Page 213 of Conquered

I huff a laugh under my breath, pitying the poor fool who’ll be shackled to her for the rest of his life. However, as we go past, I stop dead in my tracks for the second time this morning when I catch sight of who’s standing next to a beaming Amber, his face bereft of its usual flirty smiles.

“Loki?” I ask, my whole body flashing cold when I meet anguish ridden emerald eyes.

“L–Lilly…” he starts, taking a step forward, but is cut off by cuntface magee herself, who grabs his arm, the crowd before her parting as she drags him towards me.

“Oh, haven’t you heard?” she asks, a smug as fuck smile on her face as she holds out her left hand. “Loki and I are engaged.”

My whole world shatters, fine tremors wracking my body as I gawp at the garish bauble in the February sunshine.

“Loki?” I ask again, swallowing the lump in my throat, looking up at him. “What’s going on?”

His eyes burn with jade fire, but it’s soon replaced with a devastating sadness that seeps into my very bones, chilling my soul. His Adam’s apple bobs as he swallows hard, his lips moving, but no sound escapes as we stand in awkward silence.

“Aren’t you going to congratulate us?” Amber asks, her voice penetrating the haze that’s descended over me.

Anger, the likes of which I have never felt before rushes over me in a tidal wave, followed by an intense sickness that rises from my stomach, refusing to be ignored any longer. Without saying a single word, I spin and flee, just making it to the edge of the forest before tossing my bag aside, and falling to my knees, vomiting at the base of a tree.

“Shit! Lilly!” Loki cries and I hear footsteps approaching behind me. A hand alights on my back, rubbing soothing circles. “Fuck, Lilly, I’m so sorry. I should have told you sooner. I was a fucking coward. I have no choice about this, but I shouldn’t have let you find out this way.”

I finish heaving, acid stinging my throat as I spit on the ground once more.

“Water,” I croak out.

Seconds later, a water bottle is pressed into my hand, and I gratefully swill my mouth out, before taking a tentative sip, then another. A tissue is passed to me, too, which I use to wipe my mouth.

My mind still swirls like a tornado with everything that has happened recently, twisting until I want to scream. One thing stands out clearly, though, like a beacon of light. Turning round, careful to avoid the puddle of vomit now behind me, I face Loki, both of us still on our knees. I’m relieved to see that cuntface hasn’t followed him out, Willow either.

His brows are drawn together, and there are dark circles under his beautiful eyes, which are full of sadness and anguish.

Cupping his cheek, a move he leans his face into, I hold his gaze. “We will find a way through this, my love.” His breath hitches and his eyes fill with moisture when I call him that. It’s as if he thought I would have given up on him upon hearing this news. “Our fucking souls are merged, Loki. Nothing can separate them. Not cuntface, not Black Knight Corp., and certainly not Julian fucking Vanderbilt.”

His own hand comes up to cup my cheek so that we form an unbreakable circle. “But they’ll kill you, Pretty Girl,” he whispers, horror entering his gaze as it trails across my face. “If I refuse, you will not live long past your wedding day.”

A brief flash of fear lights up inside of me but quickly dissipates when I remember that we are not without power. In fact, we may have more than they do, now that I know about my inheritance.

“So we get them out of the way first,” I tell him, fierce determination filling me up and I straighten my back as if preparing for war. “Even if that means permanently removing them from the picture.”

His eyes go wide as he registers my meaning. And I do mean it, with all my heart. If we can’t remove the rotten core of Black Knight Corp. by legal means, then we will kill them. They’ve done terrible things, horrific things, without once getting their hands bloody as they force their own flesh and blood to bear the stains of their sins.

And as the saying goes, if you can’t beat them...then it’s time to get the knives out.

CHAPTER TWENTY

LILLY

It turns out Loki hadn’t even told the guys—stupid ballbag—and received a few punches when we got back to the dorm after our various gym classes until I managed to calm everyone down with threats of my own brand of violence, i.e. Her Vagisty going on strike.

Grumbling, we all sit on the sofas, a fire roaring in the fireplace, the crackling of burning logs a soothing sound. The soft beat of Sinead Harnett and GRADES singingIf You Let Mewashes over us as we clutch mugs of hot chocolate made by Kai, who used freshly shaved chocolate and warm milk. He usually puts some kind of whiskey in them, but I told him to leave it out of mine, my conversation with Willow playing on my mind. Kai gives me a considering look, but doesn’t say anything, doing as I asked. I should tell the guys, but I'm being a coward for now. I’ll wait until I take the test tomorrow.

I snuggle up to Loki, loving his vanilla scent mixing with the cocoa scent of my drink. His arm wraps around me, pulling me closer and grabbing my legs until I’m draped across his lap. Idecided that she can’t have him, I licked him and he’s mine now, so she can just fuck right off. Hence the reason he’s here with me and not her, and I don’t give a fuck if she doesn’t like it. Plus, this is his dorm so she can’t exactly stop him being here anyway.

“I fucking missed you too much, Pretty Girl,” he murmurs, nuzzling the top of my head.

“Well, you’ve got no one to blame but yourself,” I sass back, loving the way his hand tightens on my shoulder and the growl that sounds from his chest.Got to love an alpha!

“Right,” Ash starts, gaining all of our attention. “Now that, thanks to Lilly, we have a majority share in the company, we need to start putting into place the removal of the current board.” His grey eyes are the colour of flint, hard and unyielding, and a fierce sense of satisfaction floods my body at his words. “Kai?” he asks, turning to look at Kai, who unsurprisingly has his tablet in hand.

“The easiest way to do it is to set them up. Frame them with a crime, one so bad that they’ll be locked away for a long time, and be forced to step down, giving up any rights, shares, and control of the company,” he tells us, his voice hard, eyes unforgiving.