[Kingdom 01.0 - 03.0] Kingdom Series Collection

by Jovee Winters

  “I’ll ask him,” Betty sniffed, knowing he’d say no.

  The moment the front door opened, Gerard shot to his feet. He’d sat in her favorite arm chair in total dark thinking all day long, longing for her return. He was an ass, he’d ignored her for days, and not because he wanted to. But because being near her was a pain beyond any he’d ever known. She still didn’t love him, and that bothered him, not because it meant he’d die, but because it meant she didn’t feel for him what he did for her.

  If all he had was tonight, then he’d enjoy it.

  She stood in the door, and his greedy gaze devoured her luscious form. The tan pencil skirt hugged her slim hips, the white shirt outlined every beautiful, perfect curve of her body.

  “I’m sorry,” he whispered, and she stuttered.

  He frowned as her face scrunched up. Then she was sobbing, great heaving cries that gripped his soul. Betty ran to him, wrapped her arms around his neck and nuzzled him. She was warm, and smelled of vanilla, of flowers, and…

  “Cherie, I’m so, so sorry.” The words trembled from his soul.

  He let her cry, patting her back until her heaving wracks slowed down and her breathing became calm.

  “Me too,” she finally whispered.

  Gerard grabbed her fingers, kissing each one. “Non, me petite Cherie. I’m a huge ass and do not deserve your tears.”

  She hiccupped, hypnotic brown eyes holding his fast. “But, but… you’re still not free. I feel so much for you. I burn for you, ache for you, and you’re still not free.”

  He rubbed his knuckles along her velvet cheek. “This is enough.”

  She smiled, and he returned it, though his heart ached and shattered in his chest. Tonight was all they had left.

  “Trisha wants to go out for drinks,” Betty said, “I don’t want to stay out long, but maybe--”

  He kissed her lips, wanting to linger on them, savor them. But now was not that time. Tonight, when the world was all theirs, then he’d show her and tell her what she meant to him.

  “Yes, petite. Let’s go.”

  Three hours later, they were laughing. Country music lingered in the background as around them dancers swayed and groups talked. Betty nursed the same glass of white wine. His little featherweight. Her laugh was free of the cloud of pain, of the heartache sure to face them in the morning. Trisha’s date was an engaging sandy haired man who seemed wild about the waifish blond. But Gerard was having a hard time focusing. He chugged his fourth tankard of beer and sighed. He wanted to take his woman home, tell her finally how he really felt.

  “Let’s dance,” Trisha touched Bill… Bob’s… Harry’s?… (whatever his name was) arm. They left, leaving Gerard and Betty alone, finally.

  He knuckled her cheek, needing to touch her. She sighed, leaning into him. “You want to go home?” he asked.

  Funny how he now thought of that two bedroom place his, no longer could he see it as a prison. Wherever she was, he was home. Simple as that.

  She nodded, brown eyes growing liquid with an unnamed emotion that made his chest ache.

  Just as they stood to go say their good-bye’s to Trisha, a female shoved into Betty shoulder. At first Gerard thought her a drunkard wobbly on her feet. But when Betty’s eyes widened and she sucked in a hard breath, he tensed up.

  “Gretchen?” Betty’s voice was sharp. “What the hell do you want?”

  “You know your girl’s a whore, right?” The red headed woman with the most enormous pair of breasts he’d ever seen leaned around her shoulder to look at him. “She’s been sleeping with my fiancé.”

  He recognized the caustic shrill tone of that voice, and instantly his nails dug into the palm of his hands. If she wasn’t a woman, he’d punch her. He pushed Betty behind him. “You’re the, chienne, always calling. Stay the hell away from her.”

  Her blue eyes scrunched up. “The who what?” her country accent grated on his nerves, and he hated the woman, hated looking at her, hated having to share a space with her.

  “Do not call. Do not talk to her. Do not,” he shoved his face right up to hers, “even look at her. She is mine!”

  The woman’s jaw trembled, then a man came and slipped his arm around her shoulders.

  “What’s going on?” he growled, then his eyes widened. “Betty?”

  “James.” She stepped out from behind Gerard’s back and sneered. “Why don’t you warn your little dog away from me.”

