Resisting Royal (The Repayment Series)

by Delilah Mohan

  Instead, I opted to bring him donuts and coffee, which both surprised and pleased him. He thanked me, a rather polite man, then I instructed him to tell his boss I didn’t need a babysitter. The chuckle I got back told me that wasn’t going to happen.

  “He said eight o’clock,” Troy reminded me as I packed a bag of toiletries.

  “I’m sorry, Mrs. Doubtfire, but some of us have demanding day jobs that occasionally run over. I’m going to be late.”

  His eyes sparkled with amusement. “It’s your funeral. He hates tardiness.”

  “Are you afraid of him, Troy? A big guy like you afraid of a single man?” I taunted, knowing damn well that being on the wrong side of Royal’s good list was nothing to scoff at. During my downtime, I did some research, asked some questions, made some phone calls. My husband, god I almost choked saying the words, was a very powerful . . . and deadly man.

  “Find me a man who isn’t a little fearful of Royal. Hell, I fear him as much as I respect him. He’s my fucking family,” he stated, then grabbed a handful of things and started tossing them in bags. “You don’t even need to take any of this crap.”

  “Then why are you packing it?” I batted his hands away, and he held them up like he surrendered.

  “Because if you think you needed it, I doubt you will leave without it. The quicker you get your shit together, the quicker we can go.” I shouldered him out of the way and he let me, knowing full well if he held his ground, there would be no way I could move him.

  “Royal is your brother?” I asked.

  “Huh?”

  “You said he was family.” He pulled open my make-up drawer and started putting them in make-up bags. “Hey, I can come back later for stuff right, like it doesn’t have to be all done today?”

  “Not blood family. Just family.” His eyebrows scrunched together. “I guess you could, but not without an escort.”

  “Babysitter,” I corrected.

  “Call it what you will, but you can’t be without one of us around.”

  “Why? Because he doesn’t trust me to run?” I dared a glance at the clock, seeing it was a quarter to eight.

  “No. Because he wants you safe.” He put his hand on my arm to stop me. “This is serious, Bianca. If you read your fucking contract, which I know you haven’t, you would know that. He has all his trust in you and you better not ruin him.”

  I yanked my arm away from his grip. “Nothing could ruin a man as solid as the infamous Royal, you know that.”

  He crossed his arms over his chest. “You would think so, wouldn’t you? But somehow, he seems to have a weakness. One single weakness.” He stared me directly in the eyes, and I had to fight to not look away. “Do not break him.”

  His gaze left me feeling unnerved. “Why Troy, if I didn’t know any better, I would think you are invested in this thing. What do you get out of it?” He mumbled something I didn’t quite hear. “What’s that?”

  “To see him happy, okay?! I get to see him finally happy.”

  I laughed because what else was I supposed to do? The mere thought that I would be enough to make a man like Royal happy was absurd. Only, Troy didn’t laugh with me. Instead, he looked on, his expression dark, before he mumbled a string of intangible things and left me standing there alone.

  We didn’t pull into the gates of Royal’s home until eight twenty-five. By we, I mean my vehicle plus the three SUVs I’d dubbed my posse. Troy had instructed me to park in the spot closest to the door, which was previously Royal’s spot, but now belonged to me. Apparently, Royal didn’t want me walking farther than I had to. Considerate, but it wouldn’t be winning him any awards.

  I parked in my spot, while my posse continued to the end of the driveway. I hadn’t even gotten my keys out of the ignition before my door was yanked open. “You’re late.”

  “I got behind at work, so I didn’t get home until late.” I leaned over and grabbed my purse from the floorboard of the passenger seat.

  He waited until I was sitting upright again before he spoke. “This is your home now, Bianca, not that run-down shack. Please don’t refer to it as such.”

  “Fine.” I shooed him away from the door, and he took a step back. “But for the record, this doesn’t feel anything like a home.”

  I looked up at the massive building in front of me, bigger than any house I’d ever been to before. “It will.” I doubted this place would ever feel like home, but I wouldn’t be here forever. Or would I? I really should have read the contract before signing.

