Modern Fairy Tale: Twelve Books of Breathtaking Romance

by Kristen Proby

  “Do you think Romano knows why the pharmacy pulled it and the side effects?” I ask Jase as I push my office door open.

  We acquired a banned drug, manipulated it, and just started selling S2L, street name Sweet Lullaby. It was designed to help with anxiety and insomnia. It can aid in weaning off an addiction to harder drugs. But S2L is the most addictive because of the way it calms you, assures you and your entire being that everything is just as it should be and lull you into a deep sleep. Thus, the name, Sweet Lullaby. The undesired side effects were too great to risk… for them. Not for us.

  “I think they know exactly what it is,” he says with a touch of anger, “seeing as how they fucked with the formula.” The door practically slams shut from the weight of his push. He doesn’t look me in the eyes until he’s seated in the chair opposite mine. It’s only when he says the next sentence that I finally fall into mine. “They made it more potent. It’s practically lethal with the way it numbs the senses, slowing the heart and forcing the body into a deep sleep.”

  My thumb brushes against my jawline as I consider what Romano is up to. “He stole our drug; he’s selling a version that’s deadly on his territory…” I think out loud, not bothering to hide my string of thoughts from Jase.

  Jase is the one who got a hold of the drug from an asshole who owed us a debt but had secrets within the industry. Malcolm was useful enough that we let him live. For a little while.

  “He’s selling on his territory. Sweet Lullaby but the lethal version is going by ST, Sweet Tragedy. He must not have enough, or else we wouldn’t see the increase in demand.”

  “The thing about demand is that those who are addicted are still living.”

  “Unless it’s being used on someone else.”

  “So, he’s selling it as a weapon? Not as a drug?” I have to admit the thought occurred to us as well, but until we have a preventative drug that renders the deadly version useless, I wouldn’t dare to even hint at the possibility.

  His fingers tap, tap, tap with a nervousness on the armrest. “The thing that doesn’t fit though… What doesn’t add up… is that there isn’t a rise in the death toll. There’s no sudden spike in murders or people dying in their sleep.”

  “They’re either buying and not using, or they’re selling it elsewhere. Maybe overseas?”

  “I think the Romanos aren’t keeping up with the production of S2L, they have a small demand, but word got out that we’re the suppliers. So, Romano decided to up the ante, make the potent version which got someone’s attention. Someone who wants control of the market. Whoever it is, he’s buying every drop he can of the potent version, and every bit of ours so he can make the change himself, concentrating it and making an untraceable weapon.”

  “How could Romano be so fucking stupid?” The words are pushed through my clenched teeth. We sold the drug as a relaxer, a way to ease pain and keep people from ODing on the deadlier shit. It’s the perfect way to make an addiction last. And Romano’s greed had to fuck it up.

  I’m silent as I consider Jase’s theory.

  “Whoever’s gathering it is on his side, not ours. Someone who wants his territory, maybe?” he suggests, and I can only nod in response. Whoever it is isn’t doing a good job of hiding their whereabouts and intentions. Unless of course, they wanted it to be known. My thumb brushes along my chin again as I consider every asshole I know who could want Romano’s place. Maybe they wanted us to know.

  “I want Mick’s crew on the south side, tracking the information of every buyer and to find a connection. I want to know who’s fucking with it and if they’re selling anywhere else.”

  “It’s expensive shit, this potent version. And whoever is buying in bulk has to be waiting to resell.”

  “Maybe they think Romano will lose the war, and they’ll come in to a territory with a built-in high demand, already supplied with the drug?”

  Jase nods at my prediction, clucking his tongue and still tapping his finger on the chair. “That’s not a problem for us,” he adds.

  “You think they’d stop at the Romanos?” I question him and like the intelligent fucker he is, he shakes his head, the small grin ticking up his lips. Jase loves a challenge. He lives to snuff out those who think they can threaten what we’ve worked so fucking hard to build.

