Priest and his Anarchist

Chapter 42

Chapter Forty-Two

luna

present

T he diamonds in my fishnet tights stretch over my skin as my heels click over the concrete floor. With mascara smudged beneath my eyes, and my hair styled down my back in messy blonde waves, it’s no guessing who I am right now.

It’s not twenty hours since being dropped in the viper’s den.

Corbin walks beside me, his metal-covered hand covering my ass and his leather jacket grazing my arm.

Everything I’ve worked toward, everything we’ve all worked toward is right here. The final hit right beneath the palm of my hand. Why couldn’t the Elite Kings Club, the most notorious society in the world who are known to reach into places that most couldn’t, find out about Corbin. This whole time it was fucking him.

The ground beneath me crunches as we walk farther and farther into the tunnels beneath New York. A magnetic pull from above has my head facing upward. I swear we’re walking beneath the smell of the burning rubber, the yeast in freshly baked bread, and the sound of loud JDM engines racing through the streets.

But it can’t be true. Nothing exists beneath Riverside that the Kings don’t want to, which means that maybe—maybe?—

Information pours through my mind like a waterfall and these are waters I’m not sure I can swim in.

“Come here…” Corbin grabs me by the ass and forces me into his kiss. “I’m sorry. It’s going to be the worst thing you’re ever going to do.” My mouth opens as I let him deepen the kiss.

Ice.

Snow.

Cold.

Blood.

My hand crawls to his neck, and I squeeze, forcing him further into my mouth and grinding against his cock.

Dirt.

Blood.

Snow.

Cold.

So cold.

He pulls back, resting his forehead against mine and smiling wide. His kiss will stain my lips, the vomit in my throat threatening to surface. “Oh, Darling, I’ve missed you. I knew stealing that bitch would bring you back to me.” He buries his fingers in the nest of my hair. “Have you missed me?” His eyes sparkle, the edge of his mouth curved in a smirk.

“I have.” The will to continue the facade dying out the longer I’m here.

“There seems to be a breach in the armory. We have no way of getting in.” I turn to look over my shoulder, smirking at the young boy dressed in tactical gear. His brown locks fall over his face, his jaw scattered with hair.

“Can you not see we’re busy?” I bite down on my lip for added effect, turning to push Corbin behind me further. These tunnels are just like the ones beneath Colorado. Damp and weak. Nothing like the ones I was familiar with in Perdita.

I take a careful step forward, tilting my head. “You’re so damn cute.” I ruffle his hair. He had to be no older than eighteen. “Are you one of mine?”

His eyes fall to my face, holding me there. “Yeah, actually.”

Before I can register what’s happening, shots fire off behind me. I spin around in time for Corbin to catch me in his arms, dragging me through the fog of smoke.

He coughs, squeezing my hand and forcing me through another concrete door. It slams closed, shutting off the chaos erupting outside as lights flicker to the sound of alarms.

“What’s happening!” I hold him there, careful to keep enough distance between the two of us. “Corbin!”

He laughs, his eyes rolling to the back of his head. “It seems, lover, that we have a rat in the tunnel.”

I wait for him to continue, but he doesn’t, and when a heavy door opens behind me, I don’t get enough time to ask him what he means before he’s dragging me through it until we’re down yet another pathway.

I almost trip over a track as he spins me around and pushes me through another. Lost in the maze of doors, I wouldn’t know my way back out. Darkness envelops me, and my skin prickles. With no light, all I hear is our panting breaths.

“Corbin, what’s happening?”

He doesn’t answer, and in the darkness is not where I want to be locked with someone I’m sure is a notch far below the average psychopath. A finger touches my lips and I feel the dust of a capsule.

“You said you’d dance for me, and the crowd won’t wait.”

“It’s giving Midnight Mayhem,” I grumble, only when I open my mouth, he slips the pill straight down my throat.

Crap.

He chuckles, but it’s light and snarky. “You dare insult me. You know we’re nothing like them.”

I didn’t, since he is a Kiznitch after all. But he’s right. They’re not directly linked. It makes sense now why Corbin would hang around in Spain. He never spoke of his parents, but I knew he was a Brother of Kiznitch, one of the more important ones.

“True,” I tease, blindly searching the wall for a light switch. Who the fuck sits behind this screwed up Ministry? Now I wish Priest didn’t kill Darling. Maybe she could have told us, but I’m thinking maybe she didn’t know. Or care.

“We’ll wait here now. I’m sure he’ll be here any minute.”

“Who will be here?” I ask, annoyance waning.

“What do you mean, who?” I didn’t realize he was so close until his lips brush over my own. “Dance for me.”

I swallow gently. I’m not as good at acting as I thought I could be. His hand falls on my hip as he directs me over the bulge in his pants.

“Dance for me.”

His mouth is on mine and without hesitation, I open it wide, allowing his tongue to slip inside. My stomach twists and drops the longer the kiss carries on, and I grow more and more agitated. I don’t want to be here, playing nice with the boy who makes my insides crawl every time I think of that one night in Aspen being him all along.