  I pulled open the backseat of my car and pulled out a large box, feeling Peter shift as I lifted. Without even asking first, the box was removed from my hands, and Royal was carrying Peter toward the building. He was halfway up the first set of steps when he froze.

  “Bianca. Why is this box . . . moving?”

  I bit my lip. “It has Peter in there.”

  He turned slowly, “And Peter is a . . .?”

  “Rabbit. Get it? Peter . . . Rabbit.” I waited for him to understand, and when he just continued to look at me like I was nuts, I added, “It’s a children’s book, Royal. Peter Rabbit is a children’s book.”

  He nodded excruciatingly slow, making me feel ridiculous. “I don’t read children’s books.”

  “I forgot. You were born a full-grown man.” Seriously, who hadn’t heard of Peter Rabbit?

  He turned, neither confirming or denying my statement, and continued up the steps. I pulled my bag off the floorboard and slammed the door, looking up at the big house. “How am I going to do this?”

  The question was to myself, but Troy appeared behind me, answering anyway. “Flawlessly.”

  “Ha. I can’t remember the last thing I’ve done flawlessly.” He reached out and took my bag. “I can carry that.”

  “Oh, no, no, no. My head might literally roll if I let you carry anything besides your purse into that house.” He stepped past me, walking toward the steps, leaving me standing by my car watching his back.

  I followed them, not really sure where I was going. At the top of the stairs, there was a massive double door standing wide open. Royal, still holding Peter, stood waiting. He looked a little lost, and even though I harbored extreme hate for him or maybe the situation he put me in, I did find his expression sort of cute.

  When I was close enough, he spoke. “Did you bring . . . Peter’s . . . cage?”

  The way he looked at the box made me laugh. “No. Peter doesn’t have a cage. He’s a free-roaming rabbit.”

  His eyebrows rose. “Come again?”

  “He roams around the house. He’s litter box trained.” I wished I could take a picture of his expression and repeatedly refer back to it when I needed a giggle.

  “But, where does he sleep?” The whole concept had him so baffled.

  “With me, usually in my bed. Occasionally in his own bed.” I opened the box in his hand and rubbed Peter's ears.

  “No. There is no way this thing is sleeping in my bed.” His eyes looked horrified.

  “My bed,” I clarified.

  Troy came back after setting down my bags. “Someone needs to read her contract.”

  Royal glared as Troy cheerfully took away the box holding Peter. “Our bed.”

  Suddenly, the amusement of the free-roaming rabbit wasn’t quite as funny. “We share a room?”

  He stood in front of me and rolled his fucking eyes. “We are married.”

  I fumbled for words before mumbling, “Yeah, but . . . I don’t know you.”

  “You will.” He turned dismissively. “Troy put the bunny in . . . our room.”

  I followed him into the house and across the marble tile until we came to a kitchen. “Dinner is cold. Do you want it to be heated?”

  I was too busy staring at the massive and admittingly amazing kitchen when his words registered. “It’s fine.”

  He grumbled something then walked us through another doorway to a table with food. At the end sat an elderly lady. “Bianca, this is my mother, G
reta. She lives here as well, mostly she keeps to the east side of the house and shouldn’t be a bother.”

  I stared at the lady sitting in front of me, joy covering her face as she stood and pulled me in a hug. “I’m so happy to finally have a daughter.”

  I froze, unsure how to react. Did she know? Did he tell her that this whole relationship was a lie? Or did he let her believe that we were real?

  CHAPTER 9

  ROYAL

  After eating dinner as a family, with Troy joining us, and giving Bianca a tour of the house, I had to leave. Okay, maybe I didn’t have to leave, but I sure as hell couldn’t stay. Not when her huge, green eyes kept looking at me suspiciously, just waiting for me to jump in for the kill.

