by Eden O'Neill
Knight frowned. “Not our place to go there.”
“Go where?”
Knight gazed away with a huff and LJ put his hands together. The tall blond leaned forward. “We don’t talk about that year Royal got sick.”
“Why?” I asked really curious. “Was it that bad?”
“Pretty bad. Yeah, but that’s not why we don’t talk about it.”
“LJ.” Another warning, but this time obviously directed at LJ, the growl low in Knight’s voice. Knight’s dark eyes flicked in my direction. “That was the year Royal lost his mom and sister.”
My lips parted. “What happened?” I’d heard a car accident, but what did that have to do with Royal getting sick?
Knight wet his lips. “It was a car crash, but you need to ask Royal about it. I’m sorry. It really isn’t our place to go into details.”
“We miss anything?” Royal came back into the room, Jax behind him with a couple of beers from my dad’s fridge. When Jax offered, I quickly took one, nursing it while Royal and Jax got comfortable around me. Reaching for the remote, Royal started the movie again, and since he hadn’t missed anything I wanted to detail in the conversation, I stayed silent.
I’d been the only one to miss something in the end.
Eleven
December
The tone changed for a little bit after what was said during My Girl, but eventually, things mellowed out. I actually ended up falling asleep, and I was glad since the movie was so sad in the end. It was probably also the wrong thing to watch considering my sister, but since Royal didn’t mind watching it, that’s what we did. I ended up waking up while another movie was playing, and kissing my forehead, Royal advised it was probably time for the other guys to go. My dad would be back eventually tonight, and the last thing he needed to see were four large boys on my couch. He already wasn’t too fond of Royal. Royal slapped all the fellas’ hands, and after letting them out, he came back for Hershey and me. Helped us upstairs. I’d drunk a little too much, one or two beers I’d had before falling asleep. Royal assisted me by getting Hershey in her kennel and later, putting me into bed.
He tucked me in and everything, pinching my chin and kissing my lips. His weight hovering over me and fine smell around me quickly made me want more, and I opened my bed to him.
“Stay with me,” I hummed, pushing his academy jacket off, but he stopped my hurried hands, rubbing my nose with his.
“Your dad,” he said, the only logical one here. If Dad wouldn’t be happy about four boys on my couch, he definitely wouldn’t be happy about one of them in my bed.
Smiling, I slid arms around his waist. “Lock the door. He’ll know I’m in here, then. That I’m safe, but won’t try to come in.”
I’d gathered a few things about my dad too since moving in here. He needed security in proximity, nothing more. The locked door would let him know I was home.
Taking that for what it was, Royal grinned, leaving my bed only long enough to lock the door, then come back. After tossing his jacket, he unbuttoned his shirt, giving me a show when he exposed his golden, chiseled skin. His body was absolutely perfect, and he wasn’t shy about not hiding it. He toed off his shoes, then joined me in my bed, cuddling with me when he breathed kisses on my neck. I wanted him here. I wanted him safe, and there was no way he was going back to his dad’s house even if he wasn’t there. I supposed he could stay at Windsor House, the Court’s headquarters, but I didn’t even want him there. I wanted him with me.
I sighed when he lifted my shirt, then pulled it off. That left my bra on but when he reached around to pull it off, I placed a hand between us.
“Can we just hold each other for a while?” I asked, and that didn’t seem to bother him at all. He quickly got in to it, covering me with his hard body.
“That’s like asking me if I wouldn’t mind air.” He smiled, tasting my skin. He pinched my shoulder between his teeth before brushing his nose over it. “I love you.”
I loved him too, my eyes closing. He kissed the palm of my hand and I touched his face.
“Things got weird tonight,” I said, playing with his hair. “You know with what Jax said about you getting sick?”
It actually got to the point where no one talked at all, and I had a feeling that had less to do with the fact we were watching a movie. The veer in conversation had made him uncomfortable, clearly.
Lids fell hard over green eyes. He pushed a veil of dusky blond out of his face. “Yeah. And?”