  “Aww,” he grinned, and Gerard’s gut clenched as the blood rushed to his head in a red haze, “she don’t mean nuthin’ by it. Do you, G?” He chucked Gretchen’s jaw, and she grinned, popping a piece of gum, seeming more confident now that her man was in the picture.

  James looked at Gerard, his upper lip curled. “Who’s this?” he jerked his chin at him.

  Gerard closed his eyes, on the verge of pummeling the man. His anger so hot it oozed off him.

  “Screw you, James,” Betty grabbed Gerard’s hand. “Let’s go, baby.”

  His heart tripped at her endearment. She’d never called him anything other than Gerard, occasionally pig, or bastard. Never baby, never something so obviously loving.

  And he might have forgotten James and his slut, if James hadn’t grabbed Betty’s elbow, jerking her to a stop.

  “Hey, you can’t even talk to an old friend?” he snapped, and Gerard didn’t think.

  He slammed his fist into the bastard’s face. Hot blood oozed from the crunched nose, and James dropped to the ground with a shriek. “He punched me!” he squalled, sounding like a pathetic baby crying for its maman.

  A large man walked up to them, his arms crossed over his barrel chest, lips thin as he glared at Gerard.

  Betty stood in front of Gerard. “We’re leaving. No worries.” She yanked on Gerard’s hand and walked outside. The moment the cold blast of night hit him in the face, she shoved him against the wall and laughed, a deliriously joyous sound that shivered across his skin.

  “His face, did you see it?” Her brown eyes sparkled. She grabbed Gerard’s face and leaned in, planting a soft kiss on his lips. His legs grew weak and he tightened his hold on her waist, wanting to slip inside with his tongue, tasting and nipping at her delicious lower lip. Her breathing was a feather soft kiss on his lips. “I love you, Gerard Caron.”

  The moment she said it, the pendant blazed deepest amethyst, there was no red, no gold, it was solid purple. He peppered her brow with kisses, her lips.

  “Betty Hart,” he said.

  “One month’s up. You are mine, Gerard!” Galeta’s sharp voice exploded around them, then a blue hole tore through the air, and a phantom hand yanked on Gerard’s collar, stealing him back to Kingdom.

  “No! Gerard stay!” Betty cried.

  He reached for her. “Betty, I lo…” But he never finished the thought, and she never heard what he said, as he was sucked into the vacuum of space.

  He rolled head over feet, over and over, at a dizzying, alarming speed. Lights flashed by in a blur, and then his face smacked into something hard and all breath left him on impact. It took a moment for the stars to clear from his vision.

  “Stand, Gerard,” Galeta’s gruff voice pierced his throbbing head.

  “He cannot stand,” Danika’s gentle words, hovered above his head, “he’s in shock.” A gentle swell of fairy magic netted him in warmth, lifting the fog, the pain, and giving him the strength to stand.

  Danika’s smile was crooked and strained, but her eyes glistened with joy, and he knew he’d passed the test. But instead of joy, he felt only pain.

  He was in the fairy hall of justice. The checkered tile glistened alternating shades of onyx and mother of pearl. The head fairies sat behind an imposing polished bench of speckled marble, the room glowed a deep hued magenta, radiance that emanated from within the fairies themselves.

  Galeta cleared her throat. He looked up and she waved the still glowing pendant. “You have passed,” and the way she said it, she was none too happy about it. “Yo
u are free.” The moment the words left her lips, a rush of heat centered on his cock, and like a cork popping free of a bottle, he sprang to life. His cock became thick and painfully hard for his woman, his Betty.

  Galeta snarled. “Well go!” She jerked her head. “But know this, Caron, I’m watching.”

  He shook his head. “Non. You owe me a gift.”

  She curled her lip. “I owe you nothing.”

  “Non?” he lifted his brows, looking at the silver haired fairy to Galeta’s right, “should I tell them of your breach of magic then?”

  Nina the White jerked and looked at Galeta. The silver of her eyes turned a creamy spiraling white as she gazed through her third eye-- her spirit eye-- at Galeta. “Sister?”

