include lingering at the fringes of a party he didn’t want to attend.
A surfer, maybe? He had the lean muscle for it. Like he didn’t obsess over how much he benched the way Erik and his football buddies did.
Then I reminded myself I didn’t actually care what this quiet, soft-spoken boy did in his spare time. He was in my spot, about to commit a grave sin against cupcakes. How cute he might be if he wasn’t coming off a rude jerk didn’t matter.
“The cheerleader is mistake number three,” I said.
That got me a slight head tilt, one dark eye finally sweeping my direction.
“You gave this one a name?” He sounded slightly more interested.
By that, I meant I’d been elevated from listening to grass grow to watching paint dry.
“It needed one,” I said, letting my legs swing beside his. “This is my catch-all slot for the nibblers and the utensil users. And it’s usually the cheerleaders who eat a rodent sized bite and pretend they’ve had enough, or slice into it with a fork and knife, pinky fully extended.”
He held up the treat in his hand and I was tempted to snatch it.
“If you love these stupid things so much,” he said. “Where’s yours?”
My stomach clenched, longing and resentment coming together and spilling into my voice. “I’m on a diet.”
His brows drew together. My breath caught at his silent intensity while he looked me up and down. There wasn’t anything to it. He didn’t linger on my newly-emerging shape the way some of the guys at school did.
Quiet Boy slowly took me in like it was the most normal thing in the world.
So why did I suddenly care if the wind was making a mess of my hair?
If there were wrinkles in the dress I hadn’t wanted to wear?
If my tiara looked as obnoxious as it felt?
If he was put off by the heavy smattering of freckles across my nose and cheeks that I always thought made me look like I had chickenpox?
“Why?” His nose wrinkled. “You’re tiny enough as it is. Lose any more weight and you’ll blow away.”
Because a lady should always watch her figure.
I smoothed my hands over my dress. “Doesn’t matter. Are you gonna eat that cupcake the right way or keep staring at it like a weirdo?”
“And the right way is...”
“I’m glad you asked.”
I smiled again, another real one. That made twice in a single week. Look at me, breaking records.
“Here.” I pointed at the side. “You want to break it right in the middle. Then you can take the bottom half and put it on top. You get frosting every bite without making a mess. You’re welcome.”
His laugh was more a puff of air than an actual sound.
The flutter in my stomach didn’t know the difference.
“For such an expert,” he said, dark eyes focused on my face, “I’m surprised you missed something. What about the fourth mistake?”
I leaned back on my palms. “Which one is that?”
“The people who scrape the frosting off instead of eating it.”
He pulled a knife from his pocket and flicked it open. I chose not to think too hard about why the sight of a strange boy holding a knife didn’t bother me nearly as much as seeing him prepare to remove the frosting.
I sat up suddenly, catching his arm. His skin burned beneath my fingertips and his bicep flexed with obvious strength.
“Don’t you dare,” I said, clutching him tight enough for my barely-there nails to dig in. “I didn’t include those people for a reason. If you don’t like frosting, you’re not even human.”
He glanced at my hand on his arm.
I didn’t move it.
“That’s extreme,” he said.
“So is holding a sweet, innocent cupcake hostage.” I glanced at the knife. “Put it away and no one gets hurt.”
His cheek twitched, the closest he’d gotten to a smile this entire time. “Are you threatening me, little girl?”
I rolled my eyes and let him go because touching him was distracting. “Little girl? We’re like, the same sage.”
The knife disappeared back into a pocket and I breathed easier. Just because I couldn’t have that cupcake didn’t mean it shouldn’t find its way to a nice home. Said home would be in someone’s stomach, of course. But that was better than being wasted.
“Son!” boomed a man’s deep voice from somewhere behind us.
I turned.
Quiet Boy didn’t.
An older version of him stood on the shaded terrace, scowling so hard I could see it from here.
“We’re leaving,” the man said before turning on his heel and vanishing into the house.
Silence returned and it was nowhere near as peaceful as before.
The boy beside me didn’t move or speak, but he fumed.
I was reminded of the one tornado that ever came through town. The charged lull of stillness before the wind roared like the scream of an angry god. How the pictures of the path it tore showed nothing but scattered remains where trees and homes used to be.
