Rule of a Kingdom (Kingdom Duet 0)

One, the red lipstick. Alicia would never put that on.

Two, the colour of her eyes. It’s like dark blue skies right after a war.

Or right before a storm.

As it seems, wars and storms are my specialities. If there’s a chance to disturb someone’s peace and grab what’s there for the taking, I don’t hesitate.

Contrary to common belief, I’m not heartless. I’m relentless. I don’t stop until both the war and the storm end in my favour.

If they don’t, they might as well go on until they fall to their knees in front of me – like everyone else.

For the first time in a decade, I don’t act first.

I stop.

I watch.

I savour the moment and the shock value of it.

She surprised me, I’ll give her that.

I don’t like surprises — unless I’m the one who issues them.

It takes me a moment to separate what’s in front of me from what I already know.

The reality from the past.

The truth from the imagination.

And it is her.

Not Alicia.

But someone so close, she managed to slip from under my radar for years.

Fucking years.

I thought she died in a hole somewhere, or that she pissed off to another corner of the world.

Turns out, neither are the case. She’s here in my empire. Right under my nose.

She appeared out of thin air like a fucking ghost.

Does she think she’ll slip between my fingers this easily? Or that she can escape me in my own territory?

Now that I’m past the haze and thinking more rationally, I recall the first and last time I met her.

It was at my wedding to Alicia.

A little girl with barely brushed hair ran into me, lifted up her huge sparkling eyes and her mouth formed into an ‘O’. Her first words to me were, “I’m sorry, sir.”

She’ll be more than sorry now.

She’ll wish she’d stayed far away from my kingdom.

That lowlife Ethan must’ve played a part in this, but he’ll also pay. And it’ll be by using her.

The ghost.