Strobe lights flicker above us. Encased by glass shaped as a hexagon, I look back at my reflection at every angle, with Corbin’s body pressed against mine. Every angle the same, only a different view.

He stumbles backward, grasping the cane from beneath his leather coat. His arms spread, the smile on his mouth wide. “Dance for us, Darling. The way you always have….”

Is this all a show? The screams, the murder, the rush to get here—is all part of his show. Music plays in the background, and suddenly I feel exposed, like an animal in a circus. Casting a quick glance over my shoulder, every wall in this place is closed in by glass.

“Full house, Darling. Dance, dance, dance….”

“Welcome to the Circus” by Five Finger Death Punch fills the air. I never danced in Midnight Mayhem. I rode bikes and stuck to myself. It was merely a distraction for Priest, so he didn’t know what I was doing beneath. I see it now, how hard the Fathers fought to ensure he never knew what I was doing.

I pause.

A door opens and the lights above us strobe as naked people dance throughout the space. I feel the first surge of whatever he slipped me, the warmth as it moves through my blood, intoxicating.

Because their face is disguised behind eyeless hoods, I don’t notice right away that their wounds are painted on.

Blood sprays through the room as they repeat the same dance to the tune. Spinning around, swinging to the beat.

The girl on the end falls first, blood pooling around her body, marking her place of death. They continue the dance as if it didn’t happen, and one by one, they slowly fall until there’s only one left. Her stomach wound is deep and brutally done, with a heavier hand than the rest of them. The song had only just finished when her body shakes, until trembling to the ground with the rest of them.

Silence. With nothing but the deep intakes of my breath.

My hair whips across my face and sticks there when the door opens again.

I see his boots first. Heavy, leather, well worn. As if they’ve stomped through hell itself. As my eyes travel up past the ripped markings of his jeans, landing on the ripple of abs that tense every time he takes a step, the screech of metal scraping across concrete draws my attention to the machete in his hand.

His face covered with his signature diamond black skull mask, with one eye caged behind bars, and the sharpness of his fangs elongated. If I didn’t feel his familiar darkness crawl over me like an entity all on its own, I’d still second-guess who it was.

It’s a lazy stroll as if toying with his prey. If I hadn’t already worked it out when they didn’t come to save me, the realization that Corbin was right is sealed. He didn’t know about us being twins until after the fact, and judging by the way he’s circling, he didn’t come for me. The words of what everyone has said over the years come back to me. About how he felt about her. I’m going to say that when he did it, he wished it was me that he killed, and that he still had her.

The muscles in his body flex with every step. I hate that I know what it felt like to be loved by him, even if it wasn’t real. I don’t have to see the tattoo on his back to know who he is.

I hold my chin high as another song starts. He points the machete straight at me as the blood from the victims at our feet drips off the blade. “Cities” by Two Feet starts.

“Well, you heard him, Darling.”

He stops walking. Thankfully a safe distance away from me since he sounds more than pissed.

His boot leaves a footprint on one of the bodies. “Dance.”

I sidestep, but he follows, tracing my every move. Like two lions in a cave, we watch each other. The molly rushes through my body and when the beat drops, I do as I’m told.

I dance. It’s not until I twist into his embrace that I feel that familiar weight of fear drop, holding me in place.

Fuck it.

Arching my back, I bend over, pushing my ass into him, the first rush of heat surging me to life when I feel him already hard. Swinging my hair in a circle, I slowly lift myself back up, turning to face him front on before shoving him onto one of the chairs in the center of the room. He falls, but it’s not because of my force.

Widening my legs, I straddle his waist and roll my hips, ensuring to rub myself over the outline of his cock. He is home to me, but I am hell for him. The song finishes and I push myself off, my back colliding with the glass wall. I find Corbin just in time to watch him slip out of the room.

The feeling of knowing you’re about to die isn’t one that can be swallowed with anything, much less a weak drop of molly. It’s the roll of sweat down the base of your spine, or the final blink without knowing you won’t open your eyes again.

Do or die, Luna. This is do or die because I’m pretty sure you’re going to die anyway.

I open my eyes again in time to see another shirtless, bloodied person clutching his machete on his shoulder and wearing a mask much like Priest’s, only littered with a sprinkling of rubies. Vaden.

Corbin falls to the ground, crawling backward on his hands. “I’m sorry!” He throws his hands up to protect himself. “Please, I just want Danny back—the Minister is the only person. I want—his attention, we haven’t seen?—”

Vaden’s head tilts to the side as if examining him like one would an insect.

My eyes open on Priest again, a brow perched in challenge.

“Okay, Rabbit. Let’s play.”

The mask doesn’t cover his lips, and with the lights flickering, it delays movements by a millisecond.

My blood turns hot when the corner of his mouth twitches to a smirk. Even without my throwing stars, I know how to protect myself. From Priest? No. With or without a machete, but there’s got to be a part of his dark and dirty soul that sees her when he looks at me. I’m hoping that part decides to keep me alive the same way it has all these years. It dawns on me like a sad nightmare.

