There was no amusement now. The woman's stubborn insistence and inability to hear what Zarya was saying was beginning to really piss her off. "What are you talking about?"

"The contusion on your cheek. I see the outline of his entire hand where he slapped you. Not to mention the contusion on your elbow and the handprint bruise on your upper arm."

"He didn't do that. The cook did."

"Yeah, right."

Zarya was appalled by her accusations. Why would she assume Darling had beat her? "Would you listen to me? Governor Cruel has not hurt me."

Senna rolled her eyes dismissively. "At least you don't have to worry about him raping you. I guess that's one blessing. Though I've heard he has other perversions for women."

Oh this she had to hear. "Such as?"

"He likes to kill them, then dress in their clothes... especially their panties."

Zarya would have burst into laughter had that not been so ludicrous.

Could they honestly think Darling did that? Really?

Maris was right. They were all blind. Brainless. And ridiculous.

Inconceivable...

Senna leaned forward as if she were imparting a grave secret to her. "It's why his mother and sister refuse to visit him, you know. They are even more terrified of him than they were the Grand Counsel. As soon as the governor took power and murdered his uncle, all the women-his aunt, and her daughters, his mother and sister moved out... Literally, the very next day." She glanced toward the door before she lowered her voice. "You know, the governor's been confined to mental wards six times since his teens."

They'd even twisted that. How disgusting.

"Yes. His uncle did it to torture him. It wasn't because there was anything wrong with Darling."

"Wow..." Senna sat back on her legs to gape at her. "What has he done to you? Some kind of mind control? I'll have to add that to the list. We knew he made weapons... It only makes sense he could create something to also mess with the brain, too."

Zarya's jaw went slack.

But before she could say anything more to contradict the medic, Darling returned to the room.

Her hands shaking, the medic quickly wrapped Zarya's ankle. "It's not bad at all, Your Majesty. She barely twisted it." Senna met Zarya's gaze. "Keep it iced and don't put any weight on it for about a week and it should be back to normal, very quickly. I sent a prescription for painkillers and a speed healer to the pharm tech. They will have it delivered as soon as possible." She stood and bowed to Darling. "Is there anything else you need, Your Majesty?"

He barely glanced at her as he walked to his desk. "You're dismissed."

Senna hurried from the room as if she was terrified Darling might shoot her before she could clear the doors.

Never had Zarya seen the like. It absolutely blew her mind apart that anyone would say such horrible things about a man who'd lived his entire life fighting to give all of them a better life.

"They are terrified of you."

Darling opened the bottle of whisky on his desk, then reached inside a drawer to pull out a small shot glass. "Good." He poured the glass full.

How could he be so blase? Did he not know about the rumors?

Or did he just not care?

"Not really." He needed to understand how dangerous these things could be. "I mean, they are... Words fail me to describe their skewed beliefs. They really think you're worse than your uncle."

He knocked back the shot glass, then poured another. "I am worse than my uncle. Unlike him, I'm trained to kill with my bare hands."

"So it doesn't bother you to have people tremble in fear around you?"

He still refused to look at her. "Should it? As long as they're scared, they won't attack."

Yeah, right. He had to know better. Was he being obstinate to annoy her? "I wouldn't bet on it."

"Then let them try," he said in a low, deadly tone. "I could use the target practice."

He definitely had the skills to warrant that bragging right, but she'd seen a lot of good soldiers fall over the years. Nothing took them down faster than the misconstrued belief that no one could get the drop on them, or outgun them.

"Arrogance comes before the fall."

He knocked back another drink and laughed bitterly. "I'm already in the gutter. There's not much farther down I can go." He poured yet another shot, then brought it over and offered it to her.

She cringed as she realized he was drinking Tondarion Fire-a hard liquor so potent it was banned by most civilized governments. It was a miracle he still had a stomach lining left after drinking it. "No, thank you, Your Majesty. I don't drink that."

"Get assaulted enough and you'll learn to." He spoke those words in a tone so low, she wasn't sure she heard them correctly as he walked back to his desk.

"Why did you bring me here?" she asked.

He drank her whisky, too. Then he finally set the glass down. "Were you unconscious or inhaling fumes? Maris brought you here. Not me."

She scoffed at him. "Obviously something's wrong with me, 'cause I could have sworn it was you, and not Maris, who carried me into this room a few minutes ago."

"Consider it a momentary lack of sanity. Something I've had a lot of lately." He raked a sneer over her dress. "Wherever did you find those rags?"

His question cut what little vanity she possessed, but she would die before she allowed him to know that.

Still, there was poetic justice in what had been done to her. That should lighten his dour mood somewhat. "You'll be happy to know they stripped all my clothes off me last night and stole them. This is what they threw at me to wear this morning."

He went completely still. "Why should I be happy about that?"

"I figured you'd think it karmic retribution for what was done to you."

Those furious blue eyes bored into her. "You never really knew me at all, did you?"

"I knew you. I knew every thought in your head."

