by Eve Newton
“Please, baby, I’m sorry. I’m sorry,” he pleads with me.
“What are you sorry for? You aren’t the one who raked me,” I say absently.
“I’m sorry for treating you harshly before,” he says. “I’m sorry for putting you in harm’s way. You shouldn’t have jumped in front of me like that.” He leans his forehead against the shower door, and I turn the taps off. He steps back as I open it and he hands me a towel.
“Cole…” I start but heave a deep sigh instead. “This is all so fucked up,” I mutter to myself.
“He won’t stop until he has you,” Cole says quietly. “I see it now. You are going to be in the middle of this until one of us lets you go. I won’t have you hurt like that again.” His sad blue eyes change color as they meet mine. “I will let you go,” he whispers.
“NO!” I shout at him. “NO!” I step towards him, but he puts his hands up to stop me.
“Liv. I’m letting you go. We can still be together, like you and Devon are. But we can’t be married anymore. He doesn’t want it and it’s too hard and too painful.”
“Cole, no. I am not letting you do this. I want you. I want to be with you. I want to be married to you, to be your wife. Please stop this,” I beg him, and he lets me take his hands. “I need you. Please don’t leave me.”
He closes his eyes. “Liv, I won’t let you get hurt like that again. It made me sick to my stomach to see what he did to you. What he did because you were defending me.”
“He won’t do it again. He really sees now that I am in love with you and that I will protect you from anything, even from him.”
He opens his eyes at my words. “I don’t want to let you go.”
“Then don’t. Please, Cole. I want to be with you. You have given me an out, but I choose to stay. I choose to be with you. Please stay with me.”
He leans down and kisses me, cupping my face with his hands. “I love you. I’m sorry for what he did to you.”
“Hey, you don’t need to apologize for his actions. I love you, Cole. Will you stay with me?”
“He loves you,” he says.
I wait in silence.
“He loves you,” he says again. “But I love you. I won’t let you go. I take it back,” he says with a small smile.
“Good. Or I would have had to kick your arse to make you see sense.” I pause and my face goes serious. “I know it’s hard and painful and for that I’m sorry.”
He sighs. “I wish it was different, but I know this is how it has to be. If I want to be with you, I have to share you with him. I hate it. But I know he will never let you go. He will just have to wait,” he says with that half-smile I love. “But you had better tell him it’ll be a fucking long wait as I plan on never leaving you. Ever.”
“I’ll be sure to pass the message along,” I say, and he kisses me deeply.
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED FIFTY-FIVE
He leaves me while I get dressed. I hear a hushed yet firm conversation coming from the sitting room. I use my advanced listening capabilities to eavesdrop from the bedroom.
“I know that she loves you and I accept it, but she is my wife and you will respect that,” Cole says to Constantine.
I can see he is at his usual pensive spot by the fireplace as I peek through the crack in the door.
My sire just glares at him, so Cole continues. He pulls my ring out from his back pocket and holds it up. “She wants it back, so give it to her. I won’t. I don’t want anything to do with it. I told her I would let her go,” he pauses as CK’s eyes flick to his, wide and expectant. “I told her I would walk away so that you could have her. She chose to stay with me. She is mine and she will always choose me. But know this, I will never give her an out again, not ever, so you may have your fantasy, pretend that she will be yours one day, play house together, but I am not going anywhere.”
Constantine’s face is like granite as he hears Cole’s final words and he grabs my ring from him. Without a word, he stalks to the door and pockets it. My ring. He is walking away with my ring. I step into the sitting room as he slams the suite door closed behind him and look at Cole.
“Go,” he says. “I’m sure he has something he wants to say to you.”
I beat a hasty retreat and catch up with my sire waiting impatiently for the elevators. It makes me smile to see him stabbing at the button, trying to make it come quicker. It must be difficult for him to not be able to Teleport. I stand beside him and he ignores me. We stand like that, in silence, until the elevator arrives with a ding and the doors open, thankfully, to an empty space. We both step forward at the same time to enter and he pushes the button for the ground floor.
