Tears streamed down her face as Darien dropped the locket and chain into her palm.She closed her eyes and remembered the day they had taken the picture inside the locket.
A picture of her and her father when she was six years old.A rare photo her mother hadn’t burned.He was meant to give it to Adrienne when she turned twenty-four, days before his death.He never got around to it because he died of a heart attack after a poker game he lost to Desmond Morton.That was how the pendant came to be in Desmond’s possession and how he held it over her.
Tears dripped from her eyes as she held it in her hands.In her heart, she said her goodbyes.
“We love you, Adrienne.We’ve loved you for what felt like an eternity before we got to touch you.We aren’t going anywhere.If you don’t want us, we’re still going to be following you.Protecting you.Killing any man who touches you.”
They loved her?Could it be real?
“What about Desmond?How could he be your father?”
“He kidnapped our mothers and kept them as his sex slaves.Once they became pregnant, and he knew they were having boys, he threw them out.They could barely take care of themselves, so they put us up for adoption.”
Oh god.Her heart broke for their mothers, then soared with new hatred for Desmond.
“We got our revenge on him, Adrienne, for what he did to our mothers.For what he would have done to you.We would do it all over again.Killing him was deeply satisfying.”
She didn’t think she had it in her, but if ever there was a man who needed to die, horribly, it was Desmond Morton.
“I love you,” she said fiercely.“I love you with all my heart, soul, and life.Emerson.Darien.Austin.”She ran to them.They crushed her to them, taking full possession of her again without any dark clouds hovering around them.
They were her new beginning.
EPILOGUE
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Adrienne didn’t thinkher husbands could get any more protective, but she was wrong.Six months into her pregnancy, they showed her another level of possessive protectiveness that could break records.
And she loved every moment of it.
“Darling, I said to get you a man on the side, not marry three gorgeous, growly, way too possessive men and have them breed you like that,” Miriam said, pointing to Adrienne’s bump.“But I am so glad you did.You are glowing and I love this for you.This is really who you are, Adrienne.You were never an ice queen; you were just their queen.”
“Thank you.I am their queen and they’re my entire universe.”
She couldn’t wait to fill their new house with lots of kids and pets, noise, laughter and love.
With her locket around her neck, she knew her father could feel her happiness and now he could rest in peace.