"Then what am I thinking now?" His tone held a fierce challenge it.

But there was no need in that. "I don't know anymore. You never showed me this side of you."

"And what side is that?"

"The aristo who treats everyone around him like they're beneath him."

He laughed bitterly. "Then we're even."

"How so?"

"You never showed me the ruthless bitch side of you."

Now that set her temper on fire. How dare he! "That's not fair."

"Not fair?" He snarled those two words. "Not fair is watching my baby sister get shot in the back by a weapon I made for you." He stormed across the room to tower over where she sat on his sofa. "Not fair is hearing a man I fought beside, tell other people I'd put my ass on the line for, that 'the bitch' is dead. That bitch is the same age as your sister, and I feel the same way about her that you do for Sorche. So don't you dare talk to me about fairness."

Her throat tightened at every angry word he spat at her. She heard and she understood. If that had been done to Sorche, she'd be out for blood, too.

But she had to put at least part of the record straight. "I did not give that to Clarion. He stole it from me."

He scoffed at her. "Do you really think that inconsequential detail mattered to me while I hung for months in that room, thinking I'd killed the sister I swore to protect?"

No. The guilt and grief had to be horrifying. She couldn't imagine thinking that something she'd created had been used to kill her sister.

There couldn't be any worse hell. If he was insane, that alone was reason enough for it.

Wanting to comfort him, she reached up to cup his face.

He pulled back with a snarl. "Don't touch me."

Those words hit her like blows, and once more, they brought home the fact that he hated her.

"What do you want me to say? I'm sorry? I am, just so you know. But I'm also aware that words cannot undo what was done to you. They can't fix those wounds. I would give anything if they could. But I know better." She looked up at him, wishing there was some way to reach him and make him see the truth inside her.

But there wasn't.

And that hurt most of all.

Licking her lips, she kept coming back to the one thing she couldn't deny no matter how hard she tried. "Gods spare me the agony, but I still love you."

He raked her with a repugnant glare. "And I hate you in a way I've never hated anyone. Not even my uncle."

The acrimony in his tone tore into her like knives and shredded her heart. "Why would you say something so mean?"

"Because it's true. I always knew where I stood with him. He hated me from the moment I was born. But you..." His scarred voice carried the full weight of his disgust. "You made me believe a lie. And then you kicked me in my teeth and rammed it down my throat. When I needed you most, when I was being brutalized by the people I stupidly thought were my friends, I heard you laughing on the other side of the door every day with the same people who were torturing me. Every moment of that horror, I kept hoping and praying you would come in and help me. And every day you disappointed me until the only thing I could think about was ripping your callous heart out of your chest and eating it whole."

Zarya wept at what he described.

But what hurt the most was what he hadn't thrown in her face...

When she'd finally gone into that room, she'd slapped him. "I'm so sorry."

"Don't you dare cry."

"Fuck you, you sanctimonious bastard! At least I didn't throw you away... twice!" She got up to leave again.

Once more, he cut her path off and stood between her and the door. "Aren't you full of surprises? I've never heard you use profanity like that."

He was lucky she wasn't spewing even more at him. 'Cause right now, she wanted to verbally strike him as much as he'd struck her. And honestly, she wasn't sure how she was keeping it all in. "What do you want from me?"

"I don't know. I..."

Darling forgot what he was going to say as his gaze dropped to see the deep cleft between her breasts. She was so much shorter than him that he had a direct view all the way down to the fact that she didn't have on any underwear.

His throat went dry.

He wanted to hate her. He needed to hate her and yet...

Memories of the past tortured him. In all of his life, she had been his only refuge. Her voice had guided him through hell and led him out the other side of it. No matter how bad things had been, she'd always made it better.

In her arms, he'd never known pain. Only comfort.

Pleasure...

She betrayed you.

He couldn't allow himself to lose sight of that brutal fact. Yet right now, he felt himself slipping under her spell.

He was so confused. It was so easy to hate her when she wasn't around.

But one whiff of her scent. One glimpse of her body. The sound of his name on her lips...

He was weakened and undone.

Don't you dare think about forgiving her. He wanted to hang on to his anger and hatred with both hands. To wrap himself up in its protective coat so that no one could ever hurt him again.

And yet as he looked into her amber eyes...

He saw what no one else had ever given him.

Her heart.

God, help me. Please...

Zarya froze at the sight of his hunger for her. This was the man she knew. The one she wanted back at any cost.

But underneath that was a pain so profound it stole her breath. He was wounded so badly that it made her own heart ache for him. She couldn't stand to see him like this. He looked lost and tormented.

Please come back to me. She needed what they'd had. Needed him to tell her everything would be okay and that he still loved her, no matter what.

Before he withdrew from her again, she rose up and captured his lips.

He wrapped his arms around her, fisting his hands behind her back as he kissed her senseless. Closing her eyes, she breathed him in. All of her emotions slammed into her. Her fear that he'd been killed. Her guilt over what they'd done to him. Her anger over the way he'd treated her.