Page 24 of Rapunzel Unchained
“It’s not real, Eva. What Rebecca and I have is completely for show.”
Adam placed his hand on top of mine, the heat of his hand sinking into mine. I forced myself not to revel in the feel of it,reminding myself I was mad at him. It was easy to do since the queen was always angry.
The image of Rebecca kissing Adam on the television blared in my head, rallying the rage that had consumed me when I’d seen it. My hand jerked out from beneath his and grabbed him by the face, squeezing until he winced.
“Then why was she kissing you?”
“Are you jealous?” His eyes lit with something that could only be called glee.
“I don’t like others touching what’s mine.”
“Is that what I am? Yours?”
When I didn’t answer, he wrapped his hand around my wrist, not pulling my hand away from his face but stroking the pulse that thunder beneath my skin. “We had to make it look real, Eva.”
My voice came in an angry hiss. “Stop it.”
“It could be you, you know?” Adam drew my hand away from his face. I didn’t even realize I’d stopped gripping him so hard. “Is that what you want? For it to be you at my side while I talk to the reporters? For them to all know that I’m yours?”
His mouth stopped inches from mine, his breath mingling with mine. I swallowed, tempting to close the distance but remembering what he’d told me before.
I jerked back from him, pulling his hands from me. “You won’t let anything keep you from getting what you want, remember? Not even me.”
“Eva, please don’t do that.” Adam grabbed for me.
I swatted him away. The righteous anger I’d felt before rearing back in full force. “I will give you a week.”
“A week?” Adam frowned. “To break up with Rebecca?”
“To convince your little council to come to heel.”
Adam shook his head with a scowl. “That’s impossible. I can’t do that in a week.”
“You can and you will.” I pointed a finger at him, shoving it into his chest.
He grabbed my hand and jerked me forward until I was crushed against his chest. “You can’t go around making demands like this of me. I’m not some lowly servant you can push around.”
“You’re the Arch Mage, I know.” I shoved against him, but he held me firmly.
The queen inside me seethed against my restraint at his weak words of compromise. She didn’t want to compromise. She didn’t want to yield and neither did I.
I was tired of being the damsel. Tired of being pushed around by this mage or that. The queen had the right idea all along. The only way to get them to listen, to do what we wanted, was to force them.
The queen rolled and struggled against me for control and, for the first time, I didn’t fight her. I wanted to be her. I wanted to be confident and strong in this fight. I wanted Adam and the rest of them to stop looking down on me like I was someone that they had to protect and save.
I was the fucking Evil Queen, and now it was time to act like it.
My magic purred and coalesced inside me. The blank spots in my mind filled in as if something was melting away the walls blocking them. The part that was Eva and the part that was the Evil Queen merged together until there was nothing left but me.
Magic shot out of me, shoving Adam back against the desk, the contents scattering around as a magical wind whipped up around me.
Adam stared at me in confusion and a twinge of fear.
Rolling my shoulders back, my gaze set firm, I held up a single finger. “One week, Arch Mage. That is how long you haveto right the wrongs that have been done against my people, or I will fix it myself.”
Before Adam could answer, purple smoke wrapped around me, pulling me away from his home and back to Rebecca’s sitting room.
Rebecca jerked to her feet, her tea cup shattering on the floor. “My queen. I’m so sorry, I didn’t know you wanted him. I would have never—”
