[Kingdom 01.0 - 03.0] Kingdom Series Collection

by Jovee Winters

  Alice snorted. “Oh yeah, cutting up my heels was his way of showing his undying devotion.”

  “Does he not show any warmth toward you? Any sort of spark?”

  Alice remembered his touch, his eyes… how they’d gazed at her, as if seeking to slip into her soul, and she shivered.

  Danika smiled. “Aye, you call to him. You are his Alice. I know it. Now we must convince him.”

  Alice crossed her ankles and shook her head. “What if I’m not ready? Huh? What if I don’t want to?” A part of her totally did, but another part, the rational side of her, was afraid. She had a life back home. She couldn’t be expected to stay here forever. Could he come back with her? Did she want him to?

  Danika alighted on the end of her bed. “He’s dying, dear.” The fairy’s words echoed with anguish so thick Alice’s throat tightened.

  “Dying?” she whispered.

  The fairy looked around the room with a sad smile, and as she did, the walls literally seemed to vanish into mist, revealing the outside beauty of nature surrounding his home. “He is Wonderland. This beautiful madness? It’s all a product of his deliriously wicked mind. It’s lovely chaos, and it’s consuming him. Surely you’ve noticed his preoccupation with riddles and gibberish?”

  Alice bit her bottom lip, rocking backward. Dying? The Hatter? The beautiful, sexy man who made her want to scream and throw herself on him? “You’re lying,” she hissed, her lungs heaving for oxygen as the images conjured made her want to weep.

  Alice might be upset with him, might even want to hurl sticky buns at his head every once in a while, but she couldn’t imagine a world in which he didn’t exist.

  “I wish that I were.” Danika’s lip quivered.

  Alice swallowed hard. “But how can I save him?”

  “Love.” Danika smiled. “True love. He must find his mate, his perfect match and equal. She is the only one who can pull him from the ever-increasing insanity of his mind.”

  The enormity of that burden was daunting. How could she do that? He didn’t even like her. “What if I’m not the one? What if you’re wrong again?”

  Even saying it hurt. Did she want to be? She’d never been so angry, or so aroused, by anyone else. For years Hatter had been her constant thought. What if he could never get past her looks? She couldn’t help who she was, and she’d never be content in a relationship if he wasn’t as wildly in love with her as she was with him. Especially if he only considered her a replacement for the one he’d really wanted.

  “You are. I know it,” Danika said, cutting into her thoughts.

  “Oh yeah, how? He thought he was in love before—you said that yourself.” She lifted a challenging brow. “He might still be in love with my great-grandmother.”

  Danika pressed her lips together. “Wonderland did not accept her, and Wonderland is not just a place in a book, Alice. Wonderland is an extension of the man himself. Wonderland will open like a flower to the sun, the land will roll, and the wind will hum when the true Alice is found.”

  Her heart sank like a rock. “Well there you go,” she muttered. “It hasn’t done that. Obviously, it’s not me.”

  Danika shook her finger. “Your time is not yet up. You’ve only just met; it takes longer than a mere night for true love to bloom.”

  Alice rolled her eyes. “Well, if that’s what you’re basing it off, it sure as hell takes longer than three days.”

  “Not so, dear. True soul mates know. They always do.”

  Alice couldn’t stop the nagging thought that she had known. Even at thirteen, she’d fallen in love. As much in love as a child could be. But he didn’t remember her. That much was clear, because he’d made no mention of that earlier meeting.

  In all her years, she’d never once heard her great-grandmother speak of the Hatter. Alice would have guessed the woman hadn’t even known of his existence. And yet she did, and when Alice had spoken of Hatter in her hospital room, her great-grandmother had been there. It’d been her great-grandmother who’d insisted her mother take Alice to an asylum. That spiteful wench! Alice ground her molars as fire burned in her gut.

  How could he ever see beyond that?

  It hurt thinking he didn’t remember her. Didn’t see her. She saw him—all of him. It’d taken years to excise Hatter from her heart.

