Page 55 of Runaway Queen

I was done.

I handed Nikolai the frame.

He turned his attention to it slowly. My heart was pounding so loudly, I could barely hear anything else. His head tilted down, and his eyes locked on the photo.

In it, I held Leo on my knee. We were both laughing. I was looking at the little boy who had changed my life, and Leo was looking at the camera. His eyes looked silver in the light of that sunny afternoon.

Nikolai jerked, an involuntary response, like how you might fold over after a sucker punch. He stared at the photo, and I stared at him. His long, tattooed hand fell to the glass, and he traced a long finger over the image of Leo.

It felt wrong to be standing over him. I needed to be closer. I sank to my knees in front of him so I was able to look up into his face.

His expression was blank. Only the tic of a muscle in his jaw betrayed that he was even alive.

“If Antonio had only threatened you, I would have told him to go to hell. Who could take out the devil himself? I would have written you, visited you. No one could have stopped me.”

I took a deep breath. I was crying, I realized with a shock. Tears were running freely down my cheeks. My biggest sin, and my most awful regret, were being dragged out into the light, and I couldn’t control my pent-up emotions.

“But Antonio didn’t only threaten you. He threatened him, and I couldn’t take any chances with”—I took a deep breath, saying the words for the very first time—“our son.”

Nikolai flinched again. His eyes still hadn’t moved from the picture. He wiped beneath one eye, slowly and deliberately. A tear fell on the glass of the photo. It wasn’t mine, but the sight of it only sent more of my own down my cheeks.

I’d been so alone. So terribly lonely and so afraid for so long. A sob wrenched itself from my chest, sounding wretched and ugly in the silence between us.

Nikolai’s hand landed softly on my cheek. His finger wiped the dripping tears away, though only more fell. I was really crying now.

“Don’t cry, Sofia. Tears can’t change the past.” His voice was rough. “Nothing can.”

He shifted, placing the photo on the bed with a soft reverence I’d never seen before. Then his hands went to my face. He stroked his thumbs across my cheeks, washing away my tears. I blinked at him, my eyes swimming and unfocused.

“Get up, prom queen,” he softly urged.

I clung to his arms as he stood from the chair and took me with him. My legs felt uncertain as I held on to his arms. His voice was low as he pulled me into the warmth of his chest.

“You don’t kneel. Not for anyone, and not for me.”

My head jerked up, and I stared at him in surprise. That gentle reverence was in his voice, too. My eyes finally cleared enough to be able to see his.

He wasn’t angry. He wasn’t vengeful. He wasn’t manic with that terrifying energy that had sent me running into the woods the other night.

He was calm. His eyes were resolute. For the first time since he’d come back into my life, he looked like Nikolai from the basement of Casa Nera. He looked like the man who had held my hand and stopped me from falling over a rusty broken railing, even though it meant he’d get caught.

He was still there, deep down inside the damage that jail and lies had caused. My heart squeezed hard.

“What do you mean?” I managed to force out.

“You, Sofia De Sanctis, kneel for no one.”

His arms went around my legs, and he picked me up before I could really process what he meant. He held me tightly to his chest, bridal-style, and left the room that smelled of Leo. I reached out when we got to the door and switched the light off. Nikolai turned slightly to take us both through the narrow doorway. In that moment of darkness, he looked up at the neon glow that suffused the room in the sudden darkness.

Stars.

A multitude of night stars.

The night sky that had always connected us.

His hands tightened on me to the point of hurting. I didn’t care. Sometimes, some things should hurt. This was one of them. I’d been hurting for so long, it barely registered. He pulled away from the night sky I’d built for our son and walked us down the dark hall. I stared at the underside of his jaw and the tattoo that licked up his neck.

Moonlight passed over us as we walked past windows. I couldn’t resist bringing my hand up to touch his jaw. He was real. He was here. It still felt like an impossible dream. The thought of Antonio finding out, which had once terrified me, didn’t seem to matter anymore. Nikolai was free. I wasn’t alone anymore.

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