The Emperor (Dark Verse, #3)

by RuNyx

“You ever try to leash me, I’ll fucking strangle you with it.” If angels could sing, that was the moment Dante heard the whole freaking choir.

Being a good person and doing good things weren’t always the same.

People weren’t black and white, and sadly, neither were emotions.

Focus. Breathe. Live. Survive. Scream. Breathe. Live. Survive. Scream. Live. Survive. Scream. Survive. Scream. Scream.

“Don’t lose your heart, my baby,”

“You’re not going to walk through life, Amara,” he uttered roughly, each word a vow that cemented itself in her heart. “You’ll dance through it. And I’ll fucking remove anyone who tries to break your rhythm. I promise you.”

She is strong like water is strong—it doesn’t appear that way because it’s adaptable, but it can seep into the smallest of cracks and break open the largest of rocks over time.

‘Fate is always weaving its threads, Dante. We just don’t see them until our eyes open.’

she was the sun hiding behind dark clouds, muted but powerful enough to still light the world.

The thing between them grew, feeling the sun and the water, feeling the nurture and the affection. They began to feel more like magnets than puzzle pieces, finding their way to each other, close but not close enough, as the tension between them built and built and built. She became his person. She became his.

She didn’t recognize herself anymore. Things she once cared about seemed pointless to her. She knew the people around her cared for her, and after a few weeks, she’d realized she couldn’t hurt them as she hurt. So, she had put a smile on her face and listened to them talk, and lived on, pretending something very, very wrong, very ugly hadn’t taken root inside her.

God, she hated her brain some days for not shielding her, not blacking out the entire memory, and leaving her with a clean slate. That would’ve been better. Some days, anger at herself made her want to do something drastic. Some days, the knife on the kitchen counter looked friendly. Some days, all she wanted was to let go, but only knowing how much the people around her would hurt stopped her every time. She took hot showers to clean her skin but the filth stayed buried in, no matter how hard she scrubbed.

He looked at her like that more often, like a condemned soul being offered salvation, like a blind man seeing the sun.

“I will kiss you and brand myself upon your heart, Amara,” he told her quietly. “Just make sure you’re ready for me to.”

“You’re the beat to my heart, Amara,” he whispered against her mouth, pressing his forehead to hers, and something that had been wilted inside Amara unfurled, opening, soaking, blooming in the emotion she could see in his eyes. She was the beat to his heart and he was the beat to hers, both of them pulsing together. Maybe, they were both the same beats. Maybe, theirs was the same heart.

How many times did people break before they stopped mending?

“We’re not a love story. We’re a tragedy in the making. There’s no happy ending for us. I feel that you have a better future ahead of you, and you should take it.”

Don’t let him see. Don’t let him see. Don’t break.

there wasn’t much difference between true evil and true love.

“That ‘common little whore’ is going to be the mother of my children one day, father,” Dante smiled at the man. “Your grandchildren. The future Maronis.”

“You’re in my blood, beating in my fucking heart. The only way you go is when the heart stops.”

“I can’t, Amara. You’re the beat to my fucking heart.”

“I’m going to eat this pussy until they bury me in the ground,”

“One day, I’m going to put my ring on that finger, Amara,” he grit out, pushing up another inch into her. “One day, I’m going to put my babies inside you. Just wait for me, baby. Please wait for me.”

“Remember what you said? We’re not a love story. We’re a tragedy waiting to happen.”

“Then, let’s make it a good one.”

“You” thrust “are” thrust “mine”.

“You’re the queen on the board, Amara. You’re my most powerful piece, but my most vulnerable. They get you, they get me, and the game is over. So, I’ll do whatever I need to make sure they never get you. Even if that means hiding you like my dirty little secret for the time being.”

feelings were powerful. And a man who denied them out of a misbegotten sense of societal norm was a fool.

“But it’s not what you’re given that makes you who are. It’s what you do with it. It’s not the weapon but the one who wields it that holds the power, and

“This hell is my kingdom now, Amara,” he told her, his eyes solemn. “As long as I’m alive, it won’t touch you. And I intend to live a very long, very happy life with you.”

the queen of his heart was going to be the mother of his child.

“In sickness in health, in life in death, in murder in mayhem, isn’t that how it goes?”

He started writing the alphabets on her nub with his tongue, pushing her closer and closer. She crashed on the D.

“Marry me, Amara.”

“Be my wife, be my dirty girl, be mine,” he mumbled against her lips.

“You’re a romantic,”

“Give me your dreams and your nightmares, your pleasure and your pain, your fantasies and your fears. Give me everything. Be my queen outside, and my filthy girl inside,”

“And make me fucking yours, so everyone who looks at my ring knows I have you finally. Say yes, Amara.”

“Marry me.”

“Say yes, baby.”

‘yes’.

The dark in your soul is but a blemish. The dark in mine is an eclipse.”