Defensive, and that was his go-to. The boy was a vault, and I hated that he did that. It was just me here, and he didn’t have to be this way.
“Royal—”
He pulled my hands from his face, then hovered over me. Gripping my wrists, he pinned my arms above my head, extending my body and making my tummy quiver.
“Let’s just be together,” he said, placing his weight on me and reaching between my legs, he got back into what we’d started earlier tonight. What we’d started but couldn’t finish. I sucked in a breath the moment his fingers invaded my underwear, protests hard for me at the moment. He unsnapped my bra as his fingers entered me, and I knew exactly what he was doing. He was using me. He was using us and sex not to talk.
“Royal…” He stole my breath with a kiss, a taste, and that was all it took. I submitted to him.
I gave him what he wanted.
*
I turned in the middle of the night, by myself, and I didn’t understand. Opening my eyes, I realized I wasn’t by myself, but Royal had retreated to the other side of the bed. He sat on the edge in nothing but his boxers, his head in his hands.
Basically naked myself from fooling around earlier tonight, I brought the blankets up to my chest. Shimmying, I got to the edge of the bed, and when I touched his back, his head shifted my way. My hand came away clammy, sweat coating his muscular frame. I touched hot skin. “Hey. You okay?”
Royal’s hand covered mine, gripping on for dear life, and moving, I guided his cheek to make him look at me. His eyes were completely bloodshot, red and dark-rimmed. “Royal?”
A silence filled the room, and I brought him completely to me, guiding him back with me under the sheets. Together, I held him close, and he buried his face in my neck.
“Em…” was all he said, my name in harsh and tortured tones. He hadn’t sounded this way before.
“Hey, talk to me.” I folded my fingers into his hair, praying to God he’d talk to me. That he’d let some of this out. Whatever it was, he didn’t have to do this alone. Thick arms eventually moved around me, and seriously, I questioned his ability to fuse me into his flesh. He held me so hard, so long.
His lips pulled apart on my neck. “I saw their faces, Em… I see them all the time.”
“Who, babe? Who?” He sounded so terrible, tears burning my own eyes. I felt so much pain in his voice. What the hell was going on?
Coarse fingers dug into my flesh, my boyfriend holding on for dear life. “My mom. My sister,” he rasped, tugging me into him hard. “What the fuck? Why can’t I let go?”
Why would he want to? Let go of them. “Why do you need to let go?”
“Because I’m a piece of shit,” he gritted, his hands so hard on my flesh. He pulled me hard. “Because it’s my fault they’re dead.”
He’d said something like this before, admitted he was the reason they’d died when his dad hit him once. He said he deserved it. But how? “How was it your fault?”
Eventually, with some coaxing, I got him to pull away, to face me, face this. His eyes weren’t just lined in red but glassy, a shine to them like he straddled a thin line on the cusp of snapping. Maybe he was on the brink, these moments with me the only ones keeping him from hacking that rope clear through.
“I got so sick,” he said, the swallow hard in his throat. “I got sick, and I was scared.”
“Okay.” I smoothed my hands on his face.
He gripped one. “My family and I were supposed to go skiing. The whole family. My d
ad. Me. My mom and my sister. Because I got sick I couldn’t go, and my dad stayed with me. He wanted Grace and my mom to still go, though. Didn’t want to ruin their time. He used to do things like that. Be so nice.”
“Your sister’s name was Grace?” I smiled a little. “That’s a nice name.”
“Yeah, it was.” His tone hardened, his expression as well. He swallowed. “So they went. Went without me and Dad, but that was okay. I wanted that, too. Wanted them to have fun, but things got so worse after they left. My fever was crazy… I was only seven. I…”
He didn’t finish, and I held his hand, feeling he needed that.
He closed his mouth against my skin. “I got scared, Em. I got freaked because I thought I was going to die and I wanted to see my mom and sister. I wanted them home with me and was such a fucking brat. I begged my dad to call them, lost my mind until he did, and he didn’t even need to. He had it covered. He was taking care of me, but I still wanted more.”
