Total pages in book: 100
Estimated words: 101988 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 510(@200wpm)___ 408(@250wpm)___ 340(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 101988 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 510(@200wpm)___ 408(@250wpm)___ 340(@300wpm)
“Possibly. Or…it’s because you’re finally done with bullshit. I saw the change in you when she kicked you. I see it still.” Victor studied Henri before standing and gliding like a creature of the night toward a narrow chest of drawers. “I’m still open to killing you if you don’t fully step into who you truly are, but…I’m willing to see how far you’ll take this. If I didn’t know any better, I’d say you were finally waking up—just like you said—and that’s why you’re no longer afraid.”
Opening a drawer, he rummaged around before removing something. Oiling his way back to Henri, he said, “Hold out your hand.”
Henri spread his fingers and offered his palm, his arm unsteady. “I’m not afraid of you, you know.”
“Oh, I know.” Victor smiled like a doting father as he dropped the item into Henri’s grip. “You were afraid of yourself.”
Henri shuddered and fisted the item. “Fuck yes, I’m afraid of myself. I’ve been afraid all my life.”
“And now?” Victor crossed his arms. “How do you feel?”
For a moment, Henri didn’t answer. He studied whatever Victor had given him before his imaginary, drug-given wings flared with a dry rustle of skin and bone.
And when he spoke, I felt it in the core of me.
“For the first time in my life, I’m not nauseous.”
“Nauseous?” Victor raised an eyebrow. “You’re going to have to explain that one because I don’t follow.”
With a heavy sigh, Henri blinked as if he finally saw the truth.
A truth that he could be honest about things he’d hidden from all his life.
A different sort of confession to the ones he’d given me.
A real confession.
Wiping his mouth and schooling his tongue not to give in to drunken slurs, Henri muttered, “All my life, I’ve felt sick if I ever contemplated taking what I needed. I gagged on the poison inside me. I begged to throw up this curse before it killed me. But now…” His chin tipped up. His eyes locked on mine. “That sickness is gone. I feel so fucking strong. Like I’m invincible. Untouchable...”
My mind blended fact and fiction as Henri prowled toward me and pressed the knife against my cheek. “I’m really, truly free.”
I sucked in a breath.
He forgot about Victor.
He spared no thought for Peter.
It was just him and me.
Bad and good.
Alive and dead.
“Do you know what I wanted to do when I first saw you at the bar, Ily?” He dragged the sharp, sharp knife down my chin, along my throat, and over my flimsy white negligée. “I wanted to hurt you. I wanted to bend you over right there and fuck you hard enough to make you scream.”
I couldn’t catch a proper breath as he swirled the dagger around my nipple.
Gone was our pantomime.
Our script in cinders all over the floor.
“I told myself those thoughts were wrong. I pretended that the moment I noticed you, something didn’t crack inside me.” He laughed under his breath. “I lied.”
His eyes never released mine as he placed the item Victor had given him on the table beside us. His gaze no longer shimmered with righteous silver but turned a flat sterling of corruption.
Rocking back on his heels, he tested the hooks holding my golden collar and cuffs before nudging my ankles with his bare toes, ensuring the buckles he’d bound me with held.
Only once he was satisfied I was well and truly at his mercy did he drop the final pretence and give in. With steady hands, he grabbed the neckline of my negligée, then sliced it with his knife. Fisting the shredded lace, he yanked.
Hard.
The rip of it tearing in half matched the ripping in my heart.
Fresh tears stung.
Zebras brayed.
Wolves barked.
Every inch of me trembled as Henri shoved aside the scraps of my ruined lingerie, baring my nakedness to a thousand dead eyes, one slave, and a monstrous ringleader.
But none of them mattered as Henri dropped his stare to my breasts and devoured me by sight alone.
“Fuck, you’re stunning.” He palmed me, fisting delicate flesh ever so cruelly. “Ripe and young, pure and brave.”
Tears welled hotter, wetter.
I didn’t let them fall.
Not for him.
Not for death whispering in my ears or terror fisting my crazy-winged heart.
“You’ll sob for me before the night is through,” Henri breathed as he pressed the tip of his knife against my neck. “You’ll bleed for me every night. And fuck, that turns me on.”
“Die now…before it’s too late,” a swan crooned.
“Choose to drift away where he can’t hurt you,” a sparrow chirped.
“Use the pipette dropper I gave you, mon ami,” Victor said as he settled back into his peacock chair for the show. “Count each droplet you draw from her. One hundred and two, don’t forget. That’s about five millilitres, give or take.”
Five mil?
Practically nothing.
Barely anything.
Yet…it’s everything.
My blood.
My lifeforce.
Mine.
Not his.
My mind suddenly swarmed with gushing crimson.