Reign of a Billionaire : A Dark Mafia Enemies-to-Lovers Romance

“What would you have liked me to do? Let you be sold in the auction to Cortes?”

She opened her mouth before immediately closing it, her lips thinning.

I placed my elbows over the edge of the table and rested my chin in my palm while I stared down the barrel of the gun. “My turn to ask a question,” I said with a calm I didn’t feel.

She scoffed. “I don’t think so.”

“I thought you knew how to play the game.” I reached for her just as she readied herself to bolt, forcing her back into the chair. My palm engulfed her small one holding the revolver, forcing her finger against the trigger. “Pull it,” I taunted as I spun the cylinder and then clicked it back into place.

“I will when I’m damn well ready,” she shot back, shooting daggers at me. “I have more questions.”

My hand wrapped around hers. Click.

She let out a wheeze, her eyes wide with shock as they darted back and forth between me and the gun. I removed my hand from hers, her glare burning a hole in my chest. So fucking odd. Nobody had ever had such an impact on me.

“My question,” I reminded her. “And I won’t even hold the gun to your head.”

She rolled her eyes, although the light tremor of her bottom lip didn’t escape me. “I’m not even holding it to your head.”

“Not literally,” I agreed, amused.

Her fingers twitched over the trigger, her nerves practically seeping through her pores. I waited several heartbeats before I went for the jugular.

“Where were you?”

She blinked, her expression filled with confusion, and after a second of drawn-out silence, she finally asked in a shaky breath, “Wh-what do you mean?”

“Louisa was going to run,” I said. “The only reason she didn’t follow through with it was because you never came.”

Tense silence filled the air. “You’re wrong,” she whispered. “The Tijuana cartel got her. Perez—” Her voice cracked as she shook her head, staring at me dumbly. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“We had a plan,” I gritted out.

I could feel her carefully built armor cracking, disintegrating into smoke.

“What plan?”

Had guilt gnawed at her to the point of impacting her memory? Was that the reason she willfully forgot the price her twin paid? Or was she play-acting?

“She wouldn’t leave without you. Not even for me.”

Her delicate brows pulled up in confusion.

“For you?” I closed my eyes and pinched the bridge of my nose. Her confusion was grating on me. “What do you mean?”

Reliving this was a bitch. I felt responsible for not saving her. For not protecting her. Our secret love turned into a tragedy.

“She loved me. I loved her.”

I anticipated Liana’s move, but not the savagery in her eyes. She practically flung herself across the table. Pressing the barrel of the revolver against my forehead, her other hand wrapped around my throat, those golden eyes—so fucking familiar—glared at me.

“If you loved her, why didn’t you protect her?” she hissed. “I should kill you.”

The same guilt that had been eating at me for years stared right back at me through her eyes. Liana had been broken and put back together, but deep inside, those cracked pieces were in no better shape than my own.

“You should,” I agreed evenly, my hand on hers, holding the pistol in place. “But you should also question why you have such gaps in your memory.”

“Fuck. You.” Her voice trembled with fury. “I remember everything worth remembering.”

“Except for me and large chunks of your sister’s life.”

Chapter 38Liana

“Time to die,” I gritted, the anger returning with a vengeance and flooding my system. It didn’t matter that this man had given me the most mind-blowing orgasm I’d ever experienced. It didn’t matter that he made me feel all these things I’d never experienced before.

The need to finish this made my hands tremble. The only problem was, I physically couldn’t pull the trigger. And judging by Kingston’s expression, he knew it.

“Go ahead,” he urged.

His grip remained on my own, the slightest pressure of his finger on the trigger. Silence dominated the space between us. Every single cell in my body itched to carve this man’s heart out. If only I could give in to the darkness and let it happen.

Why? Haunted whispers clawed at my skull, piercing my temples and wrecking me from within. Why can’t I kill him?

My mind was trapped in a maze, unable to find a way out, and this man was to blame. So many emotions and thoughts burst through me, and I didn’t have what it took to process them all. I wasn’t coping, and what mattered most in this moment was keeping this man from witnessing it.

So I closed my eyes. I could feel tears burning. Each breath I took suffocated my lungs instead of breathing life into me. The metal became unbearably heavy, and my hands shook with every passing second.

“Do it, Liana.” More force on my trigger finger. My eyes snapped open, meeting his dark gaze. I yanked my hand away, then aimed. Terrified at what I’d find if I let him in, I pulled the trigger.

Bang.

And missed.