  Esmeralda the Green’s voice mimicked her sister’s, her voice rang with the strain of bells. Green vines crawled from the tip of her green wand, inching slowly toward a visibly shaking Galeta. The thorns of justice would be all the fairies would need to convict Galeta of improper use of magic. But Gerard was no longer interested in revenge, all he wanted was his Betty, but he needed something first, and he wouldn’t leave here without it.

  “So?” he narrowed his eyes. “Have we a deal?”

  Danika gripped her wand, worrying her bottom lip, and jerking her gaze back and forth between him and the tribunal.

  Galeta’s thin lips compressed into a hard line. “What is it?” she asked between clenched teeth.

  “I want you to make me the mate.”

  Nina the White sucked in a sharp breath. “Think long and hard what you ask for, Gerard Caron. For once the soul is bound it can never be unbound.”

  He held his chin high. There were no doubts, she loved him, that’s all he wanted. “I know what I ask, fee. I want my soul, and my life forever bound to hers.”

  Esmeralda turned her black alien like eyes on him. “So mote it be.”

  The air shivered with the use of such powerful magic as the tiny fairy covered in vines glided down toward him. “Your heart is pure, Gerard, your wish is granted.”

  In an instant Danika grew to human height and threw her arms around Gerard’s waist. “I knew it, boyo. Knew she was the one. Did I not say?”

  Gerard’s grin was proud, grateful. “Oui, fee. You knew.” He hugged her back.

  She stepped back, her blue eyes twinkled with joy. Patting his cheek with a motherly fondness she said, “I must needs be off. I’ve a wolf to satisfy. But I wondered if you could give Betty a message for me.”

  Gerard tilted his head. “What?”

  Danika smiled, her form became vaporous as a glowing blue tunnel spun behind her. “Tell her to tell Trishelle I said hi, and I’ll be seeing her very soon.” And with those cryptic words, she vanished.

  Three months later and Betty still cried herself to sleep sometimes. She’d hoped and waited, expecting stupidly Gerard would return for her, would return to confess his love. She’d known, even as he’d slipped through the tunnel, that he’d meant to say those words back. Had seen them trembling on his tongue.

  She loved him. The pendant had glowed, he was free, which meant he’d left, just like Trisha said he would. Just like she’d known he would.

  She drank tea at her kitchen table, hating that she’d developed a taste for it, and using a red sharpie to circle yet another potential roommate in the paper. She couldn’t live alone anymore, come home to the unbearable silence of an empty house. He’d spoiled her in so many ways.

  She glanced at her half eaten plate of frozen waffles and sighed.

  Betty had an appointment in another ten minutes, a girl in college. They’d talked over the phone, and the references were good, at this point, she didn’t much care. She should get out of her robe, the girl was gonna arrive any second now.

  Pushing away from the table, she walked to her bedroom when the doorbell rang. “Dammit,” she looked down at her scrubby robe. She turned back. If it was a guy, she’d change, but she just didn’t feel like it now. She had a hot date with a Hagaan Daaz after the appointment, and he sure didn’t care.

  Betty opened the door and then screamed when Gerard’s smiling face looked back at her. She slammed the door, trying to close it on him, he shoved it open.

  “Cherie, hear me out.”

  “Screw you!” She stomped back to her room.

  He swung the door shut and ran after her. “Betty, wait.”

  “Why?” She stopped and turned, fists clenched tight by her sides, knowing if she didn’t… she’d clock him. All the anger, pain, humiliation, and angst bubbled to the surface at once and she was dizzy with it all. “I told you I loved you, and you bailed out on me. Now three months later…”

  “Three months?” He forked fingers through his hair and her heart flipped, why couldn’t he have at least been uglier than she remembered? His face was still as drool worthy as ever, the five o’clock shadow scruffy and framing a jaw seeming chiseled from granite. His blue eyes crinkled at the corners, then he groaned, slapping a hand over his face.

  He grabbed her hand, leading her to her room. Betty dug in her heels, trying to push his iron grip off her wrist. “If you think you’re gonna get lucky now, buddy--”

  He grinned, and the flip in her stomach was almost physical pain.

  “I will get lucky, Cherie. Very lucky.” He bit his lip, and she tried to smack him. He swatted her hand away as if she were no more than a pesky nuisance. “One day in Kingdom is one mortal month on Earth. We’ve very long days, petite.”

