Chapter 27
The Devil’s Playground owner, Calvin, sits across from me, sweating through his silk collar, rattling off the list of suppliers and teams Sterling’s been using. He’s avoiding Sovereign connections. He thinks dealing with street-level trash will keep him invisible.
Those rats are loyal to nothing. Not power. Not ideology. Just price tags.
Sterling paid Calvin for the merc team that hit us at the warehouse. Arsen tracked the transfer, Sterling’s dirty money funneled through ghost accounts.
Calvin’s trembling, his fat fingers slick with sweat. I slide the list of names across the table. His eyes flick to it, then back to me, throat bobbing.
“I can’t…I can’t give you that information, Priest.” His voice shakes.
I don’t speak. Raze is beside me, legs stretched out, gun balanced lazily on the armrest. His thumb taps the barrel, that same rhythmic tick that makes men lose their minds before the bullet even leaves the chamber.
Calvin’s breath hitches. “Mr. Carmichael… Priest… I—”
Bang.
Raze doesn’t wait for my signal. The bullet takes Calvin’s hand clean through the middle. Bone, tendon, blood, it all splatters across the desk. His scream splits the air.
He stares at the ruin of his palm, shaking, blood spilling down his wrist.
“Please—” he gasps. “Please, I—”
“Next one’s your skull,” Raze mutters.
Calvin starts sobbing. “I can’t—please, I can’t give it to you—”
One second I’m in the chair, the next I’m on him—dragging him out of his, slamming his head into the edge of the table. The crack is dull, wet. He gurgles, tries to breathe through shattered teeth. I don’t stop.
I pound his skull over and over, until the table is painted red. Until there’s nothing left but meat and the twitch of a dying nerve.
Raze’s hand clamps on my shoulder, yanking me back. “Jesus Christ, Priest.”
I turn and drive my fist into his jaw, hard enough to make him stumble. Then I grab my knife and bury it into his thigh. He grunts, eyes flaring, half-laughing, half-furious.
“That’s for shooting your cum on my property, motherfucker. You so much as look at her again, I’ll slit your throat in your sleep. You touch her, I’ll make you choke on your own dick before I gut you.”
Raze’s hand tightens on the knife handle, blood spilling down his leg. His grin wavers for just a second before he forces it back. “Worth it.”
I shove him back and straighten. The room stinks of copper and gunpowder. Calvin’s body slumped over the table, his brains sliding down the wood.
I wipe the blood off my hands with his shirt. The tremor in my fingers won’t stop. I almost want to put another bullet in him just to quiet the noise in my head.
Raze limps toward the door, leaving a trail of blood. “You’re out of your goddamn mind.”
“Always have been.”
I step past him into the hall. Two guards already lie dead, throats slit open. Wolff stands above them, panting, his blade dripping red and chest soaked.
“Block the exits,” I order. “Torch this place. Start with the east wing—trap anyone trying to run. We’re not leaving survivors. Casualties send fucking messages.”
I look back at Calvin’s crumpled corpse.
“Anyone working for Sterling should be fucking pissing themselves.” I head for the exit, leaving footprints in Calvin’s blood.
Sterling wanted a war.
He’s getting a goddamn massacre.
Since that night at the Devil’s Playhouse, Priest’s been gone more often. I don’t know where he goes, and I tell myself I don’t care. I pretend to be grateful he’s not hovering over me, watching every breath I take.
I stopped sleeping. I’m still taking my pain pills, but fuck sleeping pills. I can’t risk closing my eyes. Because when I do, he’s there.
I tell myself I’m disgusted, that I hate him, that I’m fine.
I don’t know if any of that’s true.
Caffeine, energy drinks, working out. I’ve been doing anything to keep myself from falling asleep. But I’m tired, my body aches. I feel my body begin to crash from the exhaustion, and I know I won’t make it another night without sleep. My heart feels like it’s beating too hard, too fast.
It’s been days.
The pills on the nightstand blur in my vision.
No.
I grab the bottle and throw it into the trash. I won’t sleep. Not yet. And if I do, at least without the pills I can wake myself up. Right?
The mattress pulls at me when I lie down. Every muscle aches. My eyes burn, lids heavy. The exhaustion feels like drowning.
I drift in and out, dark dreams and memories flashing in my head. I try to fight it, to pull myself back toward consciousness, but the effort slips through my fingers. The world tilts somewhere between waking and sleep.