  Some would argue I was a monster, but I wasn’t. I was just an ordinary man living a little more than an ordinary life, but . . . just a man. Having Bianca look at me like she was waiting for a bomb to explode, stung. She was my wife, after all, and as my wife, I should only see affection and praise in her eyes. Understandably, our situation and circumstances weren’t like most, but her apprehension of me still soured my mood. I needed her to come around, and soon.

  I swung my fist into the jaw of the man sitting in front of me, blood spraying across the room, covering the wall. Then I swung again, and before I knew it, Troy was standing behind me, pulling my body away from the man’s nearly limp one. “That’s enough.”

  I sure as hell didn’t feel like it was enough, but my split and bleeding knuckles told me that maybe Troy was right. “He’s a thief.”

  I was justifying my behavior, which I didn’t need to do, but the justification made me feel better about my actions. “That may be so, but are you planning to just beat him to death? That really isn’t your style.”

  He was right, it wasn’t my style. He looked at me knowingly, and for once, I hated that we were so close. I hated that he knew that girl lying in my bed without me had gotten under my skin. I had a weakness, the first-ever genuine crack in my armor, and it wouldn’t be long before others noticed it too. What was I fucking thinking?

  I flipped open my knife and walked behind the man. He was already as good as dead. He knew it, I knew it, every fucking person who saw him come into this office knew he wasn’t leaving alive. Only, it was usually Troy who took pride in the torture, who revved from the kill.

  Troy made sure I met his eye. “You sure you don’t want me to do it?”

  He was making me feel weak when I was the strongest one. But, maybe that’s why he questioned me. I was strong enough to not go through with it, when a weaker man crumbled to the cravings. But tonight, I wanted it. I wanted to feel the blade slice through his flesh and not feel remorse.

  I didn’t answer him with words, but my actions were all he needed. I grabbed the man’s hair . . . Michael. His name was Michael. Sometimes it was better to remember that he was a person. Without taking my eye off Troy, I tilted Michael’s head back with a hard yank, he limply obeyed. Then, without a second thought to my actions, my blade sliced horizontally across his neck, cutting him so deep that his head fell back upon my release, leaving a gaping hole in his body.

  I used the man’s own shirt to clean my blade, then snapped it shut, and pocketed it. “Feel better?”

  I looked at the body, now dripping blood on my floor. “Marginally.”

  “Are you going to slit someone’s throat every time you and the Mrs. have any sort of falling out? Because if so, I’m going to need a new job.”

  “If you don’t stop thinking you’re clever, you won’t live long enough to search for one,” I retorted.

  This only made that damn grin of his appear. It was infuriating. “You never would off me, Mama Russo loves me too much.”

  “I think it’s more pity she feels,” I clarified.

  “Call it what you want, it doesn’t matter, it has been keeping me alive for years now.” One day, his cocky demeanor really would get him killed.

  “That can’t sustain you for much longer.” I looked at the pool of blood. “Get someone to clean this up.”

  I walked out of the room and was immediately assaulted by the sounds of men grunting and groaning. Each man sparing and prepping for their next fight, or maybe if they were lucky, the next battle in my ring. I walked past a group of men working solo on the punching bags, and a row of guys lifting weights before I was able to burst through the back exit and into the night air.

  I tried gulping down air without looking frantic. But I needed it. I suddenly felt stifled, completely unsure of my decisions in the last twenty-four hours. It wasn’t just the marriage contract or the girl—although as much as I keep trying to regret it, I didn’t regret owning her. But, I probably let my emotions grip me too much, and I let myself take them out on that poor bastard inside. He deserved it, don’t get me wrong. But, Troy would have given him a cleaner death.

  I glanced down at my watch, the time flashing two nineteen. Fuck. Where had the time gone? I left Bianca a little before ten, and I swore I had only been here an hour, maybe two. But my watch didn’t lie. Guilt pulled at me because subconsciously, I knew the distance was intentional. It wasn’t fair to Bianca to be at an unfamiliar home alone, but I wasn’t strong enough to be there with her.

  Strong in the sense that I wouldn’t be able to stay away. I wanted to know what her hair smelled like, freshly showered, or how soft her skin felt under my palms. I wanted to lie next to her, sleep with her, be in her, and the commitment of it all scared the fuck out of me.

