Chapter 1 Weston #2
I can taste blood instantly.
The punch caught my lips and the bottom edge of my nose, and I must have bitten down hard on my tongue. My skin is overheating behind my mask now, and the fleece hood is far too much.
“Stop. I don’t want this.”
“You’re the one who showed up here. Quit whining,” he says.
I can see the slightest hint of a scar behind his mask, right below one of his eyes. There’s something ugly and harsh about him, from the way he looks to the way his voice sounds. A bitter sickness fills my veins.
He pushes the blunt side of the knife against my skin as he uses his other hand to rustle for something else in his pocket.
It’s some sort of metal… thing.
It has prongs and a big ball in the center, and for a second terror passes through me as I think he’s going to shove it down my pants.
But it’s a gag. He moves my mask just enough to expose my lips, then pushes the gag against them, metal sliding onto my tongue and beginning to warm up in the heat of my mouth.
A tear breaks off from one corner of my eye. I try to reach my leg upward and kick him in the balls, but he’s faster than me, moving away. The motion is awkward and my ass slides down a step on the stairs, pulling at my wrist cuffed to the banister.
I can’t say words anymore, so I let out a low, growling scream.
A door opens somewhere down the long, upper hallway.
Someone else is up here.
I use my free hand to wave the person over from the far end of the hall.
Look at me.
Holy fucking shit, please look at me and intervene. Whoever you are.
I need you to look this way.
My breath catches in my throat as I see tattooed skin.
Miles of ink spread over a shirtless broad, muscled chest.
It’s him.
Fucking perfect.
Sevan Berlant is going to see me like this, cuffed and bent awkwardly on the stairs, so out of place in this fucking house.
Sev’s messy black tufts of hair spill out over the top of his intricately patterned silver mask.
His suit pants are slung around his waist, the deep V-shape of his abs leading downward at the waistband.
His skin is flushed, like he was already engaged in some sort of activity before coming out here.
He looks down at us from the top of the staircase, his arms hanging at his sides.
I focus on the dark raven on his lower arm.
“Problem?” he says.
Sev’s grey eyes connect with mine and he studies my gaze for a moment.
While he was injured and using a wheelchair, I’d forgotten how genuinely intimidating it feels to just exist in the same room as Sev.
He’s probably only an inch or two taller than me, but it feels like I’m standing next to a titan as he steps closer.
I’ve been through a lot in my life, but I’ve never come close to feeling as pathetic as this. I know Sevan can’t tell it’s me, but I’m watching him while a metal gag is shoved in my mouth and the front of my suit jacket is pushed to one side, my own blood trickling down onto the front of my hoodie.
“Only problem is he wouldn’t stop talking,” the other man says.
“Understandable. He wanted to be gagged?”
The guy hesitates. “He wanted to. Deep down.”
Sev’s gaze slides up and down my body, and then his gaze returns to the other man.
“I think you should undo his restraints,” he says.
“No. I’m just getting started.”
Sevan shakes his head. “I want this one. Let him go.”
“Fuck you.”
Sev comes down the stairs quickly. His fist connects with the guy’s head a moment later, and for the first time I’m actually grateful to see Sevan Berlant starting a fight.
Sev gets him to the ground and slams his arms against the steps, pinning them in place.
He pries the knife from the guy’s hand and holds it against him, instead.
“Undo his cuff.”
“Not happening.”
Sevan reaches into the guy’s pockets, one by one, stopping every few seconds to shove the guy’s limbs as he struggles.
For the last few months, Sevan had casts on both of his legs after breaking both shin bones in one accident. In the interim, his upper body was the only place he was able to gain strength, and it fucking worked. The musculature of his arms makes him look like a tattooed fallen god.
A god who definitely wouldn’t be fighting for me like this if he knew who I was.
He’d probably put that knife right back on me, instead.
Finally, Sevan pulls out a little metal key from the guy’s back pocket. He leans over toward me and forces open the cuff, but while he’s focusing on me, the other guy manages to wriggle out from his grasp.
The cuff comes unlatched in a split second.
Thank. Fuck.
I reach up and tug the metal gag from between my lips, tossing it down the stairs.
“You’re out of your goddamn mind,” I roar at the stranger. “Didn’t fucking want any of this—”
I reach for the edge of the guy’s mask to push it up and reveal who he is.
But Sevan’s hand comes down on my wrist. He glares at me through the holes in his mask.
“No. We don’t do that here.”
“The guy could have fucking killed me.”
“You’re right. He could have. And you’re not unmasking him.”
The guy stumbles on the stairs, standing up and shoving the handcuffs into his pocket. “Right. That’s what you signed up for, new meat. You have to fucking take it.”
“Wrong,” Sev tells him. “He doesn’t have to take anything from you.”
It’s almost like the guy is hoping he’ll be punched. The next time Sev’s hand lands on his jaw, the guy laughs like he’s a deranged movie villain. Is this person on drugs? Nothing would surprise me anymore.
“I need to get the fuck out of here,” I mutter under my breath.
“Go to the room. At the end of the hall,” Sevan commands me. He motions toward the room.
“I’m going downstairs.”
Sev fixes his gaze on me. “No. You’re going to the room up here at the end of the hall to take a breather. You are clearly in over your head here, and not ready for the reality of Zenith—”
“Fuck you. What makes you think—”
I’m cut off as the deranged guy manages to slip one arm out of Sev’s grasp and his hand comes down to swat at my face.
If he’d had anything sharp in his hand, I could have lost an eye. Adrenaline courses through me again, cold fear landing in my stomach even worse than before. Sevan reacts fast, immobilizing the man again.
“Quit asking questions and go.”