“What do you want, Liv?” he asks me as I just stand there looking at him. I flinch at his use of Liv.
“An apology would be a nice start, Constantine,” I say, and he glares at me briefly before turning away again.
“I have nothing to apologize for. It was your own misguided actions that got you hurt,” he says coldly.
Ouch. Not the reaction I was looking for.
The doors ding open a few floors down and a couple are waiting to step on. We both glare at them and they back away mumbling that they will get the next one.
We start to descend again and I pull the emergency stop button. The elevator grinds to a halt.
“What are you doing?” he asks me.
“No more interruptions,” I say briskly and lean back against the handrail. “I am not expecting an apology for you shredding me to ribbons. I expect an apology for the fact that you were going to do it to Cole.”
He flinches at my words. “It was a long time coming,” he says. “I have let him get away with too much disrespect because of who he is.”
I raise my eyebrow at him and his pompous attitude. “Try it again and I will beat you down,” I say mildly.
He finally looks at me. “Yes, my Queen,” he says sarcastically.
I ignore his tone and say, “Give me back my ring.”
He cocks his head at me. “I don’t have it. Ask your husband for it if you want it back.”
Liar. “I know you have it. Give it to me.”
“Why?” he asks.
“It’s mine. You gave it to me, and I want it back. I could just take it, but I want you to give it to me,” I say boldly.
“Hm, it is a remarkable piece of jewelry. I can see why you would want it back,” he says, just this side of insulting.
“I want it back because of what it means to me. Not because of what it looks like. You could have given me a cheap, plastic gumball machine ring and I would still want it,” I say huffily.
“Noted. However, I gave you a very expensive, very rare blue diamond that I know takes your breath away. I see it in your eyes when you look at it. When you think no one is watching. I am fairly certain that what it looks like has something to do with your wanting it back so badly.” He pauses as I gape at him. Does he think I am that shallow? “After all, it isn’t like you want it back because you want us to be together,” he sneers at me.
“What? Of course, I do,” I say to him, surprised he would think that.
He moves quickly to stand in front of me, the anger on his face clearly showing. “Then why didn’t you leave him? He gave you an out and you stayed.”
“Because I love him. I am in love with him. You know this,” I say softly. “I told you I want to be with him, that I want to stay married to him. I asked you to wait, to wait until he leaves me. You know that he will eventually,” I add, even softer.
“He said that he told you he would let you go, so that we could be together. Did he not?”
“He did. But I’m not ready to let him go.”
The pain that flashes across his face hurts me and I start to say something, anything to him to ease the pain but he swoops down on me, kissing me with such force, he bangs my head back against the mirrored elevator walls. His hand goes to my throat to hold me in place as he pushes himself closer to me. He lifts my leg around his waist a
nd fumbles to free himself. He impales me, pinning me to the wall as he rams inside me. He lets go of my throat and pushes my left hand up. He shoves my ring onto my ring finger above my wedding rings and crushes my hand in his too-strong grip. I open my mouth to protest but he silences me with a kiss that leaves me breathless and throbbing around him as he comes inside me and let’s go of my hand. Staring into my wide eyes, he pulls off the ring I gave him and places it roughly onto his left ring finger. “I am done waiting,” he says as he pulls out of me and adjusts his clothing. “Consider this me throwing my hat into the ring.”
He slams the emergency stop button and the doors ding open and off he stalks, leaving me staring open-mouthed after him in my just-fucked state.
Fuck! I think as I stumble back when a group of people enter the elevator. Fuck! What have I done? I stare down at my left hand. All three of my promise rings crammed onto the one finger. Fuck! I quickly take off the blue diamond and put it firmly back where it belongs, on my right ring finger. I am still in shock as the group gets off a few floors up and I push the button for the top floor. In my zombie state, I get off and push the door to the suite open. My eyes find Cole’s and his face drops as he sees mine. “What? What did he do?”
