by Ella Miles
I get dressed quickly, but she doesn’t. She knows I won’t let her out of this room again until Milo is dead.
When I’m finished dressing, I look at her almost reluctantly. I don’t know what to do. Tell her goodbye. That I’m going to fight Milo. That I don't care if she hates me for holding her here. She’s safe.
“Don’t worry, I’m not going anywhere. You kept your promise; I’ll be safe,” Kai says.
But there is something haunting behind her words. Some truth she isn’t speaking. She has her own secret. But then we always keep secrets from each other. It’s one reason we would never work in a real relationship.
And I feel it. The moment our time is up. I’m losing her. And I can’t keep holding onto her in this cage. She needs to be free. It’s time for me to slay the dragon to save the princess. But this isn’t a fairytale. Once, I defeat the dragon, I won’t be walking away with the princess.
And so I walk out without a goodbye or a promise. I walk away, hoping I can free her. And hoping her secret won’t destroy her. I walk away without a goodbye, even though I know it is one.
26
KAI
ENZO LEAVES me naked and alone.
He leaves without a proper goodbye. Although, after what he did to my body, it felt like a goodbye.
It felt like death.
Enzo left me to keep his promise to me—the promise that no man will ever hurt me.
But he doesn’t know I made my own secret promise. I would never let him risk his life to save mine.
I couldn’t let him die saving me.
Enzo won’t understand. He thinks after how royally he fucked up that it’s his responsibility to protect me.
But I’m the one who is in love with him. He doesn’t love me. He will get over my absence. He will be able to move on with his life—eventually.
But if Enzo were to die, I wouldn’t live. My love is too much. And his death would end us both.
So I did the only thing I could to ensure one of us survived. To ensure Enzo survives long enough to keep the Black empire thriving. To bear an heir. To continue the legacy.
I didn’t betray Enzo before, and I didn’t now. But to Enzo, what I did will feel like the biggest betrayal of all.
But waiting now is the worst part. Now I have to put my trust in other people to keep Enzo safe. I know they will because they want what I have to offer. And I will do anything to keep Enzo safe.
Slowly, I get up and get dressed, putting my bikini and shorts back on as time moves too slowly.
I pace around the room, not really taking any of it in.
This isn’t my room, it never was, and never will be. It’s just a cage Enzo created to keep me locked in.
I try to focus on anything else, the gentle rocking of the boat, the humming of the air conditioning, or the warmth of the sun through the window. But it’s useless.
All I can feel is him.
He’s everywhere.
Inside me.
Around me.
Engulfing me in everything he is. And I want to revel in every drop of him. Because the beauty encompassing Enzo squashes all of the darkness.
But that beautiful floating feeling changes quickly.
I can’t describe the feeling.
But my gut clenches.
My heart stops.
My world ends.
Something happened.
Something is wrong.
No!
I run to the door and to my surprise, the door opens. I assumed Enzo had locked it from the outside, but there is no need for him to lock it when he left a guard to watch over me—Zeke.
“What’s wrong?” he asks.
I hold my stomach, feeling something in the depths of my core. I’ve never felt this way before. It’s like a stirring of danger.
I glance at Liesel, who is leaning against the door in the hallway behind Zeke. Everyone Enzo left must have been ordered into the cabins behind the safety of the security system. I was to stay behind one more level of security in my bedroom.
The feeling is what Liesel described earlier—knowing that danger is coming.
“Danger. Enzo is in danger,” I say feeling it so intensely that I can practically feel the pain myself.
Zeke looks into me trying to understand how I could be feeling this. “You’re sure?”
“Yes.”
“Fuck!” he curses, letting me go, obviously torn between going to Enzo’s rescue and staying here and protecting me.
“We need to go,” I say.
“No, Enzo’s orders were clear. I keep you here where it’s safe.”
I smile softly, “Since when do we follow Enzo’s orders?”
Liesel frowns from behind Zeke. “You promised to protect Enzo. You swore to me.”
“This is me keeping that promise,” I say.
I look up at Zeke. “What do you say? Are we going to save the world or what? At least our little piece of it?”
“Not until you put something a little more protective on you,” he says.
I hide my smile as I run back into my room, throw on some jeans and a sweatshirt and return.
Zeke hands me a gun, which I take and tuck into my jeans like I’ve seen all the men do. My hair falls into my face as I do.
He pulls the scrunchie tying his own hair back and hands it to me. “Tie your hair back. I don’t want the reason you miss shooting Milo is because your hair was in your face.”
I raise an eyebrow as I smile and tie my hair back out of my face. “What about you?”
“I have perfect aim whether my hair is in my face or not. Let’s go,” he says.
Liesel stands in my way as we try to leave. “Don’t hurt him.”
“I won’t. I love him.”
“Then live long enough for him to learn to love you back,” Liesel says before walking away, letting Zeke and I go.
The pit in my stomach doesn’t leave; in fact, it intensifies as we get on the smaller boat and speed off into the night. I don’t know if I’m making the right move or just putting Enzo into greater danger. But I can’t just stay behind. I have to try, even if I die.
