Page 89 of Brazen King

She shakes her head, as if unable to voice the painful end of her thought. But the deep concern in her eyes triggers something deep inside my chest, and warmth floods my body as I see just how attentive she’s been while I’ve been lying here unconscious. She didn’t want to leave my side. And that gives me better hope for our future than I could have imagined after our conversation at the ball.

“She said they collapsed your lung when they stabbed you,” Natasha goes on softly. “You lost a dangerous amount of blood. Thankfully, you have some stockpiled.”

I smile and roll my eyes at Quinn’s obsessive insistence to collect the various types of blood whenever she can pin me or Lance—or one of the men—down for any length of time. “She’s always going on about wanting to be prepared to give us a blood transfusion because she never knows when we’re going to come home bled dry.”

“Well, clearly she has a point,” Natasha scolds gently. “Your sister put thirty stitches in you that night.”

I nod thoughtfully, trying to piece together the flashes of memory that filter into my brain. The mention of a collapsed lung and being stabbed help. But the images are fuzzy. I recall a crushing weight on my chest, searing pain between my ribs, and the agonizing inability to breathe.

Then the taunting threat rings in my ears, an Italian man telling me to hand over the Sokolov sisters and he’ll let me live. Not Lucian himself, but one of his men, I recall.

That triggers a flood of memories—the fight we had in the staircase, Lance and I protecting Natasha and Tatiana from Lucian Agosti’s men, who outnumbered us considerably. And though I gave it my all—and Natasha took out two of the men herself—I couldn’t finish them off before the last Italian stabbed me.

I vividly recall hitting the cold cement, choking in my blood as Natasha held me. Her tears were so genuine. The pain in her eyes had been agonizing to me because I knew I was the cause of it. But I was so far gone at the time, I couldn’t remember why I was to blame.

She begged me not to die…and promised to marry me if I would stay alive.

“Natasha,” I rasp, my chest suddenly tight with emotion as I think about the meaning behind those words.

“Hmm?” She leans closer, her dark-rimmed gray eyes intent as she searches my face.

And her genuine concern once again steals the breath from my lungs. I like this side of Natasha. Caring. Vulnerable. She’s looking at me like I’d always hoped she would once I found a way to bring her walls toppling. And I ache with longing to see the tender emotion in her eyes.

“About the promise you made…” I hedge, wondering if I have the strength to let her take it back. But I don’t want to force Natasha to marry me. I don’t want to guilt or blackmail her into anything any longer.

And for the first time, I have a sliver of hope that, if I set her free, she might just come back to me.

“To marry you?” she asks with a soft smile.

God, she’s beautiful. “Did you mean it? I mean…do you want to marry me? Because Iwantyou to mean it, but I know you agreed to it in a desperate situation, and you just lost your parents…”

Deep, raw pain flashes in her eyes, and I can see the true devastation of that loss reflected in her face. I want to take it all away, to relieve the grief that threatens to buckle her shoulders. But I also know she needs the space to grieve if she’s going to properly honor the ones she lost.

Quinn and I endured the same loss when our parents died, and only Natasha can bear the weight of it. All I can do is hold her up and keep her in one piece as she works through those emotions.

I clear my throat, trying to find the right words. “All I’m trying to say is if you aren’t ready to marry me—if you only said it because you thought you might lose me…well, I can wait until you’re ready.”

But the thought of having to wait any longer still knots my stomach.

Because I want Natasha so badly it hurts. I want to lay claim to her in every possible way. And I want to hold on to her forever.

Bafflement flashes across her delicate features, followed by a hint of amusement. And she gives me one of those rare smiles that says I’m a complete idiot and at the same time puts me on top of the world. Her eyes search mine, the sincerity in them so soft and feminine it makes me fall in love with her all over again. And slowly, she leans in to brush her lips across mine in the lightest of kisses.

“Of course I meant it,” she murmurs, and her hand comes to rest lightly on my chest, right over my heart. “It might have taken me a while to get it. But after coming that close to losing you, I figured it out. I’m crazy about you Killian King. I’m completely and irrevocably in love with you. And I never want to live a day without you.”

Her lips find mine once again, this time with a far more scintillating urgency, and that burning desire awakens in my chest once more.

“I love you,” I rasp when she pulls back to meet my gaze. “I’ve been in love with you since the first night you snuck into my bedroom to kill me.”

The hilarity of those words makes me smile, and Natasha releases one of her beautifully melodic laughs.

“So, Natasha Sokolov, will you marry me? For real?”

“Yes, you crazy Irishman. I’ll marry you every day for the next hundred years if you want,” she breathes.

Warmth bursts through me, and though I’m a little worse for wear, I can’t help myself. I pull her on top of me so I can do a proper job of kissing her senseless.

“Killian, your stitches!” she gasps, her body tensing as she hesitates to settle on top of me, but her gloriously bare thighs are already straddling my hips.

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