“Royal—”
“They died that night.” The words shot through me, the tears falling down from my eyes but not from his. He wouldn’t let that happened, absolutely shaking in front of me. His nostrils flared. “A snowstorm. They couldn’t catch a flight in the weather, so they rented a car and drove to get my bitch ass—”
“Don’t say that about yourself.” I brought his head to me, forcing his forehead against mine. I’d make him listen to me. He had to. I shook him. “You were a child, you hear me? What happened to them was not your fault. You were just a kid.”
“A kid with blood on my hands.” He forced my hands away, gripping them. “And child or not, that’s truth. I don’t deserve to have any memories of them. I need to let go. I don’t deserve…”
What did he deserve, then? Was it pain? The beatings inflicted on him by his father in result of all this? Did he deserve to have all the happy times fall away with their memories? This may not be true, but he sure felt that way. He honestly felt he deserved it all.
Things made so much sense now.
In a single motion, he was off my bed, but in a second I had his arm. He wasn’t going to run from this. He wasn’t going to run from me.
“Well, I won’t let you forget,” I urged, grabbing him and throwing my arms around him. His body shook, absolutely quivering in my arms. He was a simmering volcano, only two seconds from the brink of eruption. I pressed my lips to his ear. “I’m going to make you hold on to them, you hear me? You’re going to keep every moment, every feeling, because I won’t let you forget the good things. I refuse.”
An ache rumbled deep within him, his hard chest pressed against mine. “I can’t.”
“You can.” I pulled him away, making him look at me. “You don’t deserve the beatings. You don’t deserve the pain from your dad and all this guilt. Your sister and mom loved you, and I didn’t know them, but if they saw what you were doing now, Royal… How you were trying to let go of them because you feel like you deserve it…”
He blinked, his face so cloudy because I was crying. Actual sobs coming from my throat. I couldn’t breathe, and something told me he was having a hard time too, his big body shuddering for breaths.
“It’d hurt them, Royal.” In the end, he touched me, curling a finger and catching my tears. I shook my head. “It’d pain them so much. Don’t you love them?”
“I do,” he said, the words light and barely heard. They were filled to the brink with emotion and he gazed away.
I brought him back with a touch. “Then you can’t forget. Who will remember the good things if you don’t?”
His dad? The man was already lost to his anger, his hate clearly. I mean, look what he did and was still doing to his son? Royal said he used to be so nice. Maybe even like who my dad used to be before my mom died. Pain brought terrible out in people, but he didn’t need to be like his dad. He didn’t need to be cold and unfeeling to the world.
He braced my face. “I’m scared. Scared to lose them.”
“Then don’t.” I touched his other cheek. “Forgive yourself. Heal and be free. There’s no space for them if you don’t release all this you have pent up and let them through. They’ll leave, and you don’t want that.”
“I don’t.” Agony laced his shaken words, and I pulled my arms around him, tugged him into me.
“I won’t let you forget them,” I told him, holding him close. “You won’t.”
“Promise?” His hands curled into my skin, his mouth in my hair. “I don’t want to forget.”
Then he won’t. He’d get through this pain. He’d let everything but what truly mattered—his sister and his mom—go, and I’d made sure of that.
I’d promise him that.
Twelve
December
My night was filled with lots of tears. Mostly on my end as I finally got Royal to open up and see the truth. Together, we got him to see his truth. He’d been blinded for so long. He’d been in the depths of so much pain both physical and mental. His dad had kept him there, but he wouldn’t anymore. I’d love Royal as harshly and beautifully as he deserved to be loved, with as harsh and beautiful as I knew he loved me. I’d do that, and I’d keep doing it over and over again. Lather, rise, repeat. I’d do it until it sunk in.
I’d do that forever.
We held hands together on a Sunday morning, sitting in his car in the middle of a quiet street. With all downtown businesses closed, it was the perfect time to visit his dad’s jewelry store, end this. I knew that cell phone was somewhere inside that store. I just had a feeling. Eventually, we weren’t alone anymore when another car pulled up right behind us. We parked down the street, discrete. Royal started to let go of my hand, but I held on, kissing it.
