Their Reign, page 11
Her eyes narrow. “So she’s for me?”
I nod. “If you want her.”
“Like a gift?”
I notice she’s not wearing the necklace, but I bite back my comment. “Yes.”
“What’s her name?”
“She’s not yet named. You can choose.”
“Oh.” She looks at the small puppy as she sets her down. “Okay. I think I’ll call her Kali.”
“Kali?”
She grins at me. “Like the goddess who devours her enemies.”
“Oh. Alrighty then. Kali it is.” I am confused. But okay.
“And you want Pestilence to stay with me?”
“Can I come into the house?” I ask. She hesitates. “Just for a few minutes. I’m not going to do anything, Mercedes. I am just here for the dogs.”
“Mm-hmm, sure.” She folds her arms across her chest and gestures to the living room with a nod of her head. I see a candle burning on the mantel, and the scent of cinnamon wafts through the air. The sun is fading in the early evening hours, and there’s an overall warmth in the space. A coziness.
Steam rises from a mug of tea on the coffee table, and on the floor is a laundry basket full of baby clothes that she’s been folding. The sight of it hits me hard.
This is happening.
We are having babies.
We.
No, not we.
She.
“Mercedes, I—”
“You want something to drink?”
I drag my gaze from that stack to her. I shake my head. “Let me go get Pestilence’s things.” I need to get out of here for a minute.
“You haven’t asked me if he can stay. You just assume like you always do.”
I push my hand through my hair, my eyes falling on those clothes again. I drag a breath in. “You’re right. I’m sorry. I thought you’d want that. I thought—”
“I’m not scared of Vincent Douglas, Judge. He can’t touch us. I won’t let him.”
“He’s a man, Mercedes. If he gets to you, he will do what he wants.”
“Like most men.”
“He means you harm,” I say, cataloging the blow but not allowing myself to waver right now. Her safety is why I’m here. “And a man will always be able to overpower a woman. If he gets in here—”
“Have you seen the guards my brother has posted outside?”
“If he gets inside…” I ignore her. “They can’t help you. Not if they don’t know. I prefer you to come to the house of course,” I start, putting it out there. She scoffs at the idea. “But I won’t drag you there against your will.”
“Wow, that’s a change for you. Does it hurt to consider what someone else wants?”
I grit my teeth. “It’s safer for you if Pestilence stays. He won’t let anything happen to you.”
As if sensing the tension, Pestilence comes to nudge Mercedes to pet him. “He can stay. I’d love for him to stay. But not because I’m scared.”
I nod. “That’s all I want. I have his things outside. Food, a bed, everything he needs. Paolo will replenish his supplies. You just call me if you need anything. Anything at all. I can come to walk him—”
“I’m sure I can handle walking him.”
“Of course. Let me go get his things.” I walk out of the house, noticing the shopping bag of diapers by the stairs. One of the guards helps me unload Pestilence’s supplies.
“Where would you like him to sleep?” I ask Mercedes when we’re alone again.
“With me.”
I nod, and without waiting for an invitation, I carry his bed and the bag of infant’s diapers that are already sitting by the steps up the staircase. She follows and directs me where to put his bed. I then stand facing her, the bag of diapers in my hand, completely at a loss for what to do but unwilling to leave.
“Those go in the nursery.”
I follow her down the hall to the room freshly painted in shades of the softest green and yellow, stickers of colorful animals on all the walls, two cribs set at opposite ends, a changing table, and boxes and boxes of unpacked things for the babies.
She watches me as I take it in.
“You can put the bag down, Judge.”
I turn to her and nod. “Where do you want the diapers?”
“I’ll do it.”
“Please. Let me.”
She points at the cupboard under the changing table, and I get on my knees to unpack the impossibly small diapers. I stack them along with the baby wipes, then stand back up.
“Do you need anything?” I ask.
“We’re fine. We have everything we could need,” she says, hand on her belly. I want to ask if they’re moving. If I can touch them. But I know I can’t.
“Oh.” I reach into my pocket and take out the envelope there. I hold it out to her.
She takes it and looks inside.
“The sonogram images. I kept one. I hope you don’t mind.” She eyes me, and for a moment, I wonder if she’ll want me to give it to her. But then the puppy barks downstairs, and we both turn to the door. Mercedes is the first to leave the room. I take one more look around, feeling lonelier than I have ever felt, and follow her back downstairs and out to the patio. She opens the little gate and lets Pestilence and the puppy down on the grassy area where the puppy relieves herself.
“Your brother increased the guards.” He doesn’t know I have eyes on Douglas. I should communicate it with him.
“It’s fine, Judge. Santi is handling it.”
“Why? What happened?”
“It’s handled.” She turns to walk away, but I grab her arm to stop her. She looks down at where I’m holding her, but I don’t let go.
“What happened? Because something did.”
“Nothing.”
“Something. What was it?”
“I received a package the other day. Delivered to my front door.”
My blood turns to ice. “What package?”
Her expression falters, and I glimpse the thing she’s trying to hide. Fear. “Mercedes? What package?”
