Page 44 of The Broken Queen

Guilt swarmed through me. How would I make this up to her? How would I make this up to Julianna? There was still anger within me. I was still angry with Raven that she didn’t try hard enough to get me out, but the anger dimmed with this new information.

I was so fucking screwed.

I flipped back through the journal, looking to see what else I missed and see if I could find what I was looking for. I needed to know more about her mother’s murder. If she remembered anything from that day, who the guy looked like, what was happening around them.

It would’ve been easier to just ask her, but when it came to this, she wouldn’t say a word. She was so tightlipped about her mother’s murder. Even when we were younger and it was fresh on her mind, she couldn’t get the courage to talk about it. It was more traumatic to her than all the stuff she suffered through as a kid.

There was one thing in particular I was looking for that I hadn’t seen yet. There were only a few pages left in the journal and as I flipped to the last ones, I sucked in a breath.

Mother’s murder....

“Please, don’t do this!”

Wait...that was Mother’s voice.

My walk turned into a run. Once I reached the den door, there were two figures. One was Mother whose eyes were wide and her body was still, and the other was a man with his back to me. That man was holding a gun pointed straight at her.

“I’m sorry. You know the world we live in. This has to happen.” I tried to make out the man’s voice but couldn't, and when I moved forward, my presence became known. Mother glanced at me quickly and gave me a silent warning to stay put. Fuck that, I never did what I was told.

Everything happened in slow motion. A sharp breath escaped my lips when a pop pop sound rang through my ears. My heart dropped to my stomach as I watched her fall to the ground. When the man placed the gun in his pocket, he made a move to turn. I quickly rushed back out of the den and into the dark hallway. I hid behind one of Father’s many statues, this one a soldier who was holding a rifle over his shoulder. My body trembled as I covered my mouth with my hands so he wouldn’t hear my panting.

He strode down the hall, taking his time, not caring that he just hurt Mother or that we were under a tornado warning. The wind howled outside, and then time stopped. His phone rang right in front of the statue I was hiding behind. He stopped walking and answered. My heart was pounding so fast I was afraid he could hear it. I bit my lip and stood stock still.

“Yeah,” he barked through the phone. “It’s done. I’m getting the fuck out of here.” I couldn’t hear the person on the other end of the line, but the man’s foot was tapping on the ground and I could tell he was getting more agitated the longer he was on the phone. “Her body is in the library. It’s about to be wiped away by a tornado, anyway. No one will know she was murdered. It’ll be marked down as the cause of the tornado.”

My hands clenched into fists. While I had previously feared he would catch me, something sparked behind the pain I feltwhen he shot Mother. I wanted him to know I saw his face. I wanted him to know he wouldn’t get off scot free. He would pay, and even though physically I couldn’t outman him, I knew Father could.

Sucking in a breath, I revealed myself from behind the statue. The man’s brown eyes, that were so dark they were almost black, widened. The momentary shock vanished in an instant. The man’s features darkened and matched his midnight long hair. Everything about him screamed evil.

He took a step forward, and I took several steps back. The pain of watching Mother die before my eyes was crushing my chest, but I couldn’t focus on that currently. Instead, I had to find a way to make the man pay for his crimes, and if that meant leading him out into the middle of a chaotic tornado, so be it.

I blinked. I remembered that day. The storm was terrible, the whole Kingdom was on lockdown and there she was running out into the middle of the storm to escape a murderer. She would never say it herself, but Raven was stronger than anyone I’d ever met. She was brave, and she always fought for the truth. That’s why she would’ve made an excellent Queen, if her father would loosen the reins.

The words from the journal were running together, but reading this clarified what I was finally starting to process. The Queen’s murder was a hit, and it was carried out by none other than her King. There were numerous news reports and articles of how husbands and wives would hire hit men to off their partner so they wouldn’t have to deal with them.

Then there were the questions. The King seemed like he loved the Queen. It looked like he was in love with her, not just a surface love. So if that was the case, then why did he want to get rid of her?

Unless she found out something he didn’t want her to know.Maybe she found out about a trafficking ring? Her daughter’s tragic time in the dungeon?Or maybe...she found out the truth from my parents.

That Raven wasn’t the heir to the throne like she or her mother had originally thought.

I was starting to think that Zeke was a part of the King’s mafia ties. After all, I was sure it was the main reason Lars wanted to be King in the first place. If you were a royal, people hardly asked questions. Including the police. They knew to back down, and most of the time, they would take orders from a royal. He was the Mafia King. I’d discovered his ties to them shortly after my parents were murdered. I was slowly starting to uncover the truth.

Trafficking.

I wondered if that was Lars’s plan after all. To get Raven married to Zeke and have him take her away, to never be or heard from again.

My stomach dropped.What if that was the plan this whole time?He wasn’t grooming Raven to be Queen, he was grooming her to become a part of this nasty trade.

I was in way over my head. I needed help and the one person I knew wanted to see Lars destroyed more than myself was also the same person I was trying to avoid. It was time to bring her on board, no matter how much I wanted to keep her at a distance.I couldn’t tell her everything though, not yet.

The King’s game was dangerous and he had everyone fooled, including myself.

It was time to bring the Queen’s piece to the chessboard.

Chapter Twenty-Three

Raven

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