Page 63 of Pretty Vengeful Queen

It doesn’t surprise me, but I’m also not going to put up with it.

I’m the one who opened the door and walked in. And I’ll pull down every one of the walls he puts up between us, take everything the “monster” in him can throw at me, until he realizes the truth.

I’m not going anywhere.

He’ll never drive me away.

I love this maddening, damaged man, and if I can’t quite say that to him yet, I can at least show him that he’ll never scare me off.

I roll over and get to my feet, advancing on him as he retreats. “Look at me, Logan.”

“I am,” he says in that clipped, closed-off and utterly factual way he has.

I smile, letting my expression lay bare all the emotions he’s not ready to hear.

“Look at what you did to me,” I whisper as I reach him, bunching up the material of his smoke-and-gunpowder stained shirt and pulling him toward me. “I’m a mess. Your mess. And if you can give me all of that, you can at least kiss me too.”

His brow furrows. “I’m—”

“Mine,” I interrupt softly, not so subtly stroking the scar he left between my breasts. “So kiss me and show me that I’m yours too.”

Something shifts in his eyes, then he slides his fingers through my hair and palms the back of my head, bringing his mouth to mine. Carefully. Intentionally. Deliberately. Completely in control.

I give in to him, opening for him without any hesitation, releasing his shirt so I can slide both hands up his chest and wrap them around his neck as I press myself against him.

I’mhis, just like I’m his brothers’, and I feel it the moment he lets himself believe it, turning the kiss into a possessive claim that has none of the desperation of the sex we just had, but every bit of the dark hunger that fueled it.

It feels good. It feels perfect. And whatever comes next, whatever that bastard McKenna throws at us as this war escalates, it’s something that no one can ever take away.

Not from either of us.

19

DANTE

I wakeup on the couch downstairs, my mind still turning over some of the scenarios Maddoc and I were working on last night. It doesn’t surprise me that I fell asleep down here. We were deep in battle planning mode, and the urgency of this bullshit with West Point meant that neither one of us wanted to let up until we came up with an idea of how the fuck we’re supposed to protect what’s ours now that he’s bringing in mercenaries who could theoretically mow our people down without lifting a finger.

Theoretically.

Obviously, that didn’t work out so well for McKenna yesterday at our warehouse.

I smirk as I sit up, but then lose the expression in the face of hard facts. Yeah, we got all our people out without any casualties, but we lost a fuck-ton of product and worse, showed them what we’re capable of.

I’ve got no doubt at all that trained operatives like he sent after us at the warehouse are going to use what they learned from our response to hit us harder next time.

“Fuck,” I mutter, needing some goddamn coffee before I deal with that thought. I smell some, and if I had to guess who’s in the kitchen this early making it, I’d go with either Logan or Riley.

My bitch-ass mood evaporates in a wave of heat. I went upstairs to grab some shit Madd and I needed to look at last night from the library next to Logan’s room, and there was no mistaking the sounds coming from behind his closed door.

I grin, adjusting my morning wood when things get a little tight in my pants as it reacts to that memory.

There will never be a time when Riley’s pleasure doesn’t get me going. The woman is the hottest thing in existence, and all this love shit between us just adds fuel to the fire.

Although I’ve gotta admit, so does what she has going on with Logan.

It’s crazy as hell to see him opening up to her too. I’d lay down my life for him, but I never thought I’d see the day he’d admit to wanting someone. Or, hell, allow himself to get close enough to have someone, what with all his control issues.

I guess it just took finding a woman who meshes perfectly with all his jagged edges, and it’s not even like she smooths them down, she just… fits. It’s fucking incredible, and if I’m being honest, I don’t think there’s any way I could have the feelings for her that I do if she didn’t have something just as deep with both my brothers too.

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