Twisted Kingdom (Royal Elite 3)

It’s all in vain though. No matter how much I miss him, it doesn’t erase what he did. It doesn’t change the fact that I’ve been a pawn on his board all along.

So I hold on to the boiling anger, hate, and bitterness. I hold on to how empty it felt to be told I was merely a game.

The itch to fight him and spout profanities at him awakens in me like a phoenix from the ashes. My muscles tighten ready for a fight, for a duel.

However, I bite my tongue. Confrontation will only give him leverage over me.

Instead of giving him what he wants, I go slack in his hold and lower my gaze, cutting off eye contact.

I erase him and his metal gaze, sinister features, and tousled hair.

“Look at me.”

I don’t.

He watches me in the quiet of the bathroom. I feel it like needles at the top of my skull about to cut it open.

The silent war goes on for minutes or hours. I just stand there, watching my black shoes and filling my head with Sun Tzu philosophical tactics.

The supreme art of war is to subdue the enemy without fighting.

Silence is my only weapon and I’ll use it until the very end. No matter how suffocating that silence is.

In the quiet, Aiden releases my mouth. I don’t scream. I keep the sacred silence as if my life depends on it.

He grips my jaw with two rough fingers and forces my head up. “Fucking look at me.”

I stare at the ceili

ng with its white lights.

“Elsa,” he growls, the sound echoing around us like a dark promise. “Don’t push me.”

“Show me your worst,” I say with a levelled tone.

His lips crush to mine. I keep my mouth clamped shut. He’ll have to bite my lips off if he wants to kiss me.

He grunts against my mouth and nibbles on the tender skin.

I don’t open up.

I don’t give him a way in.

I hold on to the anger and pain. Anger and pain allow me to ignore my body’s reaction to him.

Anger and pain turn me numb to his touch.

Aiden pulls back but doesn’t release my wrists. “Are you sure you want to play that game with me?”

I say nothing.

I’m safely tucked in a numb halo right now. If I say anything, I’ll lose the shelter this place offers.

Aiden yanks my skirt up. Air hits my bare thighs and goosebumps cover my skin. His strong palm grips my pussy over my boy shorts.

My breathing hitches, chest rising and falling like I just finished a hundred-metre run. My toes curl in my shoes. I stare at an imaginary dot on the wall beyond Aiden’s head.

He lied to you.