She doesn’t quite look at me when she answers. “A chopped-up baby doll and a blank invitation to a funeral.”
“What? Why didn’t I know about this?”
“Judge—”
“Jesus Christ. I was here. I asked him.”
“Judge, you’re hurting me.”
I look down at where I still hold her and see how I’m squeezing. “Shit. I’m sorry.” I loosen my grip but don’t let go. “Come home with me. Please. I can protect you.”
She closes her eyes and shakes her head. “This is my home, Judge.” Are her words forced, or am I imagining it?
“No, it’s not. Let me protect you.”
“My brother—”
“Please, Mercedes. Let me take you home.”
“You need to go. I want you to go.”
I stare at her, not wanting to hear her. She pries my fingers from her arm and turns her back to me to call for the dogs.
“I will keep Pestilence. But you need to respect my decision and go. Now.”
“Don’t shut me out.”
She drops her head. “Please, Judge.”
“At least—”
She spins and slaps her hands against my chest. “Just go. Fucking go! Just this once, put yourself second and do what I ask for a fucking change!”
Tears wet the skin around her eyes, and I see the effort this is costing her. See how my being here is hurting her. I watch her for a long minute, letting the look in her eyes burn itself into my brain, the pain inside them like a brand on my skin.
I nod. Because I can’t speak. And when the puppy comes strolling up the stairs, I scoop her up and walk through the house and out the front door.
17
JUDGE
I call Ezra as I drive to Santiago’s house. “He delivered a fucking package to her doorstep!”
“Judge, calm down.”
“How did he do that, Ezra?”
“Have you checked your messages?”
“What messages?” I ask, digging my phone out of my pocket, which I’d muted due to a full day of hearings.
“The three I left you a few hours ago.”
I see the notifications on my screen.
“He slipped the guards. Must have gotten out overnight.”
“Are you fucking kidding me?”
“I’m sorry, Judge. I’ve let both men go, and we’re scouring the city for him. He won’t get near her.”
“He delivered a fucking package to her doorstep! I’d say he got near her!”
He mutters a curse on the other end, and I force a deep breath in as I near the gates of De La Rosa Manor.
“He’s not done with this. With her,” I say.
“No, you’re right. But we’ll find him.”
“I need to go. Let me know as soon as you know anything.”
“I will. I am sorry, Judge.”
I know he can’t control everything but fuck, this? I disconnect the call and look into the security camera outside the gates of the manor. I’m not sure Santiago will let me in, but I’m unwilling to leave until he sees me. But then, without a word through the intercom, the gates begin to open, and I drive to the entrance where, before I even come to a stop, I see my once best friend standing, arms folded across his chest, mouth in a thin line, his face closed to me.
But I don’t care about that. I can’t. Not right now.
I bring the Range Rover to an abrupt halt, and I am out of the driver’s seat the moment I jerk it into park.
“You didn’t think I needed to know about the death threat at her door?” I stalk to him. I haven’t even closed the car door.
He straightens, gaze cool. “No, I didn’t think it was any of your business.”
“Are you fucking kidding me?” I shove him backward. “She receives a death threat, and you don’t think it’s my fucking business?”
He gets in my face. “No. I didn’t think it was. And how do you know anyway? Did you go near her again?”
I clench my jaw and raise my chin.
“For fuck’s sake. She doesn’t want to see you. Get it through your thick head.” He looks me over from head to toe. “You look like hell. Go home and get some sleep. There’s nothing for you here.” He turns to walk back inside.
“Yeah well, she’s carrying my children, so get that through yours!”
He spins on me, the same rage from the day he learned about us burning like a brand on his face.
“Santi?” Ivy comes running out and catches his arm.
He stops and snarls. But gets himself under control. “I’m very aware of what you did to her, Judge,” he says, hands fists at his side.
“We need to talk.”
Ivy looks from him to me and back.
“No, we don’t. I said all I needed to say to you.” For a moment, I think he’s going to walk away, but then we all turn at the whine that comes from inside the Range Rover.
“Shit.”
“What is that?” Ivy asks, smiling when Kali pops her head up to the window.
“I need to let her out. Can you watch her? I need to talk to your husband.”
“I said…” Santiago starts, but Ivy squeezes his arm.
“I’ll watch her. What’s her name?” she asks as I open the hatch for her to scoop Kali up.
“Kali.”
“Oh,” she says, clearly confused.
“Mercedes named her.”
“Ah.” She stifles a smile and clears her throat to set Kali down. “You two go ahead. Kali and I will play.”
I look at Santiago, who only turns to walk into the house. I follow him through to his study, where he sits in his chair behind his massive desk. I close the door and remain standing.
“He was at her house?”
He only studies me with narrowed eyes.
“Look, we want the same thing. Mercedes safe. Mercedes happy. Right now, the first part of that is crucial. You’re going to need to work with me, or so help me, I will drag her back to my house and—”
“I should let you because that would sever any lingering emotions she confusedly feels for you.”