  “So, we don’t tell Romano?” he asks me.

  “Not a word. He stole from us.” I look him dead in the eye as I come to the conclusion with my brother.

  “You still want to do the dinner next week?” he questions me.

  Romano thinks it’s a celebratory dinner.

  Talvery is weak. It’s almost a letdown at how easily everything is crumbling around him. There’s already a crack within his own factions, or so says the word on the street. Half his crew is taking bribes from Romano. I’m reluctant to let my guard down. Looks from the outside can be deceiving. I know that all too well.

  Nonetheless, Romano will come here to this celebratory dinner. And I’ll have the utmost enthusiasm as his host and partner in celebrating the fall of his longtime rival. Long enough to lure him in at least.

  “Yes.” I can’t stress my words enough as I stare at the box under the bookshelf on the right side of the room. “Next week he’ll be here, at our table, in our home.”

  “It’s not about the war or the drug though, is it?” Jase’s question brings my gaze back to him. “It’s about her?”

  His intuition freezes my blood. I have to remind myself that he’s my brother, that he would know because he’s been so close for so long. I have to remind myself that there isn’t a way another soul could even begin to guess the truth.

  “Yes,” I reply cautiously as our eyes lock and I wait for his reaction. Once again, I fall prey to the ticking of the clock as he carefully chooses his words. “She’s part of it.”

  “We could give her money and let her run,” he offers. And he assumes wrong.

  “She’ll run right back to her father, and you know it.”

  “Then let her,” Jase says and shrugs as if it’s no concern to us if she were to retreat back to her father.

  “And have the Romanos and everyone else think we’re so weak that we just let a girl walk away?”

  “Since when did you start caring what they think?” he asks me, still feigning that this conversation is a casual discussion that means nothing.

  “They need to think that I don’t care what they think. But how they see us matters more than anything. For us to control what they do, we have to know what they think. We have to be able to manipulate it for us to know what they’ll do next.”

  “You can say you grew tired of her.” Jase continues to make suggestions and this time it spikes my anger. I’ve grown tired of him pushing me to let her go, to eliminate her from the equation. She’s too valuable to me.

  “Never,” I answer in a single breath without thinking.

  “Never?” Jase asks questioningly, only now dropping his guard, his grip tightening on the leather armrest and letting an inkling of anger show.

  “I wanted her… before.”

  “Before Romano offered her?” Jase’s interest is piqued.

  I only nod in response, feeling the confession so close to coming to life.

  “Why?” he asks me, and I don’t answer him. I can’t. Instead, I offer him a small truth. “He didn’t offer her. I told him it would be her or no one,” I say softly, to ensure the words will vanish by the time he can hear them.

  “What are you going to do to her?” he asks me again. My brothers keep asking me that and it only pisses me off.

  “She has to fear me… for a while.” My thumb nervously runs along my bottom lip. “It won’t always be like this.”

  “You need to give me more,” he demands, and I quickly spit back, “I don’t need to give you shit.”

  A beat passes and the rage slips into my blood. The memories and everything I’ve worked for, everything we’ve become turns to hate and ruin.

  “This conve
rsation is over,” I tell him. He only smiles. A coy knowing smile, and nods. The tension evaporates and without another word, he leaves the office. Although I know he’s left with far more than he gave.

  As I watch him leave, the ticking of the clock won’t stop. Tick tock. Tick tock. Tick tock. My gaze moves from the box to the laptop with a black screen staring back at me.

  Deep breaths. In and out. Deep breaths bring me back to her.

  When I flick the monitors back to life, to see what my little songbird is doing, she’s already asleep.

  It’s been so long since these memories have haunted me, but they come back slowly as I turn off the lights in her cell.

  Memories that made me. Memories she’s a part of, even if she doesn’t know.

  The memory of the day I learned who Talvery was and what fear could really do to a person.

