King's Reign (Sydney Storm MC #6)(15)

“We can stand here all fucking day slinging words at each other, but that would only prove I’m right.” I moved into her personal space again, unable to stop myself. Fuck, I wanted this woman. Tracing my finger over her lips, I added, “If you didn’t still want me, you would have ended this conversation before it even got started.”

Her lips flattened and she pushed me away again. Moving past me, she snapped, “You tell yourself that, but don’t ever presume to know my thoughts again. You are so wrong it isn’t funny.”

I watched her walk into the waiting room and sit with Skylar. Not once in our conversation had she brought up her ex. If she were committed to trying again with him, she would have thrown that at me. Not that I’d let him get in my way when it was clear she wanted me, but she hadn’t mentioned his name once, signalling that was bullshit, too.



Eric Bones eyed me with hesitation. “You’re stirring some shit up, King. You sure you wanna do that?”

I leaned back into the booth where we sat in the darkened corner of the dingy pub I reserved for these kinds of meetings. Crossing my arms over my chest, I said, “I haven’t been so fucking sure of something for a long time.”

“Fucking hell,” he muttered. “It’s throwing a lot of heat my way.”

“And?” Did he think I gave two shits?

“Look,” he said, angling forward and resting his arms on the table, “I’m just sayin’ that Sydney hasn’t seen any major trouble for a long time. Well, besides what went down with Silver Hell. You’ve mostly kept the peace with everyone. Don’t force a war on all of us just because of the shit you’ve had going on.”

“I’m done with keeping the peace when it’s not warranted. It needs to be known that if a line gets crossed, Storm won’t take it. I’m just letting everyone know this’ll be how it is in the future.”

“Yeah, well some people don’t like it.”

“I don’t give a fuck what people like.”

His face morphed into a pained expression. “I hope you know what you’re doing.”

This conversation had been a waste of my time. Standing, I said, “I don’t do shit I can’t stand behind. You wanna fucking cry over it in future, do it with your sisters. I don’t have time to waste talking it out.”

As Hyde and I exited the pub, my phone sounded with a text. After I read it, I looked at Hyde, every cell in my body alive with the crazy energy I welcomed. “We have an address. Call the boys. It’s fucking on.”

This moment had been too fucking long coming. Romano’s blood would finally dirty my hands.





7





King





If, as claimed by some, the two most powerful warriors were patience and time, I was a motherfucking warrior when it came to Romano. He’d evaded me at every turn over the last few weeks, and before that, he’d fought a war against me in the shadows. I’d had to be more patient with him than I’d ever been with anyone. That had only intensified my hunger for his blood.

Axe’s guy had come through with the goods, and after my men had surrounded the secluded property on the outskirts of Sydney and fought their way through the security guarding Romano, I finally stood in front of him.

“And so we meet,” he said, his attention firmly on me. He ignored Hyde, Nitro, Cole, Nash, and Axe who stood behind me. He knew his time was up. Knew there was no point trying to find a way out of this.

“You had to know that was inevitable.”

“I wasn’t convinced you had it in you. I’ve been coming at you for a long time, King, and you never worked it out. So no, I didn’t know it was inevitable.”

Motherfucker.

I had missed it.

I would never make that mistake again.

My body strained to have at him, but first I needed to make sure I knew everything there was to know about this situation. Moving closer to him, I gripped his shirt and yanked him to me. “We’re gonna have a little talk about that,” I snarled.

He snorted. “No, we’re not.”

Pulling out my blade, I slowly ran it across his throat. Hard enough to let him know I wouldn’t hesitate to use it, but not with enough pressure to draw blood yet. “Oh, I think we are, asshole. And while we’re at it, we might as well talk about Ivy.” The flare of emotion in his eyes and the clench of his jaw told me I was right in my assumption she was the key to breaking him. “Were you aware she was planning on leaving you? I’m guessing not because if you were, you wouldn’t have allowed it to happen.”

He jerked out of my hold. I let him go easily in an effort to get him talking. I figured I had more chance of that if I gave him some space first. “You don’t get to talk about her,” he spat. “Not after what you put her through years ago. You have no fucking idea of my relationship with her. I would never have treated her the way you did.”

My blood roared in my ears. This guy was a piece of fucking work. It was going to take every ounce of my restraint to keep myself in check. “I know you beat the fuck out of her often enough to cause her to lose your children.”

He smiled. A menacing smile. “Don’t believe everything she says.”

“I fucking witnessed the after-effects of her latest miscarriage, so I do fucking believe her.”