Cruel King: A Dark New Adult Romance (Royal Elite)

There’s no place for a princess on the chessboard, but she barges in anyway.

After the discussion of tomorrow’s formation, Coach leaves us to shower and head home. It’s the first game of the season and team spirit is at its highest.

You have to be blind to not notice that Aiden, Xander, Cole, and Ronan brought a new spirit to the team. Even I can’t deny that their connected team play improved our middle and front lines. It’s rare to find second years as starters, but the four of them have proved themselves indispensable to the team.

Once we’re gone, they’ll have a stellar senior year ahead. If we win this year’s championship, there’s a high chance they’ll repeat it next year, too.

For the first time in RES’s history.

If anyone can pull it off, then it’s Aiden. The guy has no relationship with failure.

The team members slap each other on the back on their way to the showers, joking and talking about pussy and partying.

I don’t feel it.

Any of it.

It’s like I’m caught in a vicious, black cycle of my own making that I can’t penetrate.

Coach pulled me aside yesterday to inform me that Premier League scouts will show up during this season. He believes I can make it to one of the big ones, but even Coach said the dreadful, ‘If your family is good with it’ line.

Uncle made it blunt and clear that there will be no professional football playing, and even if I do get recruited by one of the Premier League’s titans, Uncle has the power to blacklist me from any team that matters.

When you have King Entreprises at the palm of your hands, anything can be done with a push of a button.

My long, distant football dream isn’t the only thing that’s fucking up my mood.

I’m thinking too much, calculating too much, and partying too much. I’m not getting enough sleep. Sometimes, I wake up just to find out I’m still dreaming.

All of that is terrifyingly similar to a certain someone who shall not be named.

I take a quick shower, indulging some of the guys. Once we’re out and changing our clothes, Ronan says, “Party at my place?”

“No.” I scold. “Game night, no partying.”

“Naw, come one, Captain.” Ronan throws a punch in the air. “We can kill them Newcastle losers even when we’re drunk.”

The others yell and shout, pumping their chests.

“No partying and no getting drunk on game night,” I say in a deadly tone, making them all grow silent. “Do I have to repeat myself?”

“No, Captain.” A few of the juniors answer and the others nod.

“Guess I have to settle with one pussy. Merde!” Ronan rolls his eyes. “The sacrifices I have to make for the team.”

“How is that a sacrifice?” Cole asks.

“Cole, mate, when I throw a party, I get at least two pussies and a blowjob as a thank you. Now, I’m stuck with only Chloe.”

“You’re tapping that now?” Xander unwraps his towel and shoves his feet into his boxer briefs. “I thought she had eyes for Captain.”

“He threw her off his lap last week like a bad habit.” Ronan frowns. “I don’t know why girls think I’m cool with sloppy seconds.”

“Because you are?” Cole asks.

“You fuck anything with a skirt?” Xander chimes in.

“That’s not true!” Ronan protests.

“Mate,” Xander flings an arm over his shoulder. “How many times did you go to console a girl after she’s been rejected just to end up between her legs?”

“Hey, fou.” Ronan throws his hands around. “Sex is the best form of consolation.”

“Right.” Cole mocks. “Of course.”

It’s no use telling him that Chloe still texts me, practically begging me to meet her. He wouldn’t care and neither do I.

None of these girls stir anything in me anymore. For them, I’m just a stepping stone so they’d say they fucked King. The captain. The local star.

They’ve always been nothing, so it feels like nothing when I ignore them.

Besides, they’re not the ones who have been getting my dick hard since that night a week ago.

Maybe I really am sick.

“Yo, King,” Chris whispers from my right.

I leave the guys bickering and lean closer to Chris as I button my shirt.

“I checked with my old man and that girl’s father didn’t drop the case,” he murmurs. “We should teach her a lesson this time.”

I shake my head.

“But they will…”

“We’re only under jeopardy if she remembers and she doesn’t.”

Chris taps his foot, watching his surroundings before he hisses, “If she does, we’re done for.”

“She won’t. It’s in my hands now. Drop it.”

That night when Astrid has looked at me with teary, wrenched eyes, searching for a soul I don’t have, I didn’t sleep.

And in that sleepless night, I came up with a different tactic. If the problem is her memory, then I’ll take of that instead of taking care of her.

“We should threaten to rape her,” Chris mutters. “Maybe the bitch will understand to back off this time.”

One moment, Chris is talking, the next, I’m throwing him against the lockers with my arm against his fucking throat. He wheezes, face reddening as he struggles. I tighten my arm, cutting off his air supply.

“You won’t get near her, touch her, or even fucking look at her,” I snarl against his face as his eyes bulge. “When I say to drop it, you. Fucking. Drop. It.”

Scratchy noises escape his throat and his colour turns from red to blue. Somewhere at the back of my mind, I recognise that he’s suffocating and that I’ve relayed my message and should let him go, but the unhinged part wants to see the life drain from his face drop by bloody drop.

“Let him go, Lev.” Aiden clutches my arm and it’s then I realise that a few more of the team are pulling me away from Chris.

Or trying to.

I release him and he slides to the ground, coughing and clutching his throat.

Aiden’s brows furrow as he watches me with that calculative spark.

I’m known to not get worked up on the team, so this must be putting Aiden’s mind into a loop.

“Don’t fucking show up here again unless you plan to snatch your place back,” I bark at Chris and storm out of the locker room.

I need a long drive and a smoke. Or a few.

It’d be best if I don’t go back home tonight. Jonathan’s face is the last thing I need to see.

Murderous energy looms over my head like a thick fog with no way out.

In the car park, I stop when I spot a petite figure lingering near the exit, right under the bulb.

She must be waiting for Daniel.

Earbuds in, Astrid has a sketchpad in her hands with her brows drawn. There’s a slight twist to her upper lip when she’s in full concentration. It’s adorable.

Adorable.

Fuck. I don’t remember the last time I ever thought of something as adorable.

Astrid isn’t one of those girls who wear their uniform skirts as short as possible or their jackets at tight as possible. She wears her uniform with a quiet elegance that fits her petite frame and rebellious character.

Only… she hasn’t been rebellious at all.

She did return to school after I barged into her house, but since then, she’s been keeping to herself.

No more distasteful pranks. No more challenges. No more… anything.

She’s been treating me as non-existent since she returned to school. I thought I wanted her to back off and know her place, but now that I think about it, the sudden lack of her fight is part of what’s been pissing me off.

I’ve been feeding off her negative energy like a starved predator, and now that she’s sealing herself in, I’m tempted to claw inside and pluck her out.

There’s something about her that keeps pulling me in and I’m not the type to back off until I see the end of it.

Time to see how much fight the princess has left.