That was how his fury felt brushing against my senses. Unsuspecting and bottomless. The scariest thing of all was that he took a deep breath and it was just...gone. As if I’d imagined it when I knew I hadn’t.
He moved like liquid as he surged to his feet. I found myself looking up at him, shocked into inaction by his sudden spring.
“You shouldn’t care so much,” he said, eyes nothing more than narrow slits. “People will use it against you.”
Before I could decide how I felt about his unsolicited advice, he extended the hand holding the cupcake.
I glanced at it, then him, heart smiling even if I kept it off my lips. He wasn’t cut from the same cloth as Erik after all—rude and entitled, like the world owed a debt it could never repay.
He said nothing else, so I reached out.
“Thank—”
He threw the cupcake over my shoulder and into the lake.
My eyes went wide as I watched it hit the surface with a plop and sink out of sight.
Fire burned in my veins, making my breath come hot and heavy. I stood and turned sharply on my heel, ready to lay into him for being an awful human being. Two things stopped me.
He’d walked away, putting an impressive amount of distance between us like our brief encounter was already forgotten.
And just as I readied myself to scream at his retreating back, Mom’s pinched face appeared on the terrace. Erik showed up at her side a second later, a cruel smirk on his lips.
My stomach dropped.
She looked frazzled and he looked smug. That was never a good combination. It always preceded bad news and strained apologies.
“See you never, cupcake girl,” said the first boy I ever hated.
I etched his casual swagger into my mind, determined to never forget or forgive his mindless cruelty or the lack of concern in his eyes when he basically spit on one of the few things in life that made me happy.
Then Mom’s heels hit the grass as she crossed towards me. A cold shiver worked its way down my spine, eclipsing the sun’s warmth. For her to risk getting dirt on her red-bottoms? Surely, the sky was falling and I didn’t know it yet.
She reached me about the same time Quiet Boy passed Erik. The two exchanged a look I couldn’t read before walking off together.
They knew each other? How?
I wanted to follow him.
If for no other reason than to find something I could smack him across the face with.
“Emily,” Mom breathed in the same nasally voice she’d had since talking herself into another nose job.
“What?” I snapped, although I barely paid attention once she started talking.
I couldn’t stop thinking of dark eyes and a face that didn’t know how to smile.
At least until she got to the big D-word.
Divorce.
“What?” It came out softer this time, smothered by the lead weight on my chest.
She ran through the rest so fast I could hardly comprehend it. The tears streaking her heavy mascara and choking her voice didn’t help. But I picked up on the important bits.
We were moving.
Erik and Dad weren’t coming.
And Mom bawled twice as hard as she explained how she would hardly have a penny to her name.
Their toxic relationship had finally reached critical mass, and the fallout would change the entire course of my life.
I knew it.
Same way I knew Quiet Boy was the devil.
After one meeting with him, everything had gone to hell in a handbasket.
I didn’t even have a name to curse when
we returned to the party like nothing was wrong. Like we wouldn’t be packing our bags later that same night.
Meanwhile, he was nowhere to be seen.
If only it had stayed that way.
Emily
Five years later
“How long has it been since you saw each other?” Danika punctuated her question by popping her gum obnoxiously loud.
A few people walking down the street turned to look at the two girls chilling in the alley beside the convenience store. It was like they’d never seen people killing time before.
I glared and took another drag of my joint, blowing smoke that direction.
They got the hint.
Danika sighed. “Girl, you have got to teach me that before you leave.”
“How to glare? You have eyes.”
“Not like yours.” She shook her head. “People don’t even take me seriously when I cuss. All you have to do is scowl and they run for their lives. That’s bad-bitch status right there.”
I didn’t know what to do with her praise—never did. So, I ignored it altogether.
I said, “People don’t take you seriously because you’re about as threatening as a chihuahua.”
It wasn’t an understatement.
Danika was five feet of dark chocolate skin, bouncy, brown hair, and sunny disposition. Goober was her go-to curse. She cried watching commercials about homeless animals and lived off the sappy romances she read on her phone.
Defiant Prince: An Enemies-to-Lovers Romance (Black Rose University Book 1) Page 1
