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CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT

VALE

I lock my vintage red bike to the iron gate by my apartment and think of Nash. The fact that he’s following me everywhere makes it impossible not to. I swear I can feel him parked across the street somewhere, protecting me.

It makes this hollow ache I’ve had in my heart since childhood feel open and vulnerable. One man was supposed to fill it, but another man did.

People joke about “daddy issues,” but they’re not funny. They’re real. They hurt deeply and to the bone.

Anytime someone who was supposed to love and protect you hurts you instead? It marks your soul.

And sure, it affects the love you seek from others until you learn to love yourself.

I do. I love myself enough to admit Nash isn’t my father figure. He’s more. He’s my soulmate.

He’s my Happy Meal.

I just need my heart to catch up to my head. It doesn’t happen overnight. It takes time to figure out what’s normal in our relationship and what’s trauma left over from my dad and everything else. I get it. I read the books.

Ironically, my dad called me this week. He wants to talk and mend things with Blair and me. He deserves a chance, and I deserve to forgive him. It’s for me, not for him. I deserve to heal.

So, can I forgive Nash, too?

Or is it acceptance?

The catch is there’s nothing normal about our not-mafia-mafia relationship. I can’t find those answers in a book.

Turner was my first dead body, and me and my nine iron had a lot to do with it.

Is something wrong with me because I don’t feel guilty about it? I’ve given myself weeks, and all I feel is… Relief. Justice. Revenge.

Or does that make me a boss-bitch mafia queen like the others? Like I was meant for this?

I can hear it in Alena’s voice when we talk. She’s starting to accept this life. She forgives her father. Nash has proven his love for her too many times for Alena to let one colossal mafia mistake erase everything he’s devoted to her.

And when she complains about Loch sticking around? How he moved out of their cabin but still goes to their work? How he acts like nothing’s wrong in front of their colleagues, but he leaves wildflowers by her door every morning? I can hear it, too. He has a fighting chance with her.

Trudging up my porch stairs, I smile.

The kings and queens are fighting for me, too.

Jace has been … well, Jace … bribing me with Reese’s peanut butter cups while sweet-talking me about how I belong with Nash. Sire and Wren invite me to dinner, and we talk about everyone but Nash. They make me feel like I belong with them, too. Axel comes by, claiming he’s buying naughty toys for his mystery woman, but I know he’s checking on me.

All urge me to forgive Nash’s lie about Loch and Alena, especially Nadine. She won’t stop blaming herself, and I know there’s so much more to her story, to the story of all her sons, that would explain some of my resistance away, but right now?

I’m not the little girl waiting for her dad, who never showed up. I’m not the teen survivor who’s free of her tormentor.

So, who am I?

Who are you when you let your past go and face your future?

I huff, sweating as I round the final rung of stairs to my apartment and stop dead in my tracks. “What are you doing here?”

Nash looks too sexy, kneeling by my door with a wilted red tulip in hand, slinging his smiling sunshine everywhere. “I came for my poison.”

The fight in me is instant. My nostrils flare. “I’m not in the mood.”

“Too bad,” he answers. “Because I am.”

“Fine,” I snark. “Stay there and stink. The trash gets picked up tomorrow.”

Maybe that’s who I am now—a fighter.

He smirks. “You’ll get a spanking for that sass.”

“And you’ll get a middle finger. You’re why god created them.”

His smirk only grows. “God knows where I crave your middle finger.”

“I have one nerve left, and you’re dry-humping it.” I march his way, fishing for my keys in my bag. “Get out of my way, or I won’t be responsible for what my knee does to your balls.”

“I love it when my balls are the center of your attention, too.”

“Nash!” I stomp my Mary Jane. “I’m serious. If you think I’m short, you should see my patience.”

“I can’t.” He’s still on his knees. “You have none, just like me, and I’m tired of waiting, Vale. Time to talk.”

“Oh yeah?” I stick my key in the doorknob. “Then, on your mark, get set, go fuck yourself.”

Yep, I’m a fighter…

…and something else.

Because he grabs my shaking hands, gently tugging them away, leaving my keys dangling in the doorknob. He holds my heart, too. It’s hanging by a thread with him touching me again.

I’m his.

“I’m sorry.” He sounds so warm. “I truly am. Alena can forgive me, but it won’t be right. I won’t be right until I earn your forgiveness, too.”

“Why should I forgive you? If I had a dollar for every time you lied to me,” I tremble, “I’d be rich.”

“You are rich. You have a life of me giving you everything I have: heart, body, and soul.” Slowly, he rises. “I’m a flawed man living a dangerous life. I warned you, Vale, but you said you wanted it, so I need you to understand it, too. Understand me . I’ll do whatever it takes to protect you and Alena. So, let me inside, and we’ll talk about it.”

I don’t know if I can talk because I already understand him. Nash is a beautiful beast who protects the ones he loves.

