Page 7 of Heads You Lose (Grim & Beast Duet 2)

CHAPTERTWO

Dreams

GRIM - TWO YEARS LATER

“You will arrive at your destination in two hundred and fifty yards,”the Sat Nav drones as I crawl along the quiet street in Betws-y-Coed, Wales, looking for number thirty-five. It’s been a long drive from London, and the picturesque village is a far cry from the hustle and bustle of my hometown. Instead of concrete high-rises, smog and litter, there’s pretty cottages, fresh air and greenery. I find myself wondering what living here must feel like.

Peaceful, I imagine.

“You have reached your destination.”

I put the car in park and kill the engine, rubbing at the ache in my chest that’s a permanent reminder of howunpeaceful my life is. Being the owner of Tales is a full-time job. Being Grim, a ball and chain.

I both love her and hate her.

Sighing, I pull down the visor and check my reflection in the mirror. Tired eyes stare back at me, but that’s no surprise given I haven’t really slept since my dad’s will was read a couple weeks back. Nothing like finding out you have a younger half-sister to add to your troubles. That and running a business that has only officially become yours since the remains of your dad’s body was found, and he was no longer deemed a “missing person”.

I laugh at that.

Fucking ridiculous, but it kept the cops and the bastard criminal underbelly off my back long enough to build an army to protect what’s mine because, fuck, this life is tough.

I’ve always known it, but Carter had been a buffer between my reality and the real world. Now I’m in the thick of it, there’s no hiding behind a book of fairy tales or romantic notions. Just like the majority of the characters in Grimms’ Fairy Tales, I don’t get a happily ever after.

I scowl at my reflection, if I look a little too closely there’s more than exhaustion swelling in my eyes, there’s lingering heartbreak too that no amount of time seems to diminish.

It’s been almost two years since I shot Beast.

Two long years and the girl I’ve tried to bury with the memory of him refuses to fucking leave. She clings onto that man fiercely, and in turn I cling onto her because… If I let Kate go, I let him go, and even after everything that’s happened I don’t fucking want to.

Not that I’d admit that to anyone,ever.

Gripping the steering wheel, I rest my forehead against my curled fists and squeeze my eyes shut, trying to forget how it felt to see the man I loved battered and bleeding on his knees before me.

I could’ve killed him.

I’d considered it. Had turned the thought over and over in my head as Carter had stared sightlessly up at the ceiling and the King, Rodriguez and Dom had waited for me to act.

But I didn’t.

I shot him and banished him instead.

I will never forget the way he looked at me after the bullet ripped through his skin and muscle, knocking him back only for him to right himself again. The way he lifted his hand, not to stem the flow of blood from the bullet wound in his shoulder, but to rest it over my handprint tattooed on his chest.

It broke me.

I’ve been in pieces ever since.

“I love you, Kate,”he’d said, then he turned to Dom and asked him to watch over me before he staggered to his feet and left.

I’ve thought about him every day since, both hating him and loving him. Truth be known, behind closed doors, in the privacy of my bedroom, he’s the one I hunger for. I can’t seem to let him go, and because of that I’ve never allowed another man in my bed despite the offers I’ve received.

The woman who single-handedly made Tales into the most successful fight club in Europe, making a reputation for herself at the same time, isstilla virgin.

Fuck, the criminals I rub shoulders with on the daily would have a field day knowing that, because according to every one of those motherfuckers you can’t be a badass—not-to-be-fucked-with—bitch who will sooner kneecap you than let you call her by her real nameandbe a virgin. Their small arse brains just can’t deal with that.

To them, being a virgin equals purity and purity equals innocence, and that couldn’t be further from the truth. Sure I’ve considered fucking around with a select few, but when it came to the crunch I couldn’t bring myself to sleep with them or do anything more than kiss. I just didn’t want them like that. Icouldn’tdo it because no matter what I told myself, my heart belongs to one man and one man only. Beast.

Despite that, I’mnotpure. Not in my actions or in my thoughts, and certainly not when I make myself come night after night thinking of the only man I will ever love, a man who’ll never be a part of my life again. Not ever.

---