  At twenty-four, she was okay with that and was ready to move on. To find real love and a real man. To get married and have kids.

  To live in the real world and not in the book.

  And now this evil little fairy came and told her, He needs you. He doesn’t know it yet, but he needs you, Alice, and she wanted to cry. Because a part of her had always needed him. Hatter was her white knight, he was the hero of her every fantasy. When she’d dated at home, she’d always sought some aspect of him with guys and had found every last one of them wanting, because in the end, they weren’t him.

  Only Hatter had those soulful eyes that made her melt, the full bottom lip that made her desperate for a taste. The shoulders, so strong, firm, offering reassurance when she’d fallen into total blackness. The Hatter she’d always pictured within the pages of her beloved book. Not the slapstick caricature of the cartoons, but a hero. A savior to a frightened little girl lying in a hospital bed.

  How she’d tenderly rubbed her fingers over pages with any mention of him, her small heart swelling with an impossible feeling of love, tenderness, and a yearning for something she hadn’t been able to comprehend then.

  In her way, she’d always loved Hatter. With a madness that had consumed her. A madness she wanted more than anything to embrace now.

  But she knew if she took this plunge, if she chose to believe it was true again, that this was real, she’d never be able to forget. Never be able to pretend again. She’d be ruined for anyone else. She licked dry lips, pulse beating so hard she felt the echo of it in her head. But wasn’t she ruined already? She’d never been able to date a man for longer than two months before she found excuses to dump him.

  The flood of emotions she’d bottled away for years burst forth. She loved him, and she could no longer pretend it wasn’t so.

  She sighed, body warm and alive and filled with a desperate need to go to him—the arrogant, brutish jerk who didn’t remember her. But she’d make him remember. No matter what. And in the process, she’d make him forget her great-grandmother. Alice was not her, and she’d make him see that.

  She flattened a hand on her nervous belly. Somewhere in this crazy house, he existed. “Three days to make him love me?” She glanced up and Danika nodded. “I want to break the curse.”

  Danika’s smile was radiant.

  “But I can’t stay, fairy. You have to understand. I can’t just bail out on my family. I have to go back. At least for a little while.”

  Danika inhaled. “If it is meant to be, it will all work out in the end, Alice. You just wait and see. Trust in this, in him, make him love you, make him see you, and it will work itself out.”

  A cold chill nipped at Alice’s nose. She shivered, startled to notice Danika beginning to turn amorphous. She hovered like a ghost surrounded by light.

  “Love him, Alice. Only love him,” the ephemeral ball of light whispered before disappearing in a sun-fire burst.

  Alice hugged her knees to her chest and started rocking, staring at the door as if she’d divine an answer from it.

  Three days.

  She stood up, and before she could second-guess her decision, she went to the door, turned the knob, and stepped out into the hall. Empty portraits stared back at her. Vines, not there before, crawled like green fingers through cracks, covering the wall in a living canvas. She walked; as she slid her hand along the wall, a trail of tiny purple flowers blossomed under her touch.

  It’d only been a short walk from the living room earlier, but now she found herself walking through a maze of twists and turns.

  “Hatter,” she called quietly, afraid to speak too loudly, afraid she’d lose her nerve.

 
“Alice.” That deep voice, like a fiery caress, made her gasp and turn.

  He leaned against a wall. The jacket he’d worn earlier was gone now. A white shirt, top three buttons undone, tapered to his body, outlining taut curves and giving her a tantalizing peek of tanned male flesh.

  She licked her lips. I am woman, hear me roar, became a thunderous backdrop to the wild beating of her frantic heart.

  “I… I wanted to…” She cleared her throat, realizing she was still staring at a sliver of his nude flesh. Her fingers clenched.

  He smiled with a wicked gleam in his eyes. He knew. She lifted her chin. So she found him attractive. She didn’t care if he knew. Three days, three days to stop being mousy, shy Alice. Three days.

  “I wanted to see you. I missed you.”

  He shoved off the wall and gave her a smile with no heat. “I’m assuming you’ve finished your cozy tête-à-tête with a certain fairy?” Disgust laced his words.