But me? I’m a storm of emotions I don’t understand, so I rely on my lonely habit. It’s gotten me this far. “I wanna be alone.”

“No, you don’t.” He cups my flushed cheek. “You’re not alone, and you never were. I’ve been here all along, and I’m not leaving. If I have to kneel, watching a tulip wilt in my hand while I fight for you every day, I will.”

I mutter, “No, you won’t.”

No man’s ever fought for me.

Well … Nash did. He killed for me.

Twice.

“Wanna bet, poison?” he asks, letting my hand go so I can swing my door open.

He waits at my threshold while I blink, my pupils adjusting from the bright sun outside to the muted shadows of my apartment. It takes a moment to look around. To realize…

They’re everywhere.

Dozens of red tulips in glass vases circle my apartment. They’re nestled between my stacks of books. They’re on my dresser. They’re in baskets on my loveseat. On my bed, there’s a blanket of their red petals, and on my laptop stands a sculpture of hand-blown glass tulips, two intertwined.

“Oh my god,” I sigh, knowing Nash did this and not believing it.

Then, I glance left to my kitchenette, to the bistro table, and I choke down my sob. My happy sob.

Two Happy Meals.

They sit in their red boxes on gold trays.

When I don’t understand my emotions. When they flood me with pain and memories … Nash anchors me. He’s strong enough to feel them with me. Lust, love, or loss; it doesn’t matter. He holds me until my storm passes. He slings his sunshine and makes it all okay.

He’s right.

He’s always been here.

He’s always fought for me.

He’s always loved me.

And me?

I’m the queen who belongs beside him.

“Bet on us, Vale.” His lips press to my ear. “Let me love you. Let me inside forever, and I promise I’ll never leave.”

How do you start forgiving someone when, deep down, you always will? You’ll always love them? You’ll always give them a chance because they’re the only one you’re willing to take?

I turn around and give him my kiss. He’s the only man who gets it, as Nash gives me his, too, tender and slow at first. Like he’ll always understand my past while he kills for our future. While his tongue finds mine, claiming even more of me.

“You have so much groveling to do,” I warn over our heating lips.

“Poison, I’ll fall to my knees for you.” And he does.

At first, I think it’s to lift my miniskirt and rip my panties aside. He has such a fetish for eating me out, and, god, I’ve missed him.

But Nash surprises me.

Reaching into his disguise, his creased khakis, he lifts a black velvet bag and tugs its gold drawstring open. Grinning, he pulls something out. “If I tried to hide a ring box in my pants, you’d snark about my huge size, so I hope this is too big for you, too.”

“It’s not too big.” I shake my head at the enormous black, pear-shaped diamond surrounded by a halo of clear ones on a gold band. “It’s perfect.”

“Perfect for my beautiful wife.” He lifts my left hand to his lips. “Poison, will you marry me and vow to kill me with that mouth every day?”

I nod, tears salting my smile. “On one condition.”

“Only one?” He smirks.

“Okay, three.”

“Should’ve shut up at one.”

I wink. “You’ll learn.”

“Name them.”

“Okay, five, now.”

“Vale.”

“Okay, one: You dress like Gomez Addams at our wedding. Pinstripe suit. Pencil mustache and?—”

“Fuck, no.” He laughs on bended knee. “Try again.”

“We get married at night by the river.” His brown eyes sparkle, imaging it, too. “In the backyard of our new house.”

“Done.”

“I want all the kings and queens there. That means Alena and Loch, too. So we have to wait until they’re back together, or she’s moved on.”

He nods. “Of course.”

“And three, but I’m saving the last two for later. That’s part of your groveling punishment…”

He holds the ring poised over my shaking black fingernail. “Yes, we can serve Happy Meals at our wedding.”

How did he know?

“Okay, then, four: We invite my father to our wedding. I want to give him a chance to make it right.”

“Whatever you want, poison, it’s yours.” He still holds my ring, waiting, asking, “Now, will you finally let me make us right? Will you marry me?”

“Only if you vow to stay big and hard like my ring.”

That’s my sweet, snarky answer, and he smirks, sliding it on. “This diamond, my heart, and my dick are yours forever.”

He rises with my smile. After a kiss that rips my breath away, he scoops me up and tosses me on the bed, red tulip petals bouncing around me.

He tugs off my shoes, leaving my thigh-highs on. “Show me what’s mine,” he orders. “Only mine, or I’ll kill someone. Do you understand me now?”

“Yes, Daddy,” I tease because I do understand him, and he understands me, too, as I lift my black mini-skirt and tug my white panties aside. He licks his lips, staring at my pussy, so I clench it for him. His heated glare and hard cock in his pants are making me wet. I need him so much…

“But Nash,” I nod toward my door, “go lock it. I know we’re safe and all now, but?—”

He arches a brow, “Yeah, about that…” and I roll my eyes, grinning.

Great.

More Bratva bullshit.