  They were in her room now. Gerard closed the door and locked it, the sound like the boom of gunshot in her ears, and she swallowed hard. Then his large hands were on her robe, slipping the sides down and she moaned.

  “You can’t just come in and out of my life like this and expect…”

  “Shhh.” He pressed his warm finger to her lips. “You talk too much, harpy.” Then his lips covered hers and with a tiny moan of desperation she returned it, pouring her hate and her need into it, tasting his lips, his tongue. Her tears mingled in their kiss.

  He pulled back, frowning. “Mon belle, mon belle,” he traced the line of tears falling free from her eyes.

  Her heart broke hearing him call her his beauty, all she’d wanted for three months was to hear his sultry French tenor whisper love in her ears, and now that he was here, it hurt so bad. Opened everything up, all the wounds that’d finally started to heal were once again fractured and cracked.

  “I brought these.” He lifted his hand, and she gave a quick sob. Her still glowing pendant chain dangled from his hand, along with another one. Similar, except the other pendant was in the shape of a square. Less feminine, but definitely a matching set. But where hers was purple, his was the familiar red and gold color of before.

  She grabbed her pendant, the hearts warmth almost seeming to pump in her grip like a real heart, warmth seeped into her palm. Betty looked at him. “I don’t understand.”

  The sultriness was gone from his eyes, truth-- unvarnished and raw-- stared back at her. “This is the mate. If I put this chain around my neck, and you do the same with yours,” he handed her the chain, “our souls will be bound. You will never age, you will never die, your mortality will be forever striped from you.”

  Her hands shook as she stared down at the pumping, beating heart.

  He covered her hands with his. “This is what took me so long to come back. Galeta didn’t want to. She procrastinated the entire time…”

  Her entire frame trembled. “Gerard?”

  He stopped talking, his eyes were large, and she sensed his nerves. She’d never seen him like this, so vulnerable. It made her want him more.

  “Are you talking marriage?”

  His jaw clenched. “I’m talking much more than that, Cherie.” He forked twin fingers through his hair, reminding her oddly of the man she’d seen that first day in the library. Disheveled, slightly devilish, and incredibly alluring. “I know what I ask might be overwhelming, frightening even. But I swear to you, my love, I’ve
never felt like this before. You’re it. And I’ll prove that to you if I must…”

  Betty shushed him with her finger, her eyes burning with unshed tears. “You talk too much.”

  He grinned, taking a nip at her finger. His bite shot warmth straight between her legs, heating her blood to a fevered frenzy. The anger melted into something full and impossible and so deep she knew she was drowning, but didn’t care.

  “May I?” he asked, easing the necklace from her hands and unclasping it.

  She grabbed his and did the same. “Yes.”

  They put the necklaces on each other, the moment the heart touched her chest it flared to life and burnt her skin. She hissed and Gerard trembled.

  “My life with yours…” he said, and then the red of his pendant flared crimson for the briefest moment before completely being overtaken by purple. Swirling veins of glittering sapphire skated through the lava like movement of color. “Forever.”

  The pain in her chest vanished, and when she looked at her pendant, it too glowed with ribbons of blue. He grabbed her face. “You’re mine. Forever.”

  She smiled, and was pretty sure she’d never be able to stop now that she’d started. “How old are you?”

  A devilish grin curled his lips. “Old. Ancient.” He leaned in so close she tasted the mint of his breath. “You’re stuck with me now, Cherie. So long as I live, you live.”

  But then she stopped thinking, because he scooped her up, walked to the bed and laid her down, his hard body sliding along hers. It took only seconds for him to bare her skin to his touch. His eyes burned hot on her body as he looked her up, then down.

  He licked his lips. “Hungry, Cherie. I’m starving.”

  Empowered, she thrust her chest up and sucked in her stomach, assuming-- what she hoped to be a sexy pose-- and beckoned him with a curled finger. “I’m waiting, Caron. And I hate waiting.”

  She laughed as he literally tore himself out of his clothes. His body was magnificent, lean and hard. But it was his manhood, the piece of him she’d seen soft for so long, standing hard and ready that made her mouth water.