Page 36 of Vicious Prince (Violent Kingdom)

Or maybe it’s not. Maybe it’s just how weak I am, with my heart struggling to pump its meager supply of blood around my body, to keep me alive.

Either way, I’m slumped on the mattress five minutes later, panting shallow breaths as I try to stay awake. The room spins around me like one of those circus rides, where you’re pinned to the side of a spinning disc, and gravity makes you so heavy you can barely blink. That’s how I feel now, looking at the boy who has grown into a man, a man who wants nothing more than to destroy my family.

“What do you want?” I whisper in the almost-dark.

His expression is unreadable.

“Rome!” I insist. “What do youwant?”

“You have no idea what’s happening, do you?” he asks, and I can’t tell if he’s amused, or pained, or both.

My lips feel puffy and numb, my eyelids unbearably heavy.Why did you bring me here?I want to ask him, but before I can move my mouth again, everything goes dark.

Chapter Twelve

ROME

I’ve never claimed to be a good man. In fact, if I had to tell you what kind of person I am, I’d say I’m the very worst. I’ve done plenty of things that I’d rather forget. Things that I can avoid thinking about until that moment when I close my eyes at night and it all comes flooding back, an avalanche of blood and screams. There’s a reason I live alone, in a ruined house that I once tried to burn down. There’s a reason people don’t want to get close to me. There’s a reason I’d rather stay awake for three days straight and screw a girl I don’t even like, instead of sleeping.

I’m bad. Bad news. Bad blood. Whatever you want to call it, however you want to spin it: I’m a disease that nobody wants to catch.

But when I see the girl in the ridiculous dress, Avery Capulet, begging for her life in the loading dock of the Palatial Hotel, just as some asshole lowers a black bag over her head and shoves a syringe into her forearm, something forgotten sparks to life.

I came here to confront her cousin, to maybe even kill him. But any thought of Ty Capulet eviscerated as soon as I laid eyes on Avery, looking small in a sea of gun-toting bodyguards and her fiancé, as every single one of them dropped to the ground, leaving only her standing and trapped.

I think I loved her once, even though I hate her now. Even though she damn well ruined my fucking life with her lies. Yeah, even in spite of all that, some protective thing claws at the inside of my chest when I see her being manhandled.

I want to help her. I want to save her.

And I hate myself for that.

“Hey!” I yell, rushing toward Avery as she topples to the ground. I forget about what I’m supposed to be doing here — finding that little fucker, Ty Capulet, and smashing him into a pile of broken bones and blood for trying to get his greasy hands on my formula.

Maybe it’s my karma, then, that one of them jumps me and smashes the butt of his gun into my face. I step back, stunned by the blow, reaching for the gun tucked into my waistband. I’m normally so careful, normally the one waiting in the shadows with my gun at the ready, but the sudden sight of the girl being tossed between them like a fucking rag doll caught me off guard. My face explodes in a mess of blood, a crunch of cartilage in my nose telling me something is definitely broken, and the hot, paralyzing crack of a taser in the middle of my chest that takes me down. A fist slams into my face over and over, steel-capped boots in my ribs so hard I feel them crack, and I end up on all fours, crawling away from the boots, dragging myself toward the girl in the dress, who is still lying motionless on the dirty ground, her head completely covered by the black bag. I lift my arm to touch the bag, intending to pull it away from her face, but before I can grip the material a hand grabs the back of my shirt and yanks me away. I switch my attention to the twin fucking ninjas who seem intent on beating me to death so I can stop interrupting their kidnapping mission, and it strikes me as odd that they don’t shoot me, too. I mean, I just stood and watched as they shot six guys who looked like private security guards in a matter of seconds, all big, brawny guys armed to the fucking teeth.

One of them tasers me again. The pain is white-hot, but more than that, it stops me from moving. It effectively freezes me in one spot long enough for the dude to grab my head between his gloved palms, lift my head up, and smash my skull back into the asphalt until everything turned a dirty black.

Chapter Thirteen

ROME

Rolling on hard ground, and then falling off the edge of something. In that order.

Falling down. Into hell?

I land with a crash, and it’s the crash that properly wakes me from my drugged stupor.

Fuck.

I taste blood in my mouth. I’m on something spongy — a mattress? A mattress that’s helped to break my fall. But where did I fall from? And where thefuckam I?

I can’t see. Right. There’s a bag over my head. I pull at the material, shaking my head free of its restrictions as I try to decipher my surroundings.

Oh, shit.

This isn’t good.

Not at all.

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