Something passed between us as we stared at each other, something deep. I think, for the pair of us, something had changed over these past few days. There was no more me. There was no more Royal Prinze. We were Em and Royal now. We were Royal and Em forever, and I think he saw that too, bending my head forward. He kissed me, whispering words of love before getting out of the car. He told me to wait in the car for a second, and I watched as he walked in his low-sitting jeans to the car parked behind us. He bent his big body and spoke to the person inside, Jax the driver. I could see his friend well through the windshield, but noticed he was very much alone. I assumed LJ and Knight would be here as well.
Seeing me, Jax waved a hand from behind the steering wheel, and I did the same. They spoke for a second, but when my phone buzzed, I broke off from the distant conversation.
Ramses: What’s up, ’Zona? I’m coming home next week, but I thought I’d check in. Haven’t talked to you in a while. You ghostin’ me again? ;)
I actually hadn’t been. At least not on purpose. Oddly enough, I’d barely even noticed I hadn’t seen Ramses since well before Mira’s funeral. I supposed I had other things on my mind.
I snuck a glance into the rearview mirror, Royal and Jax still talking. We’d parked a few blocks away from the jewelry store so we wouldn’t be on the store’s security systems. Apparently, Knight was supposed to be working on that part, but since he wasn’t here, I had no idea what was going on.
Me: I haven’t been ghosting you, idiot. If anything, you’ve been ghosting me.
Ramses: Have not! My dad’s been on this crazy kick. We’re in the Swiss Alps right now. Can you believe that? Took me on a mini holiday.
Me: Wow. Why did he do that?
Ramses: Seems he wants to hang out with me. Says he wants to do it before I head out to college in the fall and life changes. Crazy, right? I guess this little piece of metal on my finger has been good for something. I actually don’t mind spending time with him. He seems to be trying.
That made me smile. Ramses had never said it, but I had a feeling a relationship with his father was something he’d really wanted. Why wouldn’t someone want that?
Ramses: Anyway, like I said, I’m coming home next week. What’s up? School still weird? Crazy about Mira.
S
chool was still weird, but I didn’t really have any time to talk about it now. Royal waved a hand, gesturing for me to come. After sending Ramses a quick follow-up text that I was in the middle of something and would chat with him later, I got out of the car, hunkering down as I made my way to the boys. We were in the middle of broad daylight, and I didn’t want to seem suspect.
Jax eyed me as I made it over. “What’s with that weird walk?”
I rolled my eyes. “We’re about to like rob a jewelry store. I didn’t want to look suspicious.”
The guys chuckled, Royal too when he threw an arm around me. He pinched my jacket. “I appreciate the stealth, princess, but it’s the middle of a Sunday downtown in a small town. Absolutely nothing is open…”
“And no need for the crab walk.” Jax jabbed me in my side, and I threw an elbow at him. He dodged the swing, picking up pace in the opposite direction. A hand behind my back, Royal guided me to follow him, looking like a god in his well-worn jeans and jacket. I wore my big puffer coat, really ready for this chill to be over. I had a feeling it was close because as we walked from the street to the alley, blades of green were popping out between the creases in the sidewalks and poking out of flower beds. Spring was coming. We just had to wait for it. I needed it, some good news and any sign to show the tides were changing in my life. We just may have that today if we could find my sister’s cell phone.
“What does that mean if we find it?” I asked, shoving my hands into my pockets. I gazed around as Jax proceeded to gain access to the building. He must have been able to swipe keys from good ole Benjamin, but I noticed he didn’t use them at this point. On his hand, he had some codes, punching each digit in one by one.
“We’ll cross that bridge when we get to it,” Royal said, taking my attention and responding to my last question. “Who knows? Paige might tell us exactly what we need to know. I’m sure there’s tons of evidence on that phone.”
“Yeah. DNA?” Jax had the jewelry store door open. He must not have needed the keys. “We’ll get it tested. Figure out who the creep is. Whoever was with her that night had to leave something on it.”