  “How did you…” Then the lightbulb came on, literally, a ball of silver light flashing above her head. Talk about weird. For a second she wondered where clichés had originated and if, perhaps, they’d come from a place like this. A place where words had power.

  Of course he’d know. She wasn’t his first. Alice buried her nails in her palms.

  A moon, heavy and round, materialized, flooding the hall—which now looked more like a garden than a hallway—with light. A gentle breeze, redolent with the sweet smell of fresh grass and rich earth, surrounded her.

  She looked around in awe. “What is this, Hatter?”

  He was silent so long she didn’t think he’d answer. “It’s me, Alice. It’s my magic, my moods. I create all this”—he tapped his head—“with just a thought.”

  She wanted to tell him she knew that, that she’d wanted to know what the place was and if it held any significant meaning to him, but words failed her. Suddenly she wasn’t standing before him in boy shorts and a cami but a frilly blue dress with thigh-high striped stockings and large, chunky heels.

  She planted hands on her hips, fighting a smile, and tapped her foot instead.

  He grinned. “Though I find I prefer you like this.”

  For a second, she thought she’d be naked. But she was once again wearing her boy shorts and cami. His look, his voice, it did something to her. Curls of heat spread between her legs, tightened her belly, made her nipples tight. He was so beautiful. Like a gothic devil with his shaggy dark hair and sensual lips that promised wicked delights..

  “Are you searching for me, Alice?” The teasing glint fled, and his voice went empty and hollow again. Almost like he didn’t want to have fun with her, didn’t want to be easygoing.

  She sighed. “I don’t know. Maybe.”

  His hard gaze was steady. Such a short distance between them—it would take nothing to close the gap.

  She’d had boyfriends in her life. Losers. Winners. None of them made her feel what she felt in that moment. Heat. Fire. Longing so profound she wondered if it were possible to die from it.

  She wondered how her great-grandmother had acted. Alice could only picture her as she was now—hunched over, an old, old woman well past her prime. How had her great-grandmother seduced him?

  Because she wanted to be just the opposite. Alice never wanted him to see her grandmother again.

  Be yourself. The echo of her mother’s gentle words flooded her mind.

  He stared at her, waiting for something. For some sign. A truth to pass between them, a kindred sharing. Some awareness of who he was.

  Alice remembered an elective she’d taken in high school. Who knew the meaningless English lit class would someday come to good use? Since he seemed to love Edgar Allan Poe so much, she’d start there.

  “The true genius shudders at incompleteness—”

  He closed his eyes and his breathing hiked. She took a timid step forward.

  “—and usually prefers silence to saying something…”

  He recited the last part with her. “Which is not everything it should be.”

  He stepped forward. The air shivered between them, a tremble, a kiss of wind at her temple. Her hand was on his cheek, the whisker-roughened skin tickling her fingers.

  Haunted eyes stared back at her.

  She pulled his face down until their lips nearly touched. “I’ve known you all my life.”

  He gripped her fingers, squeezing hard.

  “I discovered you when I was ten.” She looked deep into his eyes, peering into the mad soul, and poured out her truths. “I saw more than pages or a name in a book. I saw a brave man. A kind man. Even then I knew, even then I craved that which I could not name. And when I was thirteen…” She swallowed, wanting to share, wanting to see a flare of recognition in his eyes, a remembered memory.

  He looked at her, brows drawn, waiting for her to finish. She couldn’t, not yet. If he didn’t remember, if he hadn’t cherished it as she had, it would be a wound.

  She shook her head and smiled. “And when I was thirteen, I knew. I always knew, Hatter.”

  “Alice, don’t. Don’t say these things. They aren’t true.” Wine-tinged breath stroked her lips and she sighed. And though his words begged her to stop, his hands wrapped around her waist like a vise, defying her to step out of the circle of his arms.

  “I wish I was lying. I wish I didn’t feel this. Do you have any idea how hard it was to be in love with a man in a book?” She closed her eyes, aching as the memories flooded her. “It’s always been you, Hatter.”

