Page 21 of Make Me Queen

“Do you think Alexander forced her to call you? Do you think he might be dangerous to her?”

The question made sense, given the particular kind of monster Aurora had grown up with, but I shook my head. “My fucked up family is different than your fucked up family. My parents would never hurt each other. They would choose each other over me.”

I pulled into the driveway of the house. Aurora looked shocked. “Do you really feel that way?”

“It doesn't bother me.” I reached over and grabbed the back of her neck to pull her face toward me. Those big luminous purple eyes met mine. “I would choose you over everyone else.”

We met up inside with Remy and Stellan to talk about whether it was worth going to see what my parents had to say. “I'm sure this meeting is my father's idea. I think it's worth trying to gauge his plans. You know I can do that.” I glanced around at the other guys, who knew how good I was at reading people. When I cared to. They nodded an agreement.

That general agreement vanished the second I said, “But I'm going to go alone.”

“That's stupid,” Aurora said.

“No, you all distract me, and you slow me down. And I put the odds at 50/50 that things really go to shit with my dad today.”

“You just love us,” Remy said. “You want to protect us.”

“I want the three of you protecting Aurora,” I said. “I know how much my father cares about protecting his wife. He'll assume Aurora is my weak spot.”

It was a correct assumption.

“Do you want us to go in and get his wife? Extract her so that we can use her to negotiate?” Pax demanded.

Stellan leaned over to him, and in a stage whisper, said, “That’s his mom.”

“Let's save the acts of open war for now,” I said. “I want to go and see what they say.”

My father used to always say that chess might be lost by the king, but it was won by the queen. Knowing how he felt about the importance of a woman to motivate a man, he might come after Aurora.

He must have been thinking of the same philosophy, because my mother called me again a few moments later. “And I forgot to mention, honey. Please bring your girlfriend. Aurora. She was so sweet. I would love to see her again.”

“I'm not going to do that.”

“Oh, honey, you have to! Your father won't agree to the meeting otherwise.”

He didn't want his queen on the table unless I had mine.

* * *

Aurora might be goingin with me, but Stellan and Remy and Pax were standing guard just outside.

Stellan eyed the goons on the other side of the driveway. “So we're having a goon standoff.”

“I'm glad you're accepting your natural place as one of my minions.”

“I'm only your goon for the day,” Remy said. Then he winked at Aurora. “I’m always her goon.”

I offered Aurora my arm, and then she took it, her fingers delicately resting over my forearm. She said, “You’re unusually gallant today.”

“I just want to keep you close.” I’d forced Aurora into a discreet bulletproof denim jacket that Stellan had ordered for her from a body armor company that I had ties with. But it wouldn't do nearly as much as the tailored bulletproof suit that I wore, so I wanted to be ready to put my body between her and any attackers while I mowed them down.

We might be going to brunch, but we're still heavily armed.

My mother teared up as she hugged me hello when we walked into the expensive Italian tiles lobby. My father watched me with hard eyes.

“Hi Dad.”

* * *

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