  There comes a point when it doesn’t matter what the last punch broke or how much blood you’ve lost. It’s a point where you can’t feel anything anymore.

  Your vision is blurry, and you know death is so close that you pray for it. It’s the only thing that will take it all away.

  Nothing makes sense. Even as my head snaps back and more warmth bubbles from my mouth, the pain is nothing. And knowing the end is near, it provides a comfort. The chains holding me to the chair fade away and I can hardly feel them digging into my skin.

  But even in all of that, she meant something. I knew it instantly. She had the strength to destroy the hope that it would all end soon.

  Her small fists banged on the door that was so close but so far away.

  Her voice called out and broke through the fog of reality.

  I couldn’t hear what she screamed, but it was something so urgent, her father put down the wrench. I remember the heavy metallic sound of it falling onto the floor mixing with her sweet feminine pleas for him to help her through the closed door.

  I was so close to everything being over, and she saved me. Even if she doesn’t remember it. She never even saw me.

  It took years before I let myself think of her again. And of that day.

  I almost had an out. I was so close to leaving this life a good soul. Maybe not pure, not perfect, but a better man than I am now and an innocent soul.

  She’s the reason I lived and turned into this.

  I don’t just want her at my mercy.

  I want everything she has.

  I’m not going to stop until I have her and her everything.

  Chapter Twelve

  Aria

  I think it’s been two days since Cross changed the rules. If I’m right, it’s been almost two weeks since I’ve been here. And two full days of not eating anything.

  I refuse to eat from his fingers like a dog. I’m not his pet. The way he looks at me like he’d wish for nothing more than for me to kneel between his legs and accept each morsel is riddled with both desire for me and desire for power over me. The combination is heady, and it plays tricks with my mind. I’m addicted to the hunger in his eyes but I’m afraid of what’s to come if I give in.

  I don’t want to submit and kneel in front of him. At least, that’s what I keep telling myself. Each ache I have reminds myself of this. As the loneliness stretches and the boredom makes me wonder if I’m going crazy, I have to remind myself. It’s always a reminder.

  The thoughts make my breathing heavy and my stomach rumble. The sickening part of all of this is that I’m looking forward to him opening the door. I want him to come in tonight like he did last night and the night before. With a silver platter of temptation.

  I’m starving and I know I have to give in. I know I will at some point. He’s right. I will eat. I’m already praying for him to open the door, even as I curse him and clench my hands into fists, swearing I’ll be strong enough to refuse him.

  He’s going to win. I can feel it.

  I’m praying for him to come, so I can have something to eat. Whatever he brings, if he were to come right now, I’d accept. No matter how much I wish it weren’t true. I would do anything to eat right now. To eat anything at all.

  My eyes lift from the ground to the door as it creaks open. I don’t lift my head and I stay on the dirty ground, stiff and unmoving.

  I can feel his eyes on me, but I can’t look at him. The only thing that holds my attention is the tray balanced in his right hand and held at his chest. I can’t see what’s on it yet, but I can smell it.

  My eyes close slowly and I nearly groan from the sugary scents that flood my lungs. When I finally open my eyes, cued by the sound of him moving the chair across the floor and closer to me, I see it all. I see the tasty treats that will be responsible for my pathetic undoing.

  The tray is full of the sweetest things. Berries and chunks of mango and fresh pineapple.

  It’s all brightly colored and arranged beautifully. Like I said, a silver platter of temptation.

  “How’s your hand?” Cross asks me and it’s only then that I even acknowledge him.

  “Fine.” My short answer is rewarded with him pulling the tray closer into his lap. “I think it’s bruised,” I offer him in an attempt to give him what he wants.

  “You were banging your fist on that door for over forty minutes.” My teeth grit at his response.

  “Well, you heard me at least,” I say, although I can’t deny that it hurts. I’m so fucking alone. And tired and sore and aching with pains. But so alone more than anything else.

  “I did,” is all he says.

