Chapter 57
CHAPTER FIFTY-SEVEN
acelynn
The lights of the marquee sputtered to life just as the cab rolled to a stop in front of the Queen’s Table.
Crimson bulbs flickered against the fading dusk, bleeding their glow across the cracked asphalt like a warning more than a welcome.
I shoved a handful of crumpled bills into the cabbie’s hand, murmuring a thanks before stepping out into the evening air.
The parking lot stretched before me, deserted, empty but for my own shadow.
A low hum of music pulsed from inside, seeping through the thick wooden door as if the bar itself was alive and breathing.
The melody was distorted, rock and rage in equal measure, its bass line carrying across the gravel, making the ground vibrate beneath the soles of my boots.
Every step forward crunched against the loose stones, loud in the silence of the evening air. My stomach coiled tighter with each footfall. The Queen’s Table wasn’t the kind of place you entered without reason, and tonight, my reason might just be the noose tightening around my neck.
I stopped before the door, pressing one palm against its weathered surface.
The wood was cool beneath my hand, the vibrations of the music running through it and into my skin, crawling up my arm like static.
I drew in a shaky breath of desert air, thick with dust and the faint sting of exhaust fumes, and forced my emotions down, locking them away.
If I carried them inside with me, I’d already be dead.
With one push, the door groaned open, and I stepped into the lion’s den.
Darkness swallowed me first. The overhead lights had all been cut, leaving only shadows to stretch long across the room.
The glow of the neon sign above the bar, Queen’s Table in jagged red, spilled across the hardwood floor like fresh blood.
The air was hazed with smoke, curling tendrils that clung to the rafters and slid low to the ground, smothering every breath I tried to take.
Kaius sat in the center of the dance floor like it had been carved out just for him.
A single chair, his throne, bathed in the dim neon wash.
Smoke curled upward from the cigarette between his fingers, and every drag lit his face in brief flashes of firelight, throwing his sharp features into cruel relief.
Power wasn’t something he wore—it was something that poured from him, an invisible shroud that filled the room.
The music roared from unseen speakers, the bass so heavy it rattled the glass bottles lined on the shelves behind the bar. The sound thudded through my bones, syncing with the frantic pace of my heartbeat. I shivered, though not from the cold. It was him. Always him.
My lungs stung as I inhaled, the bitter nicotine-laced air sinking into me until it burned.
I hated the way it felt, the way it clung to my clothes, my skin, my hair.
But some broken part of me savored it too—because it was his.
Because this room, this suffocating atmosphere, was an extension of him.
A silhouette in smoke and sin that I couldn’t look away from.
His eyes lifted to meet mine, glowing like embers through the haze. He didn’t smile. He didn’t need to. The weight of his stare was enough to make me feel stripped bare.
Then, through the smoke, his hand rose. Just one finger extended, curling inward in a gesture that was equal parts command and dare. His voice slid through the pounding music like a viper striking, low and mocking. “Don’t be shy now, kitten.”
The words scraped across my skin. My body betrayed me, feet moving before my mind could argue. He drew me in without effort, his gravity inescapable. Each step closer tightened the noose I’d willingly slipped around my own neck.
My chest heaved, breath shallow, heart hammering so violently I thought it might burst free.
The rational part of me screamed to turn, to run, to get as far from him as possible.
But I knew the truth as well as I knew my own name.
If I ran, he’d catch me. And if he caught me, I’d die the same death.
So I walked forward. The smoke thickened, wrapping around me like the embrace of something ancient and merciless.
My boots whispered against the floor until the tips of mine brushed the edge of his.
Inches. That was all that separated me from the King of Lovelen, from the monster cloaked in a man’s skin.
He didn’t move. He didn’t need to. The threat radiating from him was enough to make my body lock in place, waiting for the strike.
And I would take it, because there was no part of me that didn’t deserve it.
I had lit the match. I had burned the legacy.
I had opened the door to this life. My brother knew it before he died. Kaius knew it now.
Hell, deep down, so did I.
“Alec!” My throat was raw from screaming, the sound splintering like glass in the night air.
Panic clawed up my chest, choking me. I had done what he told me.
I had lit the fire. I had watched our family home turn into a glowing pyre against the darkness.
