I shook my head; I had no idea where he was going with this.

“Serenity means to be at peace,” he explained. “When your mother was pregnant, she said the thought of you gave her that—peace.”

Ironic that my life had known so very little of it.

“You’ll never live up to your namesake if you don’t forgive, Serenity.”

“Dad—” He managed to use my one weakness, my mother, against me.

“No,” he shook his head, “this is not an argument. What you choose to do with all that anger is your business. But you can’t control the world; someone will always be there to wrong you. It’s your choice to let it go. Only you can decide the woman you want to be.”

It’s finally time to let it go. I’m not excusing Montes’s atrocities, nor all the monstrous acts that his war brought with it. No, I’m releasing my bitterness so that I can find peace within myself. I want to be that woman my father spoke of, the woman my mother might’ve imagined I’d become.

Perhaps my father was against my current circumstance. It doesn’t change the fact that he always wanted the best for me. He’d want this, serenity.

By the time we arrive back at the king’s palace by the sea, my father’s remains are on their way to becoming ash. I didn’t think he’d want to be buried in the ground after spending so many years down in the bunker.

Once he’s cremated, I intend to scatter his ashes over our homeland, just like we did my mother’s.

I walk into Montes’s room—our room—and see the bed I lost my virginity in. I have mixed feelings about this place, but it’s definitely better than Geneva, where memories of my father haunt the halls.

Montes comes in behind me. His arms weave around my torso and across my stomach. It’s clear what feelings this room stirs in him.

He places a kiss along my neck. This hasn’t happened in awhile—angry hallway encounter not withstanding. Surgeries, kidnapping, and healing wounds have kept us apart. But as the king’s hands glide down my torso, I can tell that’s all about to change.

I turn my head to face him. The look he gives me commands attention—demands I quiet my thoughts so that I can be filled with his. I see his charisma, his charm. It’s what everyone notices, but below all those hardened layers is a shred of the man he must have been long ago. Someone who wasn’t nearly so cruel. Perhaps it isn’t just me who’s capable of becoming a better person.

His fingers hook under my shirt, and he peels it off me.

“I hate you,” I say quietly, without any of my usual venom.