Brutal Vows (Queens & Monsters #4)(92)

When he’s lying on top of me, searing my retinas with the brightness of his jubilant smile, I decide it’s time to make an adjustment to the situation.

“Pardon me for interrupting your gloat-a-thon, but has it occurred to you that I might need a rest?”

He draws his brows together. “Rest?”

“Let me put it to you this way: if I inserted an object the size of a bowling pin into your behind, do you suppose you could go right back to business as usual afterward? Would you be riding around the moors of Ireland on horseback, leaping over streams and galloping around full-speed while your poor, raw bottom took the brunt of all that jostling in the saddle?”

He looks appalled. “I knew I was hurting you!” Then, after a beat: “A bowling pin?”

When his grin returns, I give up. I close my eyes and sigh heavily.

“All right, lass,” he says, his voice warm, his mouth close to my ear. “We’ll have a rest. We’ll get a good night’s sleep. You’ll need it, because growing babies requires a lot of energy.”

“Will you stop talking before I throw myself out the window, please?”

He rolls over, drags me on top of him, and hides his face in my neck as he laughs.

I must be more exhausted than I realize, because I fall asleep on top of him almost immediately.





The dream begins with fire.

All over me, all around me, even underneath my skin. I’m being burned alive from the inside out, and there’s no escaping it.

Except it’s not really fire. It only feels like fire.

Because that’s exactly what being repeatedly lashed with a leather whip is like.

I’m naked, screaming, crawling away over a cold marble floor on my hands and knees, sobbing and pleading for mercy. My tormentor gives me none. Following closely behind as I scramble for safety, he cracks the whip over and over, separating my flesh. Blood splatters the marble. It’s warm and slippery under the palms of my hands.

A vicious kick to the ribs sends me tumbling sideways. I lie on the cold hard floor on my back with my arms out, panting, desperately begging no no no no as he looms over me, a tall figure with a shadowed face and an arm raised to strike.

As it falls, the whip parts the air with a vicious hiss like a thousand snakes descending with their sharp fangs bared, prepared to bite.

I scream at the top of my lungs, knowing no one will hear me.

“Reyna! Wake up, baby! Wake up!”

Quinn is shouting at me. Holding me in his arms and shouting.

I’m blinded for a moment, seeing nothing but blackness and hearing only my pounding heartbeat and that terrible hiss that always came right before the pain exploded over me.

When I inhale a sharp breath, I come back to myself slowly. Inch by inch, the darkness withdraws. The warmth of the room and Quinn’s arms seep in, soothing me.

I’m safe. In a hotel room in Boston, not at home in New York with Enzo.

Enzo is dead.

He can never hurt me again.

Except he can, because that sick son of a bitch lives on in my memory.

Sweating and trembling, I lower my head to Quinn’s chest.

“You’re okay, love,” he says, sounding shaken as he rocks me in his arms. “You’re okay. I’ve got you.”

The sheets are in tangles all around us. I must’ve been thrashing. I wonder how long it took him to wake me up.

He kisses my head, then takes my face in his hands. His eyes search mine.

“You were having a nightmare.”

My voice raw, I say, “Enzo.”

He winces. “Ah, fuck.”

He gathers me into his arms and holds me until my ragged breath has slowed to normal, and I’m no longer quaking with dread.

“What can I do?”

“Just this. I’ll be okay in a minute.”

He exhales heavily, then pulls the blankets up, holding me with one arm. He settles us back against the pillows, tucking my head under his chin and wrapping his arms and legs around me so I’m cocooned in his warmth.

We lie like that in the dark, breathing together, for a long time. It could be minutes or hours, I don’t know.

Eventually, an odd feeling overtakes me. After examining it for a while, I realize it’s peace.

I’ve never felt peace before.

In all my thirty-three years, I’ve never known what it’s like to find shelter from the storms that always followed me. I’ve been lost at sea for so long, I thought that’s what it meant to be living.

It isn’t until now, with a glimpse of a golden-haired man waving at me from shore in the distance, that I realize the storms might be behind me. My sails are full, the seas are smooth, and the wind at my back is soft and easy.

I might finally be coming home.

In a low voice, I say, “Epinephrine.”

“What?”

I pull away from Quinn, rolling over and sitting up to swing my legs over the side of the bed. I put my head in my hands and exhale a breath I’ve been holding my whole life. It shudders out of me, heavier than gravity.

“I said epinephrine. Normally, it’s used in emergency treatment for allergic reactions. But in large enough doses, it will stop the heart. And because it’s a hormone that occurs naturally in the body, it doesn’t automatically get flagged on the coroner’s report.”