Page 21 of Darkest Before Dawn (His Perfect Darkness #2)

It’s not an emotion I’ve allowed myself to feel. All-consuming desire, yes. But the need to comfort, care for, and control her has alchemized and turned into something more.

I love Inara.

Have I told her yet? I almost want to shout it out now, shout it to the world.

“Mr. Roy!” Reporters are surging forward, shouting questions. Only the solid barrier of my security team holds them back.

I move back to the microphones, holding up my hands. “No questions today,” I tell them. “Please respect our privacy. My media team will be in touch.”

“Mr. Roy! Wait!” The press isn’t taking no for an answer. Nadia is already striding toward me, ready to take over and rebuff all questions.

But one reporter calls out to Inara. “Mrs. Roy! Is it true the Bondage Killer killed your entire family?”

My head snaps back, searching for the speaker. It’s a man’s voice, but he’s hidden in the crowd. “Who said that?” I bark before I can stop myself, and the mics pick up my question.

The reporters also look around, sensing blood in the water. “The Bondage Killer?” they mutter to each other. “Is it true?”

The same speaker calls out again, “What about reports that the serial killer is back and targeting you?”

I don’t have to look back at Inara to know that she’s gone still and stiff, shut down in the face of a threat.

I need to shut this down right now.

“Know this,” my voice rings out. “I will not tolerate any attempts to pry into our private lives.” A few reporters lower their arms, cowed.

I glower at them and the cameras, giving them a glimpse of the monster I’ve worked so hard to hide.

“And if anyone seeks to harm or threaten my wife, it’ll be the last thing you do. ”

Inara

“I didn’t directly threaten anyone,” Rex says.

“You didn’t have to,” Nadia replies. “You looked like you were about to leap off the stage and strangle someone with your bare hands.”

We’re in the back of a limo, riding to Hotel Magnifique.

After the disaster of a press conference, Nadia took over.

She ended the line of questions by announcing that she’d emailed them all detailed press kits.

Reporters stopped shouting to check their inboxes then and there.

She deftly dangled the possibility of private interviews to a few select news outlets, then bundled Rex and me into this car.

Now she’s reprimanding Rex for bungling the statement she gave him. I’ve never seen anyone attempt to give Rex orders, much less dress him down, so this is kind of fun.

“It’s not like I pointed at any of them and said outright that I would kill them.”

“Good job,” Nadia deadpans. “Do you want a cookie?”

I love this woman. If I weren’t already married, I’d be tempted to see if she would top me sometime.

“Legal is shitting themselves,” she says, swiping on her phone. “It’s all hands on deck, trying to spin this.”

“That’s what I pay them for.” Rex sounds like a sulky child. “Get my money’s worth.”

“Oh, you will, Mr. Roy. And we’re billing overtime.”

Rex doesn’t bother to get the last word, and that’s how I know he’s shaken. As soon as we slid into our seats, he captured my right hand and kept it clasped between both of his.

“Is it bad?” I ask. My stomach is churning from the rollercoaster of the day. The last hour is still a blur. I remember the kiss, then a shadow falling over us—a psychic warning. “Is Rex in trouble?”

“It’ll be alright,” Rex assures me. “Nadia has fixed much worse.”

Nadia snorts, and he adds, “If anything, I might have to pay a small fine.”

“If the reporter sues, you could be out a couple million,” she says.

“Like I said. Small.”

Nadia shakes her head and looks at me like You married him. I squeeze Rex’s hand. I don’t know why I’m comforting him when he’s responsible for this mess. I guess I can sense he’s trying.

Please, Inara. Let me help. He keeps begging me to let him in. He’s as damaged as I am, but he’s trying.

Maybe I can try a little harder too. Let down my walls and stop shutting him out.

But I’m terrified, too. “It’ll all be out now, won’t it? Everything about my past.”

Rex wraps an arm around me. We re-position so I’m leaning into him on the bench seat. A couple holding onto each other as we face the world.

Nadia’s expression softens, but she doesn’t shy away from answering. “It’s out. But the press kit focuses on your exceptional career. We included statements from several officers from the LAPD, as well as Agent Larsen from the FBI. They all spoke very highly of your abilities as a detective.”

Warmth floods through me. “Dirk did that for me?”

“Dirk? Who’s that?” Rex stiffens beside me, and I soothe him with another squeeze of my hand.

