Page 91 of Wicked Knight
“Why the fuck did your father go the Konstantins?” Everyone knows to stay clear of those people.
“Because he was desperate.”
Her answer and her tears shut me down. I realize something serious must be going on for this to be the answer.
“I can’t let you marry him.”
“You have to.”
“But I love you.” It’s strange saying those words outside my heart. I’ve always felt them to such a degree that I thought she could just look at me and know. “I love you, Mackenzie. How the fuck am I supposed to hand you over to someone else?”
She glances heavenward as if the gray sky can give her the answer she seeks. When she looks back at me, I know there’s no hope. “I love you, too. I always have. I never stopped when I was supposed to, and I always hoped you’d come back to me. But this…I would never forgive myself if something happened to my family when I could have stopped it. You can’t, and you mustn’t help me. This has to end here.”
This was the purpose of meeting here. To end us. I see that now.
“Things are bad between you and your father because of me. He pulled a gun on you because of me. The past happened because of me. Your brother is dead because of me. None of that is good. So, we should just…stop.”
“Mackenzie.” I reach for her and grab her arm, but she pulls away.
“No. It’s over. I can’t be yours anymore. You don’t own me anymore.” The hurt in her eyes reaches inside me and crushes my heart. “Whatever you do will make this worse, so we need to stop.”
There’s never been anything in my life that I couldn’t fix. Only us.
I hate that she’s right and that as she steps away from me, I can’t stop her.
“Goodbye, Dmitri.”
I don’t answer because I can’t say goodbye. All I can do is watch her go, feeling like I just lost everything.
I am sitting on the wall of the back porch at Erebus House, watching the swans swim by in the river.
It's just past nine in the morning. I've been out here for a while, since just before sunrise. I have a computer science class in an hour, but I've already decided that I'm not going. There’s no point.
With the little to no sleep that I've had, I'll be useless. The only thing I'll be able to do in that class is switch the computer on and off.
My entire body still feels numb from yesterday, and I have that mind-fucked feeling where I can't think straight.
Usually, I have a plan in my head for every day, every hour, every minute. Today, I have nothing. It’s like my brain checked out on me the moment I lost Mackenzie.
The only thing I've been able to do successfully is think about her.
About losing her, wanting her, loving her.
And I'm worried about her. I'm worried she's been forced into a situation where she has to save her family. I'm worried about what my father may do to herandher family. I'm worried about her being with Ryan Konstantin.
That guy is the last person I thought her father would set her up with.
Adrian Domachenkov would definitely have to be desperate to go down that path.
I get that we're all a bunch of criminals here in one way or another at Raventhorn, but Ryan is dangerous on another level. He and all his kin. They're the sorts of dangerous that's frowned upon by the rest of us and what you call the scourge of the underworld.
If they're not involved in some extra shady shitty dealings, one of them is under suspicion of murder, espionage, or some craziness we all try to avoid.
And that brings me to the next point of worry. Mackenzie's father.
Adrian, what the hell kind of trouble could you be in to need money?
The man is a billionaire, a media mogul.