31
After the doc finishes cleaning me up, I lay back onto the pillows, turning to face Wren who is curled on her side, freshly showered.
“Are you okay?” I ask.
She nods her head, “It feels surreal to be over.”
I sigh. It wasn’t over. Not yet. The syndicate are still at large, invisible and yet pressing in none the less. Heart is staying in one of the hotels in the city, waiting for me to come through with his payment and whilst he had told me he didn’t want a war, I suspected his patience would only go so far.
“Rory was buried today,” I tell her, cupping her face in my hand.
I would destroy the world for this woman, including my city, I’d level it all to have her right where she is now.
“Where?”
“In the Silver crypt,” My finger strokes across her bottom lip.
“Thank you.”
I nod. “I’ll take you one day.”
Images of the battle back at the hotel flash through my mind, Valentine with the blade against her neck, the manic and violent light shining in his eyes. Wren slicing through his throat like an avenging angel, watching as his blood coated her skin and never once grimacing or flinching. And then her riding me, urgent and chaotic. Her need filling me, pulling me up and the taste of her sweetness on my lips.
“Marry me.” I say.
Her eyes widen, “Excuse me?”
“Don’t pretend you didn’t enjoy being called my wife, little bird,” I grin, sliding my thumb between her lips, “be my wife. Be a fucking Silver officially.”
She sucks at the pad of my thumb, tongue rolling around the tip and then she pulls away, “you want to marry me?”
“Yes, Wren.”
She grins, “Shouldn’t there be some grand gesture, you on your knees, a ring?”
“You want me on my knees for you, little bird?”
She cocks a brow playfully.
With a grin to match hers, I slide from the bed, dropping to my knees, “I’m already there, baby,” I admit. “I’ll always be on my knees for you. I’d burn it all for you.”
“I don’t want you to burn it all,” she breathes, leaning towards me.
“But I would.”
“Yes,” she whispers, “Yes, Lex, I’ll marry you.”
The light of morning has started to bleed onto the horizon, turning the black sky grey and whilst a new day may be beginning there’s too much shit hiding in the shadows.
I will be marrying this woman but only when this city is back under control. Only when I know she can rule at my side with no threats. I kiss her with the sun rising over our kingdom, and I vow to keep her as far from this as possible.
“Come now, Little bird,” I coax, “stop asking so many questions.”
She glares at me, lips pursed as I gesture for the door of the elevators. My eyes peruse her body, the smooth skin of her legs, the hem of her dress sitting just above the knee, long enough to cover the mark on her thigh, the skirt flared before becoming tighter on the torso, neckline high but not high enough to cover the sharp lines of her clavicles. Her mass of wild copper hair is pulled across one shoulder, untamable but it’s her face that catches me off guard.
I expected some guilt over what she did last night, disgust or horror at herself for killing a man but her green eyes are clearer than they have ever been. She squares her shoulders and straightens her spine, tipping her chin to the ceiling, showing off that slice on her throat like it’s a victory badge and not a wound that could have killed her.
She was going to be formidable.