  There’s a routine that comes with Carter Cross. He likes things to be done a certain way, maybe so that it can appear that he’s predictable but I’d much sooner think it’s so he can force my own behavior to be predictable for him.

  In these sessions, the ones where food is offered, he attempts the semblance of a conversation before offering food. And today, I know I’ll talk back. I know I’ll do what he wants. I’m that desperate.

  “You’re dirty,” he tells me with what seems like sincere sympathy. “You don’t wash yourself like I’d hoped you would.”

  I bite my tongue at the perverted comments, but I can’t hold it all in. “I’m not a dog to be bathed.” I can’t hide the anger. I should fake my tone like he does, but I choose not to. He’ll feed me regardless. I hope. He only smiles at me in response and it nearly makes me back away from him. Not because of the way he’s looking at me, but because of how my body reacts to the smile. How he seems to enjoy it when I don’t hold back. It’s dangerous. He’s dangerous.

  “You’re tired.”

  “It’s difficult to sleep on the floor.” Even as I answer him, I can feel how heavy the bags are under my eyes.

  “There’s a mattress at least,” he quips, and those piercing eyes stare deeper into me like he can see through the wall of defense. Just the way he looks at me makes me question everything.

  Time evades me as I stare back at him, feeling those same walls crumble deep inside of me. I try to suppress the hate I have for him in this moment, just so I can get this over with and eat.

  “You look weak, songbird.”

  “You keep calling me that,” I bite back.

  “I’ve never called you weak,” he says, and his answer is just as stern as mine.

  “I meant ‘songbird.’ You keep calling me songbird.” My voice cracks. I don’t want him to call me anything. Not my name, not a sweet nickname. It doesn’t reflect how he truly sees me. It’s meant to weaken me, make me soften. “Stop calling me that.”

  “No,” he says in a hardened voice. “Now come here, songbird Come kneel in front of me and let me feed you.”

  This is the second part of his routine and the one where I’ve told him to go fuck himself over and over again. But today, I slowly move my body and get on my hands and knees. I swallow my pride and it hurts. It physically hurts. I didn’t know pride was a spiked ball until I move one knee in front of the other. My body is hot with embarrassment and shame as I stop at his feet.

  I can’t open my eyes unti
l his rough hand brushes against my jaw. I wish I didn’t feel the need to lean into him. Loneliness consumes me every day. If I could pause this moment and pretend I’m somewhere else, with someone else, I’d lean into his strong touch. I’d allow myself to enjoy his warmth and comfort.

  But as it is, I’m staring into the dark eyes of a man who’s held me like this before. And then so quickly shown how easily he could hurt me.

  Swallowing thickly, I wait for the third part. Only seconds until he tells me to open my mouth.

  As if reading my mind, Cross lets his thumb brush along the seam of my lips. It’s a gentle caress that ignites something primitive in me, heating my core and making my heart beat furiously inside my chest. My knees inch forward, obeying the command from my body to move closer to him.

  Closer to the man who controls my freedom. Closer to the gentle touch.

  “Open,” he commands me, and I feel my lips part of their own accord.

  My eyes stay closed until his hand moves away, and his warmth is replaced with the chill of the air in the cell.

  My heart flickers with fear until I watch him pick up a chunk of strawberry and lift it to my lips. I’d be ashamed at how greedily I eat the small piece of fruit if only consuming it didn’t make me feel as though I’m starved. The sweetness falls into a pit of hollow hunger pains. And again, my body moves closer to him.

  He doesn’t say anything or hint at anything other than his desire to keep feeding me. And I accept every piece with a hunger that only seems to intensify. My hands find their way to his knees, gripping him as I swallow the next piece he’s offering me.

  It takes me far too long to realize I’m touching him. His groan of approval is what cues my awareness, but as I try to pull away, he does the same to the fruit in his grasp.

  “Stay.” He gives me the simple command, and so I do. I cling to him for more.