Chapter 27
KEEP YOUR HANDS OFF
Killian
Lexi’s jab about the black hole where my heart should be meant nothing next to the rage tearing through my chest as Bass stood in front of her. His smirk held all the arrogance of someone who thought they were entitled to anything and anyone.
Including her.
I inhaled her sweet fragrance to distract the raging beast within. "Funny, Lexi, I could say the same thing about you."
She swallowed thickly. "I, uh, didn't know you were there."
The edges of my lips twitched. "Somehow, I doubt that would have stopped your insults."
Her eyes narrowed, but before she could speak, my stepbrother cleared his throat.
"Imagine my surprise when I spotted little Alexis Vega at Stonewall." He smoothed back a lock of golden hair that fell into his face. "However, you don't seem that surprised, Killian. She obviously lied when she claimed you weren't aware of her presence."
Her head snapped in his direction. "I never said that. You assumed that. I just said we weren't close anymore."
Lexi seemed composed and collected for the most part. It was all a lie, though. Fear looped around every syllable she spoke, and fine tremors raced through her body. The way she looked at Bass, like he could be the next infamous serial killer, had my rib cage constricting.
She knew.
The moment Lexi encountered Sebastian Davenport, she put the pieces together about what happened the night of the masquerade party. My stepbrother was the Bass she heard, and she probably recognized the charming, urbane voice as the one yelling obscenities at the other girl.
Lexi was in even more danger now. She just didn’t have a clue.
"You all know each other?" Lorelei’s shrill tone distracted me from the terror pumping through my veins. She planted her hands on her hips, tapping her foot as she waited.
Bass's laughter grated on my eardrums. "Little Lexi and Kill grew up together. He worshiped the ground she walked on. That is until—"
"You're full of shit, Sebastian." Lexi folded her arms and glared at my stepbrother while taking a tiny step away from him. "We were friends. Nothing more."
"And we're nothing now." My mouth curved into a disgusted scowl, one I didn't mean. "I have standards these days, and they don't include slumming with someone who is that much beneath me."
Crimson bled into Lexi's cheeks, and those blue eyes flashed like lightning in the sky during a tumultuous thunderstorm. "I would rather rot than be with you, Killian Davenport."
I couldn’t allow Bass to believe I had any reason to protect Lexi. Hurting her feelings was better than my stepbrother realizing she was the girl who stumbled on his little murderous secret.
The fact that I’d cared about her once was enough for her to have a target on her back where my stepbrother was concerned.
"Let's get out of here, Lorelei." I grabbed the blonde’s hand, hating the smug grin she threw at Lexi.
Lorelei glued herself to my side, her fingers possessively curling around my arm. "Where are we going?"
“Don't worry, little brother,” Bass called. “I’ll take good care of Lexi.”
I couldn’t resist glancing over my shoulder, my blood boiling as Bass moved behind Lexi and wrapped his arm around her waist. She looked frozen, too stunned or scared to move.
“Let’s go to my room, Alexis.” The smile stretching over my stepbrother’s mouth would impress the devil himself. “We can play some games and find out how long it takes you to beg for mercy.” One of his hands slid up her ribs, fondling her breast.
Her expression morphed into pure horror.
Why the hell wasn’t she moving? The Lexi I knew would never just stand there, not unless fear had her completely, utterly frozen.
The chains on my inner monster snapped at the thought of her vulnerable and terrified.
A blood-red haze filled my vision.
And the urge for violence hemorrhaged through my veins.
Sebastian Davenport was a dead man.
Before my brain released a single rational thought, I’d spun and closed the gap between us, jerking Lexi away from Bass. My fist crashed into his face, the pain whipping across my knuckles barely registering.
His shriek, however, made a dent in the scarlet fog clogging my mind. And it pleased my inner beast.
I grabbed Bass’s collar and yanked him toward me. “Touch her again, and I’ll kill you.”
Blood oozed out of the split in his lip, but instead of fighting back, he laughed.
The motherfucker laughed.
“There’s the real Killian, the one you hide behind all that perfection.” Crimson coated his white teeth as he grinned. “How does it feel to let out the monster, little brother? Does it make you feel alive? Does it make you crave destruction and chaos?”
My nostrils flared, breathing heavily while I tried to hold on to some semblance of control. “Keep your hands off her.”
Lexi and Lorelei had scrambled away, shocked at the eruption of violence. But I felt Red’s eyes on me, watching my every move.
Was she surprised that I reacted like this to Bass touching her? Did my possessive response piss her off? Or did she like it?
Bass tsked and wiped blood from his chin. “Careful, little brother. Your feelings are clouding your judgment. Maybe if I take one for the team and dirty her up, you’ll finally drop your obsession with her.”
My ears rang, and I couldn’t rein in my fury or shove the darkness back into a cage. Bass had ripped apart my walls, leaving me without my mask. I hauled him farther from the girls and slammed him into a tree.
“Leave Lexi alone.” The low, menacing tone of my voice cut through the space between us like a deadly blade. “I won’t tell you again.”
His head tilted to the side as he studied me, realization brightening those icy blue irises. “You’re awfully protective of someone you claim to hate. Change your mind about her?”
“It doesn’t matter.” I gritted my teeth so hard my gums would bleed. “Just stay away from her.”
He tried to push me off, but I wouldn’t budge, keeping him trapped against the tree.
His gaze shifted to Lexi. “She has such beautiful red hair, don’t you think? The same red hair as the girl who overheard us talking in the room after my little accident.”
Fuck.
Cold fear coiled around my muscles, stiffening each one. “That’s ridiculous. You know as well as I do that Lexi Vega wouldn’t be caught dead at one of our secret parties.”