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED FIFTY-SIX
“T hrew his hat in the ring,” I say slowly.
Cole closes his eyes as he drops his head into his hands. “Fuck!” he says.
Yep, that is the only word to describe this disaster.
“Oh, fuck, Liv! What am I going to do?” he asks desperately.
“Nothing, my love. Nothing will change. I promise you.” I try to reassure him.
“But he is going to fight for you now. He barely has to try to get you and now he is going to fight. I won’t win, Liv. He will push me out the second he gets you to be his wife.”
“He won’t. Just because he is going to fight for me doesn’t mean anything. I love you. I want to be with you. We will deal with this. Please, baby. Trust me, okay?”
And what does this mean exactly, I wonder, as I console my husband. Fight for me? What exactly is he going to do? It’s hardly like he can ask for pistols at dawn like back in the old days.
We sit in silence for a long time but then I stand up to get showered and changed.
My phone goes off and it’s Devon. “Ready to go? It’s nearly dark out.”
“Yes, is everything organized?”
“Yep.”
“How is she?”
“Hungry and moody,” he complains.
“Did you let her feed from you yet?”
“No,” he says shortly.
“Dev, sweetie. Don’t keep refusing her. Your punishment this early on will be destructive.” We have enough to deal with without her going rogue.
“Humph, we’ll see. Just come down now.” And he hangs up. Great. Give him a bit of sire responsibility and he starts acting like an arse.
“Come. We had better make tracks.” I take Cole’s hand and we Astral downstairs.
“I’m glad we are going home. To our home. Even if it is only for a couple of days,” he says.
“Me too. I miss our bed,” I say, and he chuckles.
“Me too.”
Everyone except CK, is assembled downstairs in Devon’s suite. Cade has Jess under his twirling sphere, and I look questioningly at him. “She’s a firecracker, this one. Christ. Exert some authority over her will you. She keeps stalking us.” ‘Us’ being him and Nico, I presume. I grip her arm and he lets the sphere go.
“Stay away from them,” I hiss at her and she quakes.
“Sorry, I’m trying. I really am. I need to get out.” She flexes her shoulders and I grudgingly understand.
“I know. We are leaving now. We are going back to L.A. for a couple of days before we go to Canada. I will drive you to the airport in the Veyron. You can have a bit of fresh air before we get on the jet.”
She smiles gratefully at me. I smile weakly back at her. I let her go and glare at Devon until he comes to take control of her. He holds her arm lightly and barely looks at her, but she is gazing adoringly at him. I want to throw up. Again, it strikes me as odd, this detachment he seems to have. CK couldn’t keep his hands off me after I woke up and the same with me and Devon and me and Cole. I must remember to ask CK about it. But that reminds me of his threat, or promise, or whatever you want to call it, and I sigh.
I turn to Nico. “Where is he?”
“He will meet us at the airport,” he says, and I shrug.
Fine. Whatever.
I clap my hands to get the attention of everyone and say, “Right, it’s dark out, let’s move. I will drive Jess, the rest of you pile into the limo. Who is driving my car back to L.A.?”
“Me,” Nico says, and I see a hint of delight there.
“Look after it,” I say and then add, “Any speeding fines you get are your own to pay.”
He smiles a proper genuine smile and nods. “Of course.”
“Great, shall we then.” I take Cole’s hand and open the door. Who should be standing there but Xane.
“I’m ready,” he says shortly. I can see he is still pissed off with me about my revelation of trying to break our bond, but it is the least of my worries.
“Fine. We’re going. Oh, crap.” I spin around and do a quick head count. “We won’t fit ten on the G6. Nine is the max.”
“If you can look after yourself for a few hours, I will drive with Nico,” Cade says, and I can see he is also eager to get his hands on my Veyron.
“That’s fine. But play nice,” I frown at them and they chuckle like old buddies. Hm, interesting.
