Page 37 of Queen of Diamonds

“I would be a fool to dismiss your mind,” he said. “Or your determination to be free of this place.”

I took a breath, still kneeling before him, holding his gaze with a blank expression he knew, by now, was a mask.

“Do you disagree?” he asked.

I blinked, considering that. I didn’t lie to Ace, not unless there was no choice, and certainly not when he’d know. “No.”

“I propose a game.” He smiled, something malicious dancing in his blue eyes. “Double or nothing. I think it would be amiss to assume that one day you might win—for a time. One day, you might get free, and this dance will shift from this mansion, and into the greater world.”

I felt goosebumps rise on my skin from far more than the cold air and marble.

I tried to reject what he was saying. With such ease, he moved the goalposts. He promised that, should I ever escape, this wouldn’t be over. His games would always go on, no matter how far I ran.

Still, I was silent, holding his gaze with perfect neutrality I’d trained myself for.

“So. If you do find yourself on the other side of these mansion walls, our deal holds.”

My lips parted in shock for a moment, a reaction I couldn’t contain. I saw a flash of delight on his face as he saw it.

Our deal?

The one that had landed me with this fate.

“You gave up so much that day—all in the name of their protection. I won’t waste that. Unless… I see, even once, even for a second, any Alpha in my brother’s pack protecting you. Then, I will hunt them down alongside you, and they will die like that maid this week.”

Ice-cold dread slid through my veins. Dozens of images crossed my mind. Ace was ruthless, cruel, and merciless.

How many had I watched die by his hand?

He knew how much I feared it, so he made sure I was there every time. And when it was my fault? I almost shut my eyes at the thought.

The bodyguard who’d taken pity on me. The maid who’d slipped me a key and her own clothes so that I might get free.

They hadn’t died like the others.

Instead, the gun shook in my own hands. Ace was at my back, chest crushing the scars he’d so recently opened. He held me still. The barrel aimed.

My finger was numb. I didn’t feel the trigger. With the last of my courage I’d shifted the aim. I’d shot a gun enough times to easily land the bullet right between the eyes.

Mercy.

Everything I would never have.

He could have stopped me. He always could have stopped me. But he never did. He loved watching me defy him so he had reasons to torture me more. He was far, far more obsessed with me than he ever was with his compliant scent match.

“Double or nothing. That’s the deal.” Ace said into the silence, a smile playing on his lips as he watched me work through the threat.

Those words sunk in.

For a moment, that gun was in my hands, but it wasn’t the maid before it, it was Kyan. Knight. Zed.

Double, or nothing.

Pack and freedom. Or neither. Forever.

And it would all come down to whether or not I trusted Zed and his pack could match Ace and the resources he held as leader of the Brotherhood.

I didn’t know if it was his plan, but that night he finally found the thing that would kill my fight. The last thing that gave me hope. The final lantern I followed, snuffed out at last.

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