  For a weird second, she was sure the grass beneath her feet trembled. She looked at him, his gaze riveted to her face, searching her like he was trying to peer into her soul.

  He shook. “Three days, Alice. Three days and you’ll be gone, just like your wicked great-grandmother. She also gave an oath of love.”

  “I. Am. Not. Her.” She shook her head. “Three days to prove to you that I”—she grabbed one of his hands and forced him to cup her cheek—“am real. Three days to make you see me. Not her. But me, little Alice Hu. Lover of all things Hatter.”

  He didn’t yank his hand away. “No, Alice.”

  He smelled of sweet smoke and wine. Such a delicious combination, it made her want to purr and curl her toes into the dewy grass.

  Alice stopped thinking, stopped wondering right from wrong. She wanted this. Always had. She laid her head against his chest. The muscle flexed beneath her cheek.

  How would she ever be able to leave?

  Chapter 8

  Alice slept. Her silky black hair trailed along the white pillow like cracks in the earth, and he ached to touch her. To kiss her gently awake. To watch her eyes grow soft and liquid with lust, with love.

  Hatter gripped the doorframe. Once he was certain she’d fallen asleep, he’d tiptoed back to her room and stood outside, watching. Hoping. Dreaming. Hating.

  Hating his existence. Hating her for coming. For looking so much like the other one. Hating her because he needed her so much, knowing she’d leave him like all the rest.

  Each Alice had been an adventure. Each wild, unpredictable incarnation had imprinted an indelible mark upon his soul. He remembered one who’d loved to fish out treasures from the sea and another who’d spun dresses from the cotton candy orchards. Some had sat three days locked away in their rooms, never venturing out, never trying to know him. He’d enjoyed some more than others and at the time had mourned their not staying.

  In the end they’d all left, ripping out a piece of his soul. For a time, he’d grown excited knowing another Alice would come, dreaming the next one would be different. But after several years, the constant parade had lost its appeal and he’d yearned for the moment they’d leave him to his solitude.

  She sighed and rolled over. Her outstretched arm pointed toward him. A wild sleeper, she’d moved from one corner of the bed to the other as if seeking something, even in sleep. Her fingers curled and her mouth tipped down.

  So damn beautiful.

  Skin the c
olor of wild spring honey with hair like shadow, hanging long and low, with the tiniest widow’s peak on her forehead. A short thing, this Alice, barely reaching the top of his chest. Petite, but full figured in a ripe, luscious way. Her hips flared out, and his heart pumped harder. She was the perfect size to hang on to while she rode him, passion gleaming from the depths of her big doe eyes.

  Heat pooled in his groin. It grew stiff, frustratingly so. But he did not touch himself. He’d stopped doing that a long time ago, when the other Alice Hu had left. After her, he’d sworn never again. Never again would he allow himself to care because to do so would weaken him.

  It’d been years since she’d left, and with time, he’d realized he’d not loved that Alice at all. He knew because he’d survived, but it was that knowledge that made him fear to love. Because though he’d not loved her, the weeks that had followed had been some of the worst in his life. Only Danika’s stubborn willfulness had brought him back from the fog of his mind.

  The episode had so frightened Danika that she’d stopped bringing him Alices for a while, and he’d reveled in the peace and quiet, thinking surely Danika finally understood there was no match for the Hatter.

  Hatter leaned against the door, his eyes drinking her in. His body trembled, remembering the rush of heat and fire that’d blanketed him when she’d touched him and forced him to touch her. This Alice was more dangerous than any of the others because not only did he not mind her presence, he sought it out like a man parched for a drink. She needed to leave. To forget him in the hopes that he could forget her. In the hopes that, someday, he’d not be plagued with night terrors, with the dreams of having a life he was never supposed to have.

  He was the Hatter, a lunatic, a madman. His life was nonsense and mayhem. Everyone within Kingdom said so. So had the other Alice Hu—she’d hurled the words at him like a blade, cutting him to the quick. He ground his jaw.