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED FIFTY-SEVEN
We all leave the dreaded hotel suite, glad to see the back of it.
“I took the liberty of packing up your gifts,” Sebastian says to me coyly. He hands me the cuddly black dragon. “I found this on the bed. Thought you might like to keep it with you.”
“Thank you,” I say, taking it from him and holding it close to me. Cole is suspicious but doesn’t say anything, thankfully.
Downstairs, we all gratefully head out to the cars idling at the sidewalk. The valet reluctantly opens the door for me to jump into my car, sad to see it go.
Cole leans down and kisses me. “You sure about this?” he asks, meaning Jess.
I nod and he closes the door. “See you in a few,” I say as I spy Jess hovering on the passenger side, Devon having already abandoned her for the limo.
“Get in,” I say, irate, and she does as bid. She buckles up silently and I wonder where to start. I have some more things to say to her. I pull away from the curb. She twiddles with her thumbs.
“I’m sorry,” she says hesitantly. I’m surprised she spoke first. “I just wanted to be like you. Like Devon. I love him.”
“Then you should have honored his decision not to turn you. You have pushed him away. You would have been better off leaving things as they were.”
“I know,” she whispers tearfully. “When he told me about you. Him and you and the bond that you have, I wanted that with him. I thought he would be with me like he is with you, but he won’t even look at me.”
“Every bond is different. Ours is special. Don’t expect it to be like that because it won’t be, ever.” I don’t mean to be cruel but it’s the truth. “Give him time. He is still in shock. Don’t push him.”
She nods. “Okay.”
After that, I have nothing to say to her, so we spend the rest of the drive in silence. She breathes in the fresh air deeply and sighs when we pull up outside the jet.
“We have a few minutes if you want to stay out here for a bit.”
“No, I’ll be okay.” She waits patiently by my side as I wait for the limo. I move forward as it comes to a stop and she follows me. Closely. Oh, great. Seems she is now my little shadow. Cole climbs out and takes my hand. I grip it tightly and turn towards the jet. Jess follows me again, choosing to stay by my side and heeds my warning of not pushing Devon. He looks
mildly surprised and also relieved, but he steps up and takes her arm. Throwing her a very small smile. She tries not to beam back at him, and I’m glad that she at least listened to me. We climb on board, with everyone following, and Scott asks if he can go sit with Captain Jim again.
“Of course. The G6 is technically now yours, my dear. You do whatever you like.”
He looks startled. “Mine?” he says in wonder as he goes off in search of Jim.
“It’s sweet,” Lincoln chuckles at me. “You did a good thing.”
“It’s well deserved,” I say in return and flop down into a seat and everyone follows suit. Devon and Jess on the sofas with Sebastian and Xane opposite and me, Cole and Lincoln at the table. Nico sees CK on board, who has turned up finally, and with a wave, he darts back down the stairs with joy, to fire up my pride and joy.
“Nice of you to join us,” I murmur at him. He pointedly ignores Cole as he kisses me on the forehead as if nothing had ever happened.
“I had something to attend to,” he says and sits opposite me.
“I wonder if I might have a word with you in private once we are in the air… about…” I point subtly to Devon and Jess. They are not even looking at each other, never mind holding a conversation.
He flicks his eyes over briefly and frowns. “Of course.”
Everyone sits in silence as we take off and as soon as we are in the air, I kiss Cole and head for the back of the jet, followed closely by CK.
“What is it?” he asks.
“Do you not find it odd? The way he is treating her?”
“Yes,” he says straight away.
Oh, good, so it’s not just me then. “Why is he doing it?”
“You should ask him,” he says.
I roll my eyes at him and pop my head out of the bedroom, “Dev. A word please?”
He stands and comes into the room, closing the door behind him with a sigh. “I know what you are going to say, and the answer is, I don’t know.”
CK and I look at each other, then back at him to elaborate.
