My hand delves into her hair and strokes its way down the golden locks. There is no name for what I feel right now. Not awe, not love, not gratitude. None of those are large enough to encompass this emotion that’s not quite pleasure and not quite pain.

“Mmm.” She moves against my side and opens her eyes. “You’re awake.”

I expect her to try to move out of my arms—not that I’ll let her. When she doesn’t, that feeling burrowed beneath my sternum expands.

Her fingers touch my side, where I’d been shot. “Did you know you died?” she says, her voice toneless.

My hand pauses its ministrations.

So my wife not only spared my life, she saved it.

“I don’t want to outlive you, Montes,” she says.

I squeeze her close and whisper against her temple, “Are you admitting you can’t live without me?”

She’s quiet for so long I assume she’s not going to respond.

“Maybe,” she finally whispers.

I’m not big enough to hold what I feel.

I touch the scar on her face and follow the line of it down her cheekbone. “Do you still hate me?”

“Sometimes,” she says honestly.

I smile to myself. “Good. I like you feral.”

She shakes her head against my chest. “You’re twisted.”

We fall silent for several minutes.

“I’m going to be a terrible mother,” she finally whispers.

I pause. Serenity’s scared. The woman who’s killed legions of men is actually afraid. Of herself.

It’s almost unfathomable.

I pull her in closer and kiss the crown of her head. I’m holding my family in my arms; I have literally everything I could ever want.

“You’ll be the best mother,” I whisper against her temple. She will be because she’ll second guess everything and work to get it right. For all of my wife’s ruthlessness, she has a wealth of compassion.

“You’re not a great judge of character,” she says.

I laugh. “When it comes to you, I am.”

Serenity

THE DOOR TO our room opens.

“Good morning, Your Majesty.”

“Oh, I love the view from this room.”

“Look at that flaxen hair of hers. I’ve tried to dye mine the same color, but I can’t quite mimic it.”

The female voices fill the bedroom, and I can hear them moving towards the bathroom.

I squeeze my pillow tighter. The cool metal of my father’s gun brushes against my hands. I’m not going to look up; that’ll make it all real, and I have at least another hour of sleep in me.

The bed dips and I feel a hand on the small of my back. A moment later, the king’s lips press against my temple. “Serenity, you need to get ready.”

I groan and bury my face deeper into the linen. If the king has it his way, then I am not going to get myself ready at all—a bunch of strangers are.

“Make them go away,” I mumble.

One of Montes’s hands delves under the pillows and finds me gripping my gun tightly.

“Don’t you agree one massacre is enough per week?” he says conversationally.

I turn my head to face him so that I can glare. All that earns me is a kiss on the nose.

He gets up to leave, and I release my gun to snatch his wrist. I’m more awake now, more aware that the only time the king actually calls in a team to get me prettied up is when something important occurs. “What’s going on?”

He stares down at me, and those conniving eyes of his hold such fondness in them. It both moves me and disturbs me that the king looks at me this way; I’ll never get used to it. “Politics,” he says evasively.

I squeeze his wrist tighter. “Give me more than that.”

He raises an eyebrow. “And what will you give me in return?”

I’m not in the mood for his coy games. “This isn’t a fucking exchange. I’m your wife.”

Montes leans in. “With me, it will always be an exchange. Of wits, of wills, of affection, and of everything in between.” He yanks his wrist out of my grip and walks away.

Two hours later I’m glaring at him as I exit the palace, my hair coiffed, my face painted, my body sheathed in another too-tight dress. He waits to the side of our ride, wearing his coat of arms.

Those deep eyes of his land heavily on me. “My, doesn’t my wife look lovely.”

“Fuck off.” I stride past him and duck into the car waiting for us. I still have no idea where we’re going.

He follows me in. “Dark blue is a good color on you.”

I won’t look at the asshole, who probably took a total of ten minutes to get ready himself.

“Are you going to finally tell me where we’re headed, or do I have to guess?”

When I turn to face him, he’s pinching his bottom lip and studying me with interest.

“We’re going to church.”

IT’S BEEN A while since I’ve been inside a church, and not just because I lived in the bunker for most of my teen years. After all, I spent a good amount of time topside when I was doing my tour with the military.

I lost my religion about the same time I lost my city. When it comes to war, people tend to go one of two ways: either they find God, or they do away with him. I fell into the latter category.

I never blamed him, not like some of the others that gave up religion. They seemed more like jaded lovers than atheists. God just never was a man in my mind. He was food, shelter, safety, and—ultimately—peace. And when all that fled, I realized that my world no longer had a place for him.

But now as I enter the cathedral, holding the king’s arm like I was prepped to do, I can feel the weight of something fall on my shoulders. Maybe it’s the dim light, or the silence in the cavernous space filled with hundreds of people, but it prickles the back of my neck.

I’m about to ask the king if we’re getting married all over again when I catch sight of a crown at the end of the aisle. It rests on a pillow next to a priest—or a bishop, or a cardinal. I have no idea what title the holy man goes by.

My breath releases all at once.

The king’s planning to coronate me.

I pause mid-stride. I want no part in this. It’s one thing to be forced to marry a ruler, another to accept the position yourself. And this isn’t just some parliamentary affair; this is a spiritual one as well.