“Now that I think about it, Lexi also has the same build as the girl in the butterfly mask. Tiny waist, perky tits, delicious curves...” He sucked his bleeding bottom lip. “She certainly has matured over the years.”
I couldn’t breathe as sharp claws burrowed into my chest with every damning sentence Bass spewed. Like I feared, he baited me into becoming a possessive, protective idiot, and I played right into his fucking hands.
Now, his suspicions turned to Lexi.
“She wasn’t invited to the party.” I released him and calmly stepped away, hiding my trembling hands behind my back. “Besides, she’s a prude who would never go for that kind of deviant shit.”
Bass’s low hum had sharp knives scraping my spine. “I bet little Alexis isn’t as sweet as she pretends. In fact, I’ll prove it when I make her my whore. You can watch while she begs me for more as I tear into her cunt and—”
I didn’t even register it as my hand snapped out and wrapped around Bass’s throat, crushing his windpipe. He’d gone too far. No one was laying a finger on her except me, and he needed to understand that.
So fucking stupid.
I might as well have painted a target on her forehead.
His eyes widened, and he sputtered, trying unsuccessfully to sever my grip.
“I didn’t have a lot growing up, so when someone threatens to break what’s mine, I don’t like it.” The smile that curved my mouth made his smirk from a few minutes ago look tame. “Out of the two of us, I’m the real psycho. I only pretend not to be. Don’t forget that.”
Bass wheezed, his chest rising and falling fast.
This would come back to bite me in the ass. Bass would tell Stan I overstepped my bounds, or my stepbrother would do something else to put me in my place. Whatever route he took, there would absolutely be retribution.
But right now, I couldn’t think beyond the rage.
“Killian, stop!” Lexi was suddenly beside me, trying to pull me away from Bass. “You’re going to kill him.”
I bared my teeth. “Good. Maybe he deserves it.”
A vein throbbed on his forehead, his face now a deep red. Soon, he’d pass out from lack of oxygen.
“Kill, please!” Lexi squeezed my arm, her nails digging in. “Don’t do this. He’s not worth it. Please.”
The desperation in her voice, that last word breaking, finally ripped my attention away from Bass’s impending murder, and she broke my grip on his throat.
“Didn’t know you had it in you, Killian.” Bass wheezed and gobbled up air, laughing as if I hadn’t nearly killed him. “You really are a Davenport, aren’t you?”
Lexi used all the strength in her tiny body to drag me away. “Let’s go, Killian. You need to calm down.”
“I thought we were leaving together,” Lorelei called out, somehow oblivious to the shitstorm I might have started.
Or she was simply trying to pretend she hadn’t witnessed me lose my shit over Bass threatening Lexi. That didn’t bode well for Lorelei’s ego or her plans to sink her claws into me.
“Don’t worry, Lorelei,” Bass said as Lexi picked up the pace to tow me farther away. “You don’t want to be around my brother right now. He could snap your little neck if you say the wrong thing.”
He was correct. Everyone needed to keep their distance, Lexi included.
Once we were out of Lorelei and Bass’s sights, I yanked out of Lexi’s hold and veered to the right. “Get away from me. I don’t want to hurt you.”
She scoffed and hurried to keep up. “Too fucking late.” She shook her head. “Besides, I’m not taking the chance that you’ll turn around and attack your stepbrother. Again.”
A smirk curved her lips, but it vanished too quickly.
Was she actually happy at the violence I unleashed on Bass?
I am so fucked.
By protecting Lexi, I made Bass even more interested in her. And now, he suspected she was the one who had overheard us.
“Fuck!” I yelled, startling a few nearby students.
Undeterred, Lexi pulled me onto an empty walkway between two buildings. “Just breathe, Kill. Everything’s going to be okay.”
She had no idea how bad things could get. No. Idea.
I backed her into the wall, pressed my body to hers, and inhaled her scent. Her muscles tensed as I trapped her, but she quickly softened, melting into me. When she first arrived at Stonewall, her mere presence sent me into a rage.
Right now? She was the only one I wanted to be around, even after everything that had happened.
How screwed up was I?
I rested my forehead against hers as the silence washed over us.
A beat passed, and another.
As the fury faded, the last few minutes caught up to me, and panic slashed at my chest. My heart tapped out a frantic beat, and black spots speckled the edges of my vision. Stan would rip me a new one if he found out I nearly killed his precious son.
To make matters worse, as the Domnus, Bass could punish me for assaulting him—even if the bastard had it coming. He could lock me up in the catacombs, torture me, even strip my privileges until I was little more than a Neophyte.
Lexi noticed the anxiety suddenly drowning me and rested her hands on my back, pulling herself farther into me. “It’s okay, Kill. Just take deep breaths. Smell the flowers and blow out the candles.”
A strangled laugh burst out of my mouth. “Did you really just use that little kid trick on me?”
“Well, did it work?”
I pulled away, staring into her worried face. Lexi was slowly chipping away at the fake persona I’d built over the years, reminding me of who I used to be. It pissed me off. I couldn’t afford to be that powerless kid again.
But I also couldn’t allow anyone to hurt her. Except for me, of course. I’d protect her only to ruin her myself.
At least that was the lie I kept repeating, hoping it would take hold and dig in.
We needed to get off Bass’s radar for a while and turn his attention elsewhere. Maybe the self-absorbed prick would fall for the old out of sight out of mind trick.
Best case? It would give his anger some time to cool.
“Be ready in an hour,” I said.
Lexi frowned. “Ready for what?”
“We’re going away together, Red.”
“What?” she screeched. “I’m not going anywhere with you.”
My fingers slid around her jaw, tilting her mouth toward mine. “We’re going on our trip for the Geology project. Get packed. I’m not taking no for an answer.”