The faint sound of the door opening cuts through the haze. My heart stumbles, then starts to race. I’m half-aware, caught between the pull of sleep and the pulse of fear. I don’t move. I keep my eyes closed, turned away from the sound—away from the monster stepping into the room.
Cloth rustles behind me, and I freeze, every nerve split between anger and something I don’t want to name.
Fear. Shame. Want.
Please don’t.
But I don’t say it out loud. I’m so tired of fighting. Tired of hating him and myself in the same breath.
The mattress dips, and his fingers find my hip, pulling me back until my spine meets his chest. Mint and smoke. The scent I’ve learned to dread. His lips brush my neck.
“Little one.”
I suck in a breath. His hand slides up and stops at my stomach. I slowly turn until we’re facing each other in the dark. His ice-blue eyes catch what little light there is. Too many emotions flashing there for a man who I swear doesn’t have any.
I should shove him away. I should yell. Instead, I just lay here, my body betraying every part of me that still wants to feel something.
“I can’t keep fighting you,” I whisper. “I’m done.”
“Then don’t.”
My throat tightens. “I hate you, Priest. I hate you so fucking much.”
“I know you do. I’m worth hating. There’s nothing good in me, kitten. Never was.”
Something inside me twists. I should tell him he’s right. But the way he says it, like a confession—makes it hard to breathe.
His hand catches my jaw, thumb following the line of bone until it stills under my chin. “You want to forget. Everything. Every fucked-up thing that’s ever happened to you. I can give you that, little one. I can make the world disappear until there’s nothing left in your head but me.”
I should tell him no. But when he bends toward me, the refusal dies before it reaches my mouth. His lips find mine.
He’s only kissed me once before, in the safehouse… I haven’t been able to stop remembering it.
My arms wrap around his neck, and I cling to him, our tongues sliding together. A groan leaves his chest, vibrating against me. I’m not sure how long we stay like that, locked together, bodies straining, mouths devouring.
“You don’t know how dangerous you are, Arlo.
Your fucking taste is a drug.” His voice breaks against my lips, his hands sliding down my body.
“I’m not going to stop. Not until I have all of you.
I’m going to use you. Hurt you.” He slides my panties and leggings down my thighs, and then my legs. “Is that what you want?”
“I…I…” I stumble with my words as he pulls my shirt over my head, until I’m naked on the bed in front of him.
He grabs my hair and wraps the long strands around his hand, yanking my neck back. His teeth sink into my shoulder, making me moan, and I feel him smile against my skin.
“Use your words, kitten. Tell me what filthy fucking things you want me to do to you.”
He sucks my earlobe between his teeth. “Do you want to be my little plaything? For me to fuck your throat and pussy and ass? To be used like a whore for my cock? Whenever I want, however I want, wherever I want?”
My head spins. I don’t know what to say. All I know is that is exactly what I want.
“Use me, please. Make me forget everything.”
He lets out a low groan, his hand gripping my chin, his teeth dragging across my skin.
“I will break you until you’re nothing but a hole for my cock.
You’ll beg for it, scream for it, and bleed for it.
That’s how I’ll teach you to take me.” He moves his hand to my pussy and slips two fingers inside of me.
“Perfect little thing. You were made to take me.”
I rock my hips against his fingers. He releases his hand from my hair and slowly brings it to my face. His thumb traces my bottom lip, and I suck it into my mouth.
I hate him, I’ll always hate him. But right now, I need this. To feel anything but the pain and the nightmares and the cold. To let go. To lose control. And he’s the only one who can do that.
Arlo’s trembling beneath me, hands clinging to my sides like I’m the only thing keeping her tethered to this fucked-up world. Her cunt’s soaked. My fingers are buried in it, and still—it’s not enough.
It’s never enough.
I want to ruin her. Bury my cock so deep inside she forgets who she is. I want her dripping for me even when I’m not touching her. I want every fucking nerve ending rewired to respond to me. My voice. My touch. My rage.
I want to crawl inside her head and rip everything else out.
I want her worshipping me.
I want her destroyed.
I want her to need me as much as I need her.
“Arms up, little one.”
My fingers slip from her mouth. She obeys, slowly lifting her arms. I drag open the nightstand and clamp the handcuffs tight around her wrists, chaining her to the bedframe.
Her ankles are next.
She flinches when I grab them and tries to squirm away.
“Arlo.” Her eyes snap to mine, wide with panic. “You’re going to do what the fuck I tell you to do. Understand me?”
She gives me a small nod.
I secure her ankles next to her wrists above her head, folding her in half. Her cunt’s glistening. Her ass lifted. Her whole body is begging.