King of Depravity: Chapter 31

The plane ride, a red-eye, leaves me exhausted. I’ve barely strung two nights of decent sleep together and I hardly know French, so in the end, I muddle through getting a taxi, by just showing him the slip that Killian gave me with an address.

Once I’m there, I drag my suitcase up to a door, studying the colorful frame. This doesn’t appear to be a hotel, but a private residence.

I lift my hand to knock, the door immediately opens, a woman in a smart uniform on the other side.

“Miss Clark?” she asks with a smile, her English perfect despite her French accent.

My brain is so addled by the lack of sleep that it takes me a full three seconds to realize that she’s using the name on all documents that Killian gave me. “Yes.”

She gestures for me to come in.

I step through the door and immediately gasp because the view through the back of the house is stunning, the house right on the ocean.

“Are you hungry, ma’am?” The woman asks as she dips into a curtsey. I turn back to her. Is she here to cook for me?

“No. Thank you. Just tired.”

She gestures for me to follow her up the stairs. I do, carrying my suitcase up the wrought iron staircase and down a long hall with a picture window at the end. Turning into one of the doors, I find myself in a stunning bedroom with a Killian-sized bed.

The sight of it makes my chest ache.

Is he all right? What’s happening back in Vegas? I came because I knew in my heart that leaving helped him the most, but I hate being here.

All right, under different circumstances, I’d love being here. But nothing feels right without Killian.

Heading into the large bathroom, I shower, brush my teeth, and then crawl into bed. As I close my eyes, visions of Killian fill my head, and despite being exhausted, it takes me forever to fall asleep.

When I wake, the entire day has passed, the sun setting. I push up from the bed, looking out the large picture window with views out over the water. The sky is bathed in shades of orange, pink, and red.

I just watch for a second and then grabbing my phone, I head down the stairs and out the door to put my toes in the sand and watch the sky change.

The lapping of the water relaxes my shoulders as I turn my face up to the sky. “Please be all right, Killian,” I say into the light breeze, my arms wrapping around my middle. “Please come back to me.”

“I already did.”

Spinning, I gasp. He stands behind me, a cocksure grin on his face as he opens his arms.

He looks exactly the same and somehow different. Lighter. Brighter than I’ve ever seen him.

For a moment I just stand there, overcome with emotion and then I close the distance between us, as he pulls me off my feet and into his arms.

I’m wrapped around him before I’ve even said a word, my legs about his waist, my arms circling his neck. “You came.”

“I would have been here sooner, but I flew into England and then had to take the Chunnel.”

“England? Were you visiting family?”

“Something like that. And also losing the guys tailing me.” But he gives me an easy smile.

“Tailing you?” I feel the prick of worry, but he shakes his head.

“Nothing to worry about. Everything is as it should be.” Then he starts carrying me inside.

“Where are we going?”

“I need to fuck my woman,” he murmurs in my ear. “It’s been too long.”

I giggle despite myself. “It’s been like thirty-six hours.”

“Exactly.” He steps back inside and then yells down the hall, “We’ll need dinner in an hour,” before he starts carrying me up the stairs.

I’m not going to argue. I’m hungry for food and starving for him too. “You’re sure everything is good in Vegas?”

“Everything is good. The Russians are a longer-term problem, but we’re making good progress. And in terms of your safety, all is well.”

I don’t ask the details. I know it’s better if I don’t know.

He enters the bedroom, clearly familiar with the house and lays me on the bed, shucking off my clothes between kisses.

I’m naked before he’s pulling off his own shirt, yanking down his pants and leaving them at his knees as he sinks inside me.

We both groan in satisfaction, he feels so good.

Still inside me, he pushes up, staring down at me with dark eyes. “There is something I wanted to ask you.”

“Now?”

“Now.” And then reaching into his pocket, he pulls out a box. He’s buried deep inside me, filling me, as he cracks open the box. “Chloe, will you marry me?”

I gasp as the large diamond, encrusted with emeralds, winks down at me from where it’s nestled into the velvet folds of the box. “You…you’re proposing?”

“I am,” he says as he drops the ring on the bed, and then presses his body back on top of mine, wrapping me in his arms. “Because wherever you are is where I’m home.”

Emotion clogs my throat as I nod. “I feel the same.”

“Is that a yes?”

“Yes.”

His mouth devours mine as he pulls out and pushes back inside me, making me forget all about danger, and France, and marriage. All I can feel is Killian and he is so beautiful.

He ratchets up the pace until I’m begging him to make me cum. With a deep thrust, I break apart, crying his name. He cums with me, his groan filling my ears as I hold him tight. My body slowly floats back to reality. I look to my right, the ring winking at me from where it’s still nestled in its box.

He sees it too, and reaching for it, he pulls it from the velvet folds and slips it onto my finger.

Then he laces his fingers through mine, locking our hands together as he kisses my lips. The sight of our hands locked together like that steals my breath.

He kisses me again, before nuzzling into my neck. “So how do you like your new house?”

I scrunch my brow, trying to look at him. “My house?”

“I doubt I’m going to be easy to be married to, but there are a few perks to being Lady Killian.”

“Lady?”

“By the way, my mother would like to meet the woman who has, in her words, given her her son back.”

I try to process everything Killian has said, but he’s pulling me up from the bed and taking me into the bathroom.

“What are we doing?”

“Taking a long, hot shower before dinner,” he rumbles. “You can ask me all your questions while I soap you from head to toe.”

“Oh,” I feel my cheeks heat with pleasure. But as I step into the hot spray and he grabs the soap, I take him up on the offer. “You saw your mother?”

“I did.”

I know how Killian feels about his mother. “And?”

“It was good,” he says as he starts to scrub my body. I thought I might ask him about the house, or the title of lady, but instead, I’m stunned into silence as he shares the lie his father told him.

The pain I feel for him settles like a brick in my chest. So, he wasn’t made from darkness either. He was shaped into it by the man who raised him. It’s not that I don’t understand being at the mercy of cruelty when you’re too young and innocent to fight.

But I hate that’s what made him. He’s bent down washing my legs and I thread my fingers into his hair even has his head rests on my stomach. “Killian,” I hear the pain I feel tighten my voice.

“If we ever have kids,” he starts. “We’re going to bathe them in beautiful light, aren’t we?”

“Yes.” It’s a simple promise, but one I know I’ll keep. “Promise.”

He looks up at me then. “I promise too.”