Aria’s/Lysara’s POV

He caught my waist from behind, and the next thing I knew, I was spun around, collapsing into his broad, sturdy chest.

I flicked my eyes up at him. I hated him. I wanted nothing but to make his empire crumble and to watch him draw his final breath while I plunged a knife into his heart slowly and cruelly so that he also felt every bit of the pain he’d made me go through all these days.

That was the picture in my head, the way I had planned his death over and over in ...