Page 133 of Tarnished Queen

“I’m going to pick you up,” he says. “Tell me if something hurts.”

Everything hurts, I think. But I can’t force the words out. My lips won’t move, and the harder I try, the more tired I get.

My eyes drop closed and the world fades away.

* * *

Nikolai looks like a god. He’s shirtless and jogging towards me, sweat glistening across his skin.

“Did you have a good run?” I ask, swallowing back the lust clogging my throat. I want to lick him clean.

He slows to a stop in front of the porch and shakes out his limbs. Muscles ripple. It takes physical effort to keep my tongue from lolling out of my mouth.

“I finished, so I guess it was fine. I prefer getting my cardio in other ways,” he says, wagging dark brows at me. “But you said you were busy, so—”

A blush creeps across my chest, but I hold my chin high. “Next time you want to have sex in the middle of the afternoon, I’ll tell the kids to make their own damn snacks.”

“Good. It’s about time they learn.” He grins and swipes a hand across his forehead. “Where are the kids, anyway?”

“Aunt Elise came and picked them up. She’s taking them to the children’s museum and then for ice cream.”

Nikolai’s gray eyes lock on mine. “Are you telling me the house is empty?”

“That is exactly what I’m telling you, Mr. Zhukova.” I lean back on my palms, back arched, shamelessly ogling him. “What are you going to do about it?”

He crosses the distance between us in two strides and scoops me into his arms. I yelp, but there’s no need. He won’t drop me. He never has.

“You’re all sweaty.” I swipe my fingers across his golden chest, trying to be disgusted with him. But I’m only human.

“And about to get sweatier.” He leans down like he’s going to kiss me, but I barely feel the brush of his lips.

“Hey!” I wrap a hand around his neck and pull him down to me. Once again, his lips move across me, but I don’t feel a thing. “Why aren’t you kissing me?”

I open my eyes. Nikolai is still holding me, but his face is suddenly, bizarrely blank. His gaze is flat. Lifeless. He looks down at me, slack-jawed and vacant, and asks, “Why would I kiss you?”

“Because… because you’re my husband?” I laugh, but it’s a weak, nervous sound.

He shakes his head. “No, I’m not.”

“Is this a joke? This is a weird joke.”

“It’s not a joke.”

“Then what is it?” I demand, suddenly angry. “We’re married. You and I, we—we had a wedding. And how do you explain the kids? There are three of them.”

Nikolai shakes his head again. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Nikolai, stop! We have three kids. Their names are…” I think hard, but no names come to me. My mind goes perfectly blank. I grunt in frustration. “I know we have kids! What are their names?”

“We don’t have kids,” he says, his voice shifting to a lower pitch with every word, into baritone, into something too low to be real. I barely recognize it now. “We don’t have anything. There is nothing between us.”

“What are you even saying? This doesn’t make any—”

I look up and Nikolai’s face is gone. It’s like he was a graphite drawing and someone smudged the image. His features shift and slide and blur until he is a cloud. Until he doesn’t exist.

Until nothing exists.

I scream, but it doesn’t make a sound.

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