That makes me pause. Because what Mercedes said was not this. But haven’t I said the opposite of what I want, too? To protect her. Protect myself. Because there is something that I’ve managed to avoid for a very long time. All my life, in fact. I have never had a real relationship. I can count on one hand the dates I’ve taken women on. I go to the Cat House. I fuck. I leave. I am not blind to the pattern. And I understand why. It’s hard not to.
I am afraid.
And now I’m afraid not only of hurting her. Perhaps the true fear is entirely out of my control.
I know I’m not worthy of her affection or her love. But if she did give it to me and then took it away, what would become of me then? If what’s happening to me now is any indication, it does not bode well for me.
“I don’t understand, Judge,” Santiago finally says, drawing me out of wherever the hell I was going.
I sit.
“What don’t you understand?”
“Why won’t you do it? Marry her? You have feelings for her that’s obvious. I see it on your face even now. And she has feelings for you. So why don’t you just fucking do it and put everyone out of their misery?”
I bow my head. Can I tell him? Can I reveal this terrible secret to him?
“You know me, Judge. You know everything about me. Yet you don’t talk about your past. Never have. Or on those few occasions it comes up, it’s very superficial. Perhaps you think I haven’t noticed, but I have, all these years. I know I don’t see you, not all of you. So what is so fucking dark that you’re willing to lose everything, every goddamn thing, to hide it?”
I swallow over the lump in my throat, feeling sweat collect under my arms and along my forehead. I look at my friend, but I’m looking through him.
He snorts, shaking his head. He gets up, pours a scotch, and sets it on the desk in front of me.
“Does it have anything to do with the tattoo on your back? The one I never knew you had.”
I pick up the scotch, barely controlling the tremble of my hand. I drink a swallow.
“Or the scar it hides beneath? The knife wound.”
I swallow the contents of the glass. He doesn’t pour another. Just sits back and watches me. This is too hard. It’s not that I want to keep my secrets. It’s that it’s too hard to share them. To bare myself like that.
“You will miss out on a family. Is that what you want?”
I look at the ring on my finger. All Sovereign Sons wear them. The Montgomery insignia, law and consequence. I can almost hear Carlisle.
“You know Hildebrand is salivating to have me on The Tribunal.”
“I know.”
“He and my grandfather had been planning for it for years.” I make myself look at him. “Hildebrand thinks we’ll make a powerful team.”
Santiago watches me. He doesn’t speak, and I can’t read him. But I don’t expect him to make this easy for me. Why would he? If our roles were reversed, I’m not sure I’d even give him this chance. And perhaps a few years ago, he wouldn’t have. This is Ivy’s doing. She has softened him.
“He sees something inside me that he recognizes, Santiago. A violence…” I trail off because I don’t know what else to say.
“Is it there?”
I nod once.
“Have you unleashed it on my sister?”
“No.”
“Did you force her?”
“She was in my care. I was the one in control.”
“Did you force yourself on her against her will?”
“No. Christ. I am not that beast.”
His expression softens infinitesimally. “I know that already. I just wasn’t sure you did.”
That surprises me, and I find I’m struck mute.
“A neighbor delivered the package. Douglas is smarter than to come to the house with the presence of the IVI guard. But he is determined.” He opens a drawer, takes a box out, and sets it on the desk.
I stand, open it, and look inside to find the baby doll chopped to pieces and the funeral invitation. My blood turns cold just like it did when she described the contents. “Christ. Did she see this?”
“No, the guard wouldn’t let her.”
“Let me take her home.” He raises an eyebrow, and I know it’s at the word home. I press on. “I can keep her safe. He won’t have access to her in my house.”
“Nor would he in mine. But she doesn’t want that, and I think it’s past time we respect her decisions for a change.”
“This is life or death, Santiago.”
Standing, he comes to put a hand on my shoulder. “Imprisoning her in your house or mine is a different sort of death. And neither you nor I want that for her.”
18
JUDGE
I’m on my way home when my phone chimes with a text. At a traffic light, I check it. It’s Solana sending some idiotic message I don’t understand.
Solana: Dun dun da dun…
Me: Can you forget my number?
Solana: I hear wedding bells.
Me: What?
Solana: Didn’t you hear? A certain eligible Sovereign Son has asked for Mercedes’s hand in marriage. He was very romantic about it too…
When I pull a U-turn in the middle of the intersection, cars honk their horns, sending traffic screeching around me. My cell phone drops to the floor as I press the gas pedal and race to the apothecary. I double park outside, fuming as I stalk into the shop. Solana is with a customer, and that crack Madame Dubois is filing her nails from her table, wearing a sly smile on her face.
“I’ll be right with you,” Solana says with a shit-eating grin. “Why don’t you look at our selection of mood-enhancing elixirs over there.”
I grit my teeth and consider shaking her when I hear Kali bark. Shit. I forgot about her, and I don’t need her pissing in my car.
“I will be right back!” I tell Solana and go back outside, the bell over the door irritating now. Opening the hatch, I lift Kali out. I should put her down in case she needs to piss, but instead, I grin and walk back inside the shop, forcing myself to smile at the customer leaving with her purchase, then set Kali down.