He thinks I’m pretending to be her, and he’s let me this whole time.

Nothing but his eyes move. “What’s the matter, Madness? Don’t wanna play anymore?”

In waves, everything rolls into me in soft but unwelcome waves. The last one hits me hard, so heavy I slide to the ground. My world as I know it slips between my fingers, an overwhelming sadness too much for me to hold in. The years, the back and forth of not knowing where I belong, the emotions, the confusion, the games.

It’s too much.

The tears that well in my eyes blur the room in an array of blood and fools. “Vermilion Pt 2” plays, in some sick, twisted way of the universe taunting me, as if a lifetime wasn’t enough.

Laughter leaves my chest, sharp and hollow. I swipe at the tears running down my cheek, sniffing and resting my head against the wall.

Nothing helps calm my spiral.

Not deep, slow breathing.

Not my eyes closing out the disaster around me.

I tried. I tried for the longest time, to the very end. I can’t do it anymore. I can’t be anyone but myself, and if being myself gets me killed, I’ll do it myself.

“45” from Shinedown plays and my world stops. Whoever is behind the playlist is playing a sick joke.

His shadow towers over me like it has so many times before, and I hold my breath. I never knew what it would be like when this day finally came. Part of me hoped I’d go old. Happy. Loved.

I should have known better.

My cheeks burn from the tears and blood as sadness vibrates through my body so hard my shoulders jerk when my sobs break out.

He didn’t know you were a twin until after you were dead.

No one could love the way he did her! And he still killed her with his bare hands.

It wasn’t just his first love. She made him feel for the first time.

We can’t have him know about you. It’ll risk him killing you and hunting her down.

“Do it,” I whisper, but the music suffocates my words. I don’t bother opening my eyes. If he has to take my final breath, I’d rather he does it without seeing the truth.

That I’ve been in love with him since the day he saved me. Since he wrapped me in his jacket and carried me back to the house where I met my parents for the first time. From the very first moment, I had to pretend. I didn’t know how to say any other words except please, no, yes, okay. I was mute. They thought I was dumb.

“Priest. Just do it! Kill me!” My eyes fly open onto him, my vocal cords torn to shreds.

He lowers to my level, bringing me face to face with his mask and lips far too soft to be on a man made for destruction.

Unclipping the side of his mask, it slips off his face. His wrath is carefully trained to simmer below the surface, but right now, you wouldn’t know it. Like a brewing storm, the beat of his heart flutters between us.

Tears continue to roll down my face because as much as I didn’t want to give him this final part of myself, the part where he takes this from me too, I realize it’s no use. Every part of myself is his. Even knowing I’d die at his hand one day. It doesn’t matter because dying at his hand would still hurt less than loving him a lifetime.

His touch stings when he takes me by the chin, drawing me in close. I stop breathing. When his lips brush mine, I burn to ash. It’s a simple kiss. One you’d use as a goodbye. My tears don’t stop. Not when he stops kissing me, resting his head against mine, and not when he pulls back, searching my eyes. His hands disappear behind my head, but I’m too busy lost in him that I don’t realize what he’s done.

My fingers touch the silk in my hair, tied to a loose pony.

The ground tilts beneath me.

In the reflection and through the splatter of blood, the familiar yellow ribbon glows like a halo of light.

My breathing deepens as my panic rolls off me.

He rests his forearms on his thighs. “I know who you are, Madness.”

My throat dries. “And who’s that?” The words feel like acid when they travel up my throat. I need him to say it. To say who I am even though the ribbon should be clarification.

He doesn’t move. “Mine.”

I blink. “But—what?”

He shakes his head the same way a parent would their disappointment of a teen. “You should have trusted me over everyone.” He leans down, catching my chin once more and forcing my lips back onto his. “Even the Fathers.”

Guilt weighs heavy on my chest.

“Why do you think I gave you my name, Madness? Think.”

My mouth opens and closes. I try not to think too hard into it because I find that anytime I do, I end up in a tighter knot than I had before I started.

“I don’t know.” I exhale, deflated from it all.

His head tilts to the side as if he’s going to kiss me, but he doesn’t. “I made you a Hayes because I wanted to keep you safe. Because if there was one thing on this earth that was guaranteed to keep you alive, it was my name.”

“But that was before I came back? That was before.” The pieces slide into place. He knew she was a twin all along.

I cover his hand with mine. It only barely covers his palm. “But you loved her.”

“I killed her.”

Taking my hand in his, he slowly stands. I have no idea what any of this means. I thought he would have killed me the same way he did her, but he kept it. He kept my ribbon this entire time, and more than that—he tied it back onto me. The gaping hole in my chest closes. He’s carried it with him this whole time until he was ready to give it back to me. What did he do with this during that time?

He steps over a body, directing us toward the door when his mask catches my eye in the sea of blood.

I bend down, swiping it up with my other hand.

“That was a little terrifying, Luna. Not gonna lie…” Vaden jokes when we pass him. He tugs on the chain that’s wrapped around Corbin’s throat. “Good boy.”