Page 12 of Queen of the Crimson Throne

But he wasn’tmyanything anymore.

He was my betrothed in name only.

“Lennox, please,” Luka pleaded from the other side of the door. Every wall I had attempted to build back up over the last weeks threatened to crumble at those two words.

“Lennox, please. I only want to talk to you. Open the door.”

I was tired. I hadn’t slept well on the trip. I hadn’t slept wellin weeks. That’s why my control was threatening to slip so easily. It had nothing to do with the male on the other side of the door.

He was silent, but I could still sense him there. I could smell him. I let myself slide to the floor, clutching my knees to my chest with my back against the door.

“I missed you,” he said finally.

I missed you too.

I listened as he moved, his back thumping against the door as I assumed he sat as I did with his back against the door.

“I’m sorry I wasn’t there to greet you. You weren’t due to arrive until later this evening. I didn’t want you to arrive herealone. I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay.” My voice was rough in my throat.

“Nothing is okay, Lennox.”

He was right.

“How did everything get so fucked up?” he continued. Even through the door, I knew he was running his hands through his hair the way he did when he was anxious.

“We’re two fucked up people.” I sighed. “We were doomed from the start.” I never should have let him in. I knew it would never end well, but yet I had let him in. I was as much to blame as he was.

“Do you ever think about how we almost had it all?” he asked.

I furrowed my brows. What did he mean,have it all?

“Those last days before I left everything was so good. You and I were happy. We were together. We were surrounded by the people we loved, spending our nights drinking too much wine and laughing until our sides hurt before we fell into bed together.”

I shivered at the memory of the nights we spent together, skin on skin as we discovered one another’s bodies. I hadn’t let myself remember those nights or the ones spent with Kara, Luka, Nico, and Declan.

Those memories were now clouded with the ash of my burning city.A city I left unprotected while I relaxed and enjoyed myself. While I let myself get fucked into oblivion.

“We still had the prophecy and the Vanir to worry about, but we were happy and we had each other. When I had you by my side all of those other things seemed so insignificant. With you and I hand in hand I was confident we could do anything we set our minds to. It was supposed to be you and I, together forever.”

Until the stars turned to dust,we had promised.

I could hear the smile in his voice. A smile a small part of me itched to see.

“And then everything got fucked up.” He sighed. “I know I’m to blame for it, and I’m sorry I lied to you Lennox, and that I broke your trust and—” He swallowed. The words left unsaid hanging thick in the air.I broke your heart.

“I think about the choices I made every minute of every day. In my waking hours, and in my sleeping hours, I wonder what would have happened if I had told you about the potential of us being married from the start. Maybe it makes me a terrible person, but I don’t regret my decision.” That bastard. I’d?—

“If I could go back I’d do it again. I’d keep that secret from you if it meant I got to spend the time we had together. If I had told you, you never would have looked at me as someone you could love. As someone you could choose to be with. You never would have looked at me as someone you could see a futurewith. You would have only seen me as a pawn in this game you wanted to win. So I don’t regret what I did. I’d do it a million times over. I’d break your heart and mine over and over if it meant I got to see the way your eyes glow when you’re happy. The ways your smile lights up a room. To hear your laugh. To experience what it feels like to be cared for by Lennox Adair, even if it was only for a short time.”

My anger vanished as quickly as it came. Snuffed out like a candle in the wind by his words.

“I know that makes me selfish, but I’m done caring. I’m selfish when it comes to you, Lennox. I have been from the start. You do things to me?—”

He sighed.

“I’m sorry I broke your trust, but I’d do it again. And I will spend every day making it up to you. That’s what I was doing—that’s why I wasn’t there when you arrived. I was out looking for a witch Scribe with the hopes she could help me find Astria’s spellbook.”

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