27
ENZO
I STAND on the stern of my boat, watching Milo’s yacht face my fleet. Rowan’s yacht is to my left. But this isn’t going to be a battle of yachts; this is a battle of men.
Rowan may pretend to be on my side, but I know he’s not. Langston confirmed the truth. Rowan has a vendetta against my father. He may not truly be on Milo’s side either, but the two enemies may form together to take down a worse enemy. And I’m that worse enemy. I’m the worst it gets.
Because I have nothing to lose. And I fight like death means nothing to me. And I’ll face my father’s crimes, even though I didn’t commit them.
They think I have something to lose—Kai.
But I can’t lose her, not when she’s locked away in the safest place possible.
And dying isn’t a curse; it’s a blessing. So I will fight as fearless as I always do.
“You ready to surrender?” I shout to Milo.
He laughs. “Are you? I think we have you outnumbered.”
“We? It looks like just you,” I say, putting my foot up on the railing like I’m going to a cruise instead of about to launch myself over the railing onto his yacht. I pretend I don’t already know the truth, that Rowan is on his side.
Milo’s eyes cut, and I know that’s his cue.
But I’m faster.
I shoot Rowan before he has a chance to make a move on me. I watch his lifeless body drop to the floor.
Seconds later, my men have Rowan’s entire crew surrendering.
“Now, as I was saying. Would you like to surrender?” I ask. “It seems you are a bit outnumbered.”
Milo frowns. “I don’t surrender to men who can’t keep their word.”
“I kept my word. Your quarrel was with Rowan. He’s dead now. Now you deal with me.”
Bullets fire, and we attack.
The rest goes by i
n a blur.
The orders I give.
The gunfire.
The screams of pain.
The bloodshed.
All of it moves so slowly and so quickly. Until all that I’m left with is me and Milo. Everything disappears into the background.
“You hurt her,” I say.
“I did. And I will again,” Milo answers.
“Over my dead body.”
“That’s the plan.”
Our guns are pointed in each other’s direction, but I feel her before I see her—Kai. What the hell is she doing here?
And then I hear the crack of the gun, and I know I’ve lost her.
“Kai!” I yell, begging for the bullet to miss. To not hit her. To go anywhere but her.
Zeke is standing next to her, I spot Langston holding is own wound on his side, but he will never make it to her in time. But Zeke can and does.
He dives in front of her and pushes her to the ground. The bullet hits him square in the heart.
I knew I loved Zeke, but not until this moment of watching him die, saving my woman did I realize how much. I thought my heart was a cage of metal and stone, only there to hold my monster inside, but it’s a heart all the same. A heart capable of breaking, shattering, and ripping in half. And that’s what I feel. All of it.
No amount of pain my body could experience is greater than losing someone I love. I learned that with my mother, but I thought it was because I was a kid. I was young, but now I know it wasn’t because I was a kid. It’s because this is what love does; it is everything when you have it and then takes everything away when it’s gone and leaves nothing but the dull pain behind.
I don’t have time to go through all the stages of grief in a single moment, but that’s what my body tries to do. I feel denial, reality, bargaining, pain, all of it. And I hate it.
Kai sobs over Zeke’s lifeless body.
She’s alive, and I made a vow to protect her—no matter what. No matter how she fucked up. It’s time to make good on that promise.
All of my anger, rage, and pain take over, and I charge at Milo. This won’t be won with guns. He made this personal, and I’m going to kill him with my bare hands.
My fist connects with his face, bloodying his nose, and making contact with his eyes.
He stumbles backward, but I don’t relent. I attack ruthlessly over and over. My fists flying, my legs kicking. He tries to fight back, but it’s clear he’s not used to fighting hand to hand with someone his own size. So instead, he moves to a defensive stance. His body blocking blow after blow. It will take longer for me to kill him this way, but I don’t care. I have time.
But the world is never on my side.
A storm is coming, and I don’t mean just my fists. The ship begins rocking at an unsafe level as rains pour down upon us.
This needs to end—now.
“This is for Zeke,” I scream, putting everything into my attack, my entire body drives into Milo’s. I don’t care about the consequences of my attack on myself; I just want this motherfucker dead.
My force is too much for either of us, as our bodies collide, we hit the railing that breaks, and then we fall down to the ocean depths.
Our bodies stay connected as we hit the water, and now we both rely on the other for survival. The only way we live is if we both live. If we both surface. But I’d rather us both die, than Milo live.
So I force our bodies lower under the water. Milo fights against my hold on his neck and body, keeping him down. But my hold is tighter. Our oxygen levels deplete more and more with every second that passes. It will happen soon. Death is coming, and it will be sweet.
I look up and see light. This is it—the end.
A light descends further upon us.
Wait, it doesn’t make sense. In death, I shouldn’t be headed for a light. I should be headed to the darkness of hell.
But that doesn’t stop the light from grabbing me. I let go of Milo and watch his body float down, away from me as the light takes me up.
