Page 10 of Cruel Crown

If I continued to see Gideon, if I allowed him to keep getting close, I could get lost in this feeling—in him. I couldn’t do that. I wouldn’t do that. The weight of an old crown rested on my shoulders.

So, I let Gideon fuck me. I kept his shirt on as a shield. I couldn’t be any more vulnerable around him. We fucked for dominance until the sun came out, and when a piercing scream broke through the house, I kicked him out.

I had a mission, I had a plan, and there was no room for him in it.

Daphne

Some plans were carefully executed; others had to be played by ear. I was on the latter one at the moment. I knew I would need to see Franco, and I knew that I couldn’t precisely stroll to the gates of his vineyard with his daughter, or he might just execute me on sight.

Since Bas stayed behind and I needed someone to help me, I had no other option but to call one of my markers. I could count my allies on one hand, but enemies, those I had in spades.

The plane arrived at night, thanks to us leaving so early in the morning. The person I’d called was already here and waiting in the airstrip, since for him, it was only an eight-hour flight, but for me, it was fourteen.

Rebeca Estacado was knocked out for part of the flight, and when she woke, she tried to commit suicide. The shame was always too much for them that they thought in death, it would be peaceful. Maybe it was selfish of me for letting her live, but we shouldn’t be scared or afraid of something we had no control over, and I needed her alive too much to let her just die.

The Italian girl was bound and gagged when I opened the door to the room. She glared at me with sad, angry eyes.

“You’ll thank me for this one day,” I said before I grabbed her by the wrist and pulled her up. She tried to resist and begged me with her eyes not to take her back to her father.

“Don’t make me do this the hard way… You won’t like it.” And neither would I, but compared tohim, she meant nothing.

She walked slowly, and I sighed a bit in relief. Subconsciously, she wanted to live—she wasn’t ready to admit it, but she wanted to live.

Per my instructions, the pilots were out of sight when the door opened. Standing at the bottom of the stairs was the man whose life I spared on my last trip to New York. He was tall, light skinned, and light haired with piercing blue eyes that would turn icy when he was enraged. He was well built, and boy could he put on a hell of a fight.

“The polite thing to do is to help a woman out,” I said through gritted teeth when I managed to get to the last step.

“I see no woman, just a bitch.” Ren Falcon bit out.

My eyes flared, but I held back. I guess if I wanted to win his loyalty, I was going to have to cut him some slack. There were very few people who got away with making empty promises to the Sekt, and he would have died like all others. Still, I owned his ass, and it was better that he didn’t forget it. My back still felt the sting of the punishment for sparing his life.

“How’s that pretty little girlfriend of yours?” I taunted, and his eyes went cold and his body stiff.

He didn’t say a word when he grabbed Maria’s arm and pulled her toward the car—the one I instructed him to get.

It was a blacked-out Dacia Duster. When the girl started to move erratically, I was about to pull out the syringe and sedate her when Ren hit the back of her head with the side of his hand, knocking her out instantly.

“I see domestic life hasn’t made you a pussy,” I said dryly as I put the syringe back in my pocket and walked to the driver’s seat.

“Sure, why don’t you drive,” he added in the same tone as me.

“You’re not used to driving on this side of the road, and no offense, a woman driving is less conspicuous.”

He snickered.

“Why would we get pulled over? “Anybody would think you are another rich bitch flying private.” Ren Falcon was a mercenary, one who could be loyal and he had a code. It was the reason why I didn’t kill him. He was an assignment I had to do, and I always liked to know my assignments; one could never be too careful.

Killing wasn’t an issue for Falcon. He was cold, efficient, but he was in love, and through that, I was able to make sure he was going to jump when I asked for it. I told myself I wasn’t like Damian. If he bothered to do our dirty work, then he would have killed the thing Falcon held most dear, and that was his girlfriend.

But that would have brought us problems as well, because of who the girl’s maternal grandparents were, and Damian would have been too arrogant to care. So I kept my mouth shut and saved that information for a rainy day.

“This whole city is currently on alert,” I said as I navigated the dark streets toward the closest hotel to the Estacados’ vineyards. “The girl in the back seat is Rebeca Maria Estacado.”

“Shit,” he cursed as he pulled a cigarette from his pockets. “That explains a lot.”

My head turned toward his. “Explain yourself?”

He ignored me while he lit his cigarette and then opened the window to ash it. “After my fight, there wasn’t anything Ignacio could do for me.” Ignacio was Franco’s younger brother who held down the front in New York. “So we made an arrangement. They helped me with a little problem, and in return, I owed him three markers, no questions asked.”

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