“He said that you were the best profiler he ever had the pleasure of working with. That you had, quote, ‘A brilliant and unique mind.’”

“Oh.” I fight a smile at the high praise. “That was kind of him.”

“He didn’t seem like the type prone to hyperbole. Or kindness. He meant every word.”

“Yeah, that sounds like Dirk,” I say, picturing the solemn agent who drove most of his team crazy with his meticulous nature and attention to detail. Beside me, Rex is bristling like an attack dog who senses an intruder.

“Dirk,” he mutters the name like it’s a curse word.

“Did you date him?” Nadia asks bluntly. Her no-nonsense professionalism is reassuring, and I can trust she’ll tell me like it is.

“No. We just worked together. We made a good team,” I add to rile up Rex.

“Maybe we’ll invite him to the engagement ball,” Nadia muses.

“Absolutely not,” Rex interjects, then swears when we both grin at him.

What Nadia says suddenly penetrates. “Wait, what engagement ball?” I ask. “Isn’t it a bit late for that?” We’re already married.

“We’re rich,” Rex smirks. “We do what we want.”

The limo is pulling around the back of the hotel. It rolls up to a gate and, after getting checked by a security guard, rolls through to the dark underbelly of a parking deck.

I have one more question. “What did the press kit say about how we met? Where we were. . .” I trail off. Nadia didn’t mention Club Empire, did she? That would make the front page.

“At the NRPD Charity ball, of course,” she says. “Chief Jordan is already taking personal credit for introducing the two of you.”

Rex scoffs, and I roll my eyes. The chief will be insufferable. It’s going to take some getting used to being the center of attention and getting fawned over like this.

But I have Rex to shield me. I’m already getting used to the idea.

Maybe that’s what I’m craving—the feeling that someone has my back, no matter what.

I can’t trust Rex not to take the concept too far, but the primal part of me wants that level of devotion.

He will stop at nothing to protect me. I know it in my bones, and it makes me feel safe.

The limo slows to drop us off at an elevator door.

“Okay, lovebirds, this is your stop,” Nadia says. “Just lie low until I say so.” She points a stern finger at Rex. “No more threatening the press.”

He gives a grim nod, and then it’s my turn to get lectured.

“And you,” Nadia says, looking pointedly at my hand. “You need a ring.”

I don’t need a ring, but I’m not going to backtalk a domme. She turns back to Rex. “Get her a rock the size of Antarctica. Give people something to gossip about.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Rex says and half salutes her while helping me out.

“Is a ring really necessary?” I grumble.

Rex laughs. His hand skates down my back as he leads me into the elevator. “It is if Nadia says so. She’s the best. She’ll feed the rags a bunch of romantic nonsense, keep them speculating about our wedding colors?—”

“There’s going to be a wedding?” This whole thing is supposed to be fake!

“We might be able to avoid it if the engagement ball is spectacular enough.” He presses a button, and the elevator rises. “As for the ring, think of it as costume jewelry.”

If I know Rex, he’s going to get me something that costs more than a house. “Not as a tiny collar?”

He looks smug. “Not unless you want to.”

I sigh. Once we’re back in the hotel room, I turn on the TV. Every news channel is playing footage from the steps of City Hall.

I watch Rex cup my face and kiss me over and over again.

I replay the moment in my head. I was totally swept away by Rex’s warmth, his touch. He looked at me like I was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen. Like he never wants to look away.

Just watching it, I feel shaken to my core. I’m overflowing with feelings—fear, lust, acceptance, longing. All my emotions explode out of the box where I’ve kept them locked down.

And now I’ll be on display.

“. . . is New Rome’s most eligible bachelor settling down? Who is the lucky woman who tamed this notorious playboy?”

They show a picture of Rex on a red carpet, looking suave, then juxtapose that with a police academy picture of me in my dress uniform. I look like a kid playing dress up, clueless, impossibly young.

The news switches to pictures of Rex’s glamorous ex-girlfriends, goddess after goddess with perfect skin and pouting lips like a slideshow on the screen. Women who deserve to stand on a red carpet with him. It’s obvious the press thinks Rex should be with one of them.

But in every picture of Rex and one of his exes, he keeps a space between his body and theirs. In contrast, on the City Hall steps, he crowded close to me and stared at me like we were the only two people on Earth. I’m not imagining this; it’s clearly shown.

Our marriage doesn’t look fake at all.

The chyron reads Secret Wedding: Rex Roy married!