I hit the surface of the water and take a deep breath, my lungs heaving for oxygen but not getting enough. I vomit up the salt water before I can finally take a breath.
“Thank fuck, you’re alive,” Kai cries, holding me to her.
She saved me.
I look behind me, but I don’t see Milo surface.
She kisses me hard as the rain pours down on us, and I know as much as I want to spend my life making out with her here, I can’t. It’s not safe.
“We have to go,” I say.
She nods, and we swim for the ladder on the yacht. When we reach the deck, Langston finds us, gripping his side where a bullet grazed him.
“The men have the yacht ready to go. We need to leave,” Langston says.
I nod. “Where is Zeke?” I ask. I need his body. I need to bury him properly.
“He’s gone. Went overboard in the storm,” Langston adds.
“Let’s go,” I say, even though I want to dive back into the ocean and pull Zeke’s body from the depths myself.
We all board the boat that will take us back to our yacht and stand on the edge, looking out into the dark ocean. The moon and stars twinkle overhead as we mourn a man we all loved.
Langston loved Zeke as a brother.
I loved Zeke as a friend.
And Kai loved Zeke as her protector.
“He deserved better than to be shot by a man like Milo,” I say, refusing to cry as I lean over the railing looking down into the water.
“He would have been honored to die protecting someone he loves,” Langston says, and a tear drips from each of our eyes.
“And he’ll rest in the sea he loved,” Kai finishes. She removes the scrunchie from her hair and places it on her wrist. A scrunchie I recognize as Zeke’s.
His hair wasn’t always long. He’d go through periods of it being long and short. But when it was long, he always carried a scrunchie for when his hair got in the way. We used to make fun of him, calling him a girl. Now I want him back just so I can tease his giant ass. I want him back so he can tease me back. So he can tell me how stupid I’m being. I want him by my side when we fight, when we drink, when we sail. But he won’t be, ever again.
Kai kisses the scrunchie. “We will miss you big guy. You have no idea how much you were loved.”
I meet her eyes; you have no idea how much you are loved, stingray.
28
ENZO
WE SAILED BACK TO MIAMI.
There is no reason to keep running on the ocean now that Milo is gone. All that is left is to keep my promise to Kai to set her free.
Kai has used her own room since we got back on the yacht. She hasn’t been in my bed since before I went after Milo. At first, I thought it was because we were all mourning Zeke’s death and needed our space, but then I realized the truth, she’s distancing herself from me to make the next step easier.
We made port in Miami yesterday. There is nothing keeping her here anymore, except the truth.
The truth could keep her here, trapped forever. But I realized something the second that Zeke died. I realized just how capable of love I am. And I love Kai Miller.
I love her more than I could ever love Zeke or Langston. The love is different. It’s all consuming, unhealthy in some ways, and like breathing air in other ways. My love for Kai is greater than anything I’ve ever felt before. It’s greater than the pain my father made me endure.
It’s greater than losing my mother.
It’s greater than losing Zeke.
Losing Kai would top everything I’ve ever felt. But I can’t keep her trapped here any longer. If I love her, she deserves to be free. She deserves the chance to choose her own life and future. I won’t take that from her any longer. Even to keep her safe. There are other ways to protect her.
I take out my phone and scroll to Kai’s contact. I change it until it reads, My Love. And then I text her.
* * *
ME: Meet me in the lounge.
<
br /> * * *
MY LOVE: Five minutes.
* * *
THOSE FIVE MINUTES are the longest of my life. Because I know what I’m about to do, and I don’t know what the outcome will be. But I have to do it; if I truly love Kai, I have to set her free.
She looks like a goddess in an all white bikini cover-up, her jet black hair cascading down her back in thick strands, and Zeke’s scrunchie on her wrist—I doubt she will ever take the scrunchie off.
“One last game of truth or lies?” I ask, pouring a couple of shots of the disgusting alcohol she poured us before.
“Last?” she asks, stepping into the room.
I nod.
“Okay,” she says, looking concerned as she takes the shot glass from me. This time we don’t make ourselves comfortable on the couch, there will be nothing comfortable about this. This will be the most uncomfortable, painful thing I’ve done.
“I promised to protect you forever, truth or lie?” I ask.
“Truth,” she says, not taking the shot, just holding it in her hands.
“And have I kept that promise?”
“Yes.”
“I promised to set you free when Milo is gone, truth or lie?”
“Truth.”
“Milo is dead, truth or lie?”
“Truth,” Kai says, swallowing hard.
I hold my shot up, as does she, and then we both drink it, because we both know what is coming next. The drink burns going down, but it doesn’t hurt as much as what will come next.
I won’t tell her I love her. It’s not fair to her if I do. If I tell her I love her, that might make her decision for her. And that’s not what freedom is about. Freedom is about giving a person a chance to choose, and that’s what I’m doing.
“You are free, truth or lie?” I ask, my voice breathy.
“Truth,” she breathes back.
I nod.
“Thank you,” she whispers.
Stay. I love you. Stay. We will figure out everything else. I will keep you safe. Just stay.
