Black Knight (Royal Elite 4)

I fall on the bed and stare at the ceiling. “I freed her of me.”

“Do you think you did the right thing?” Cole stares down at me with his fucking green eyes and I’m tempted to poke out and maybe put in a jar.

“Yes.” My voice breaks and I cover my eyes with the back of my hand, hiding the moisture that gathers there.

No.

Somehow, I fall asleep and somehow, I dream of her.

I always dream of her when I’m at my lowest and when I’m at my highest.

Instead of Aiden and Cole’s arsehole presence, gentle hands are pulling my arm from my face. Cole’s soulless green eyes are replaced by her soft, inviting ones.

There’s moisture in their brightness, too, as if she also wants to cry.

The Kim in my dreams is a play of my imagination. She looks so real while she touches me, while she strokes my hair back like she used to do when we were kids.

A few of my favourite memories always begin with me laying my head on her lap, her stroking my hair, and me handpicking the fucking green M&M’s for her before I ate the other colours.

Then I fed her the pistachio gelato while she read her magical stories about wizards and princes and kingdoms aloud.

And knights.

Lots of fucking knights. Even if there wasn’t one, she made them up and inserted them everywhere.

My knight, she used to call me.

Now, I’m a rusty one without armour or a sword.

I abandoned being her knight to become War.

“Why have you been drinking again?” she asks in a brittle voice. “What happened to your hand?”

“Shh, don’t ruin it. Just stay like this.” I lift my head and set it on her lap so that I’m staring up at her.

The Kimberly from my dreams always tells me what a fuck-up I am and that I can do better, just as before. I can be a knight instead of War.

But not today. Today is fucked up.

Today, she’s with Ronan and I can’t do anything about it. Today, I have Cole and Aiden as my guardians because they don’t want me to do some stupid shit like getting myself killed in a gang fight.

I reach out a hand and touch her cheek with my fingers. She trembles underneath my skin as if she always wanted me to do that. My palm burns due to the cut, but I almost don’t feel it.

“You’re so beautiful, Green, and I fucking hate you for it.”

“Xan…” My nickname catches in her mouth like she doesn’t want to say it. “What the hell? You’re not supposed to call me that.”

“And you’re not supposed to be here. I freed you.”

“What if I don’t want to be freed?”

“A masochist, aren’t you now?”

“Maybe.”

“Maybe, huh?” I smile. “I’m going to do bad things to you.”

I’ll hate it in the morning, and I’ll hate myself for it, but if I only get this in dreams, then so be it.