He had failed to mention that people were still inside.
I had assumed it was abandoned. But as the flames climbed higher, a shadow had moved.
Someone had been in there. And they were screaming for help.
I sprinted forward, lungs tearing against the smoke. My feet slid in the loose dirt as I reached the edge of the home. Heat licked at my skin. From the upper bay window, a figure forced itself out, stumbling into the open air before gravity claimed it.
“No, no, no—”
Their body slammed against the shingles with a hollow crunch, then tumbled down the roof like a rag doll, hitting the ground in a heap that made my stomach heave.
I dropped to my knees beside them, the gravel biting into my skin.
The smell hit me first—burnt flesh, sharp and metallic, turning bile into acid at the back of my throat.
They whimpered, a sound so faint it broke something inside me.
Tears blurred my vision as I hovered uselessly above them, hands trembling, desperate to touch but terrified of doing more damage.
Their skin was blackened, charred beyond recognition, features melted into something inhuman. And then I saw it.
Beneath the wreck of burned skin, the glint of silver embedded in flesh. A small charm, glowing faintly in the firelight. A spade. The world collapsed inward.
“Mom?” My voice fractured, a sob torn from my chest as I clutched at air.
Her eyes—the same ones that my brother and I shared with her—fluttered open. Blue. That same impossible shade of blue that had always been my safe place. They found mine, soft even in agony, the kind of look that once made monsters under the bed disappear.
“Please, no, please—” My words fell apart. My breath came in panicked gasps as hers rattled into silence.
She drew in one last, shuddering breath, and then…she was gone.
I screamed. A sound so animal, so feral, it didn’t feel like it came from me.
But grief didn’t have time to settle its claws, because rough fingers seized my arm and yanked me upward. My head whipped around, fist flying on instinct. My knuckles cracked against a skull, and a grunt of pain echoed back at me. The grip only tightened.
“Hit me again, Emersyn…” Alec’s voice was a razor dragged slowly over my spine. My brother. My blood. And yet nothing about him was familiar anymore. His tone was a weapon, stripped of warmth, sharpened into something cruel. “And I’ll bury you next to Mommy Dearest.”
Fear iced my veins. This wasn’t my Alec—the one who used to sneak me candy, who shielded me from Father’s rage, who once swore he’d protect me from everything. This was something else. A beast. A wolf with its teeth bared, and I was the rabbit caught in its jaws.
“Sorry,” I whispered, broken, hating myself for the weakness but unable to stop.
He spun me so I was facing him fully, fingers digging into my jaw until pain flared white-hot down my face. His blue eyes glowed with fury and something worse—amusement.
“I gave you one job,” he hissed, the words hot against my skin. “And you can’t even follow instructions.”
“I did—” My voice cracked.
His hand clamped tighter, forcing a cry from my throat.
“I told you to burn this place down and run.” He wrenched my face toward the blazing inferno behind us. “Does standing here look like running, little sister?”
“No,” I sobbed, the word catching on a jagged edge in my chest.
Alec shoved me hard. My feet tangled with the body on the ground—her body—and I fell, wrist twisting under my weight as I collapsed against her.
My mother. Burned, gone, the last light in her eyes finally fading away, leaving behind a hollow stare.
I let out a raw, guttural scream that tore through me like shrapnel.
“Tell me what to do, Alec!” I begged, voice hoarse, hands shaking as I pressed them into the dirt. “Please, I’ll do it right this time. I promise!”
He crouched, bringing his face level with mine. His expression softened, not with compassion, but with a twisted kind of pity that made me want to vomit. His smirk curved like he was about to tell a joke.
“Tsk, tsk, tsk. I believe you, Em,” he said, voice low, taunting, almost playful. “But you already fucked up our plan. How am I supposed to trust you won’t deviate again?”
“I won’t,” I swore, tears streaking hot across my cheeks. “I swear it.”
“Swear?” His smile widened. “Promises are dangerous little things, sister.”
Another sob racked me, and I dropped my gaze, unable to withstand the sharp light of his cruelty. But Alec wasn’t finished. He hooked two fingers under my chin and forced my face up until our eyes locked. His grip was bruising under his power.