Page 1 of Break a King (Five Kings 3)

Lexi

He looks at me as if he’s sizing up his next meal. The swirl of his tongue across his lips. The deepening desire in his eyes makes my breath pause and wonder if it’s ok to carry on. The slight smirk on his face as he casts his eyes across my body and the knowing look he throws my way promising me I will only leave when he says so.

I shift nervously in my seat and cross my legs to stop them from trembling. A nervous habit I should really have conquered by now. I can feel the sweat sliding down my back as the anticipation grows and my breathing is erratic as if I’ve run a marathon and may not recover.

It’s all around us. The atmosphere is choking me, drowning me, and threatening to inflict a wound so deep I will bleed to death before him.

He looks as if he’s deep in thought. Probably planning the direction my life is about to take. Planning the agenda that ends it.

He wants me; he thinks he owns me, and he thinks I’m good with that.

I’m not.

Far from it, in fact, and yet I still can’t stop my leg from shaking as he casts his powerful gaze all over me.

I watch as he lifts the crystal glass to his lips and swirls the amber liquid in a fine arc, allowing it to breathe. I wish I was so lucky. I am struggling to fill my lungs with air because this man is ripping the oxygen from the room and leaving me with the toxic fumes of destiny.

But whose?

“Do I make you nervous, Eliza?”

“No, sir.” I’m amazed my voice made it out from behind the wall it’s hiding behind because I can’t bring myself to move, let alone speak right now.

“You should be.”

“Why?”

I try to brazen it out and appear unconcerned about how this man affects me. I should drag my dignity around me like a shield and stare him straight in the eye and demonstrate how strong I am. But I can’t. Because of who he is.

Massimo De Luca, mafia bastard, psychopath, murderer, and I’m his next victim.

“You know why you’re here.”

A statement of fact, and I’m only surprised he bothered to ask the question.

I nod and lick my dry lips as I taste the fear. Fear that I’ll fail, it’s always there, the heightened sense of disaster that I can’t seem to shake.

He nods as if closing a business deal and shifts forward, causing me to recoil slightly in my seat. “Madison sent you to me to break you in. To educate you in the profession you now call yours. You have never been with a man before, is that correct?”

Swallowing hard, I try to inject some fear into my eyes and direct them to the part that interests him the most, his iniquitous soul. “Yes sir.”

He leans back and I sense the desire growing in him by the second. The night sky outside is as dark as the eyes that are stripping me bare right now, and only the erratic sound of my breathing disturbs an otherwise dead sound.

We are sitting in his apartment in the heart of the city. The place he prefers to be alone, away from his usual fortress, where he runs his business like a general. Making decisions that will cost many lives and not giving them a second thought. We are thankfully not at one of his many warehouses dotted around the city where he tortures, maims, and despatches his victims to an afterlife they take some time to reach. Men and women who have angered him in some way, his enemies, those who criticize him, and some who only look at him the wrong way. I am here because he has a sordid secret he practises often. His sexual desires are debauched and illegal. He likes to ruin a virgin and make the experience one she will never recover from. Many end up dead because he can be a little over-exuberant sometimes in his pursuit of a high only a despicable soul would get off on.

He has to go.

He raises his glass to his lips and I swear time stands still. I concentrate on trying to make myself as small as possible in my seat as he casts his wicked eyes over me as if deciding which part to ruin first.

We are alone because he prefers it that way. His bodyguards have been given the night off and are only required to scoop up the body if things go a little too far. It’s the only time he reveals his Achilles heel, and it’s up to me to strike it because I can’t fail. Death follows if I do—mine.

He sets down the glass and licks his lips in anticipation and I note the battle-torn eyes of the damned gazing at me with lust and excitement for an evening spent cutting out my heart.

He stands and I swear my heart rate increases to dangerous levels as he walks across to the large panoramic window looking down on a town who shiver in fear of his shadow. He runs it with an iron fist and I’m in no doubt he has no heart. Too many people have met their maker courtesy of him and the options are few to rid the world of a menace dressed like a prince.

From his ten-thousand-dollar shoes flown in from Italy that were made especially for him, to the tailored cloth of a suit many would work a lifetime to afford. The thread used to create such a masterpiece was paid for by the souls of the damned—the souls he sent there.

Despite all his wealth, he is still the most unattractive man I have ever met. Sharp angular features with a cruel edge that makes you shiver just staring at his image on a computer screen. His body has become another victim of his dubious tastes because it went to ruin years ago. The muscle has been engulfed in fat and any definition lost as he enjoys the excesses rich living provides. He is a walking health hazard in every way, and I am about to be his next meal.

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