  “You’re freaking out.” I turned to see Troy propped against the door.

  “God, a man can’t even get air without you hovering,” I grumbled.

  “You didn’t need air, you needed peace to have a mini, mental freak out.” He pushed off the frame and came to my side.

  “I am not freaking out.” I was past that stage.

  He reached into his pocket, pulled out some gum, and popped a piece in his mouth before offering me some. I declined. “You should go home.”

  I shuffled my feet. “Why? It’s still early.”

  It was still early. Staying out most of the night was part of the job. Holding fights in the early hours of the morning, taking bets, collecting loans, that tended to work better in the dark. Plus, I didn’t sleep. I wanted to sleep, don’t get me wrong. But, I fell into a fitful few hours before my alarm blared, or I was jarred awake, and there’s no going back to sleep after that. There were no solid eight hours, more like three, tops.

  “Does she scare you?” He laughed.

  I knew who he was talking about. “Who?”

  “Your wife.” His amusement was apparent in his words.

  “She couldn’t scare me if she tried.”

  He snorted . . . fucking snorted at me. “She sure scares the fuck out of me.”

  “You’re a fucking woman, that’s why. I’ve heard you scream at a mouse.” This was a lie. He’s probably the meanest fucker disguised as a sweet choir boy. He could smile at you, while his knife was running through your gut, spilling over his hand.

  “It was a rat,” he clarified.

  “Still screamed like a female,” I taunted.

  “Really, though, go home. We don’t need you here right now, you’re tired. You have a wife at home now, things are different.”

  He was right. Things were different now, but still very much the same. “You coming?”

  “I don’t have to hold your hand to your marital bed.” Fucker. He knew what I meant. He lived in my fucking guest house with his kid, so I was just offering him a ride.

  “You know what, you can take a cab.”

  He held up some keys. “I’ve got the boat.”

  He was referring to one of the larger SUVs in my collection. The boys alternated using them, and I didn’t mind. “Fine. Don’t fuck it up like last time.”

  ”You crash one time . . .”

  ”With a body in the trunk!” I emphasized, and he groaned.

  “Get the fuck out of here. Like seriously,
nothing more is happening tonight, besides drinking until our vision blurs.” I stared a few more beats before turning, walking the other direction to my car.

  The house was pitch black when I pulled up, and I made a mental note to install some motion sensors. With Bianca here, I wanted her to be as safe as possible. She couldn't feel safe walking in the dark.

  The moment I opened the door, I flipped on the light, then blinked a few times as my eyes adjusted. I hung up my coat, then started the trudge up the stairs, my heart suddenly speeding up and my palms sweating. I made a left at the top, heading for the double doors that were once my room, but now belonged to both of us.

  The door was cracked open, a small stream of light spilling into the hall. At first, when I opened it, I thought she was awake, but as I moved closer, I saw the steady rise and fall of her chest as she slept, her hair spilling over her pillow and half of mine. She was exquisite, with her perfectly formed lips and high cheekbones.

  I stepped in slowly, not wanting her to wake, and headed to the bathroom where I stripped out of my suit, showered, and then stared at the bed some more. I could sleep in the chair, in fact, that was probably the wisest choice. But, sometimes the most sensible choice wasn’t the most satisfying.

  Going to the opposite side of the bed, I pulled back the covers and climbed under the sheets. The material was cool but did nothing to dull the heat radiating off Bianca’s body. Fuck, was this what it would always be like? Just lying next to her had me so uncomfortably aware. I closed my eyes and took in a breath; her scent filled the air.

  Shit. It took everything in my power to not reach out and touch her. I blew out some air trying to level my breathing and calm my mind, so I could drift off to sleep. I counted numbers backward, then forward. I wrote a grocery list in my mind that I wouldn’t actually use. Then, when my mind slowed, my heart settled, my pulse leveled and I began to drift off . . . her fucking rabbit started doing laps around the room, and she slept through the whole damn thing.