Chapter Twenty-Two
………………………….
Henri
COULD EMOTIONAL PAIN KILL A person?
Because I felt seconds away from death.
I couldn’t breathe, blink, think, or swallow.
My eyes locked on Ily, where she huddled next to Rachel. Their hands entwined, their thighs kissing. Two stunning women but only one of them had the power to reach into my chest and wrench out my godforsaken heart.
I swore I heard her in my head before.
The quietest whisper that she was okay.
Which was fucking ridiculous because she wasn’t okay. Rachel wasn’t okay. I definitely wasn’t okay.
None of this is okay!
I gagged on the thought that Q wasn’t coming. His life was over because of me. I’d killed him all because I’d confessed who I was instead of letting Victor shoot me. His maid had stupidly signed her signature next to mine on his death warrant the moment she let his biggest secret slip while on the phone to his greatest enemy.
No one is coming.
I can’t save her.
Can’t stop this.
Fuck!
Sweat poured down my back; my shirt stuck to my skin.
I was hot and cold, calm and crazy.
Not only had I gone mad thinking I could sense Ily without words, but I literally wouldn’t be able to get it up, even if Victor held a gun to my head.
Every urge and need sucked deep, deep in my belly, leaving me flaccid, limp, and sick.
The vodka in my stomach did nothing to take the edge off.
If I wasn’t responsible for Ily, I’d probably do what she suggested and leap off the patio. Then again, if I’d never met her, I wouldn’t be in this unwinnable situation. I wouldn’t have a rebelling heart or a mutinous body. My soul wouldn’t be dying the slowest, blackest death.
Victor padded closer and sat beside me.
He rested his hand on my thigh.
I shook with dripping, feral violence to take his hand and rip it the fuck off me.
“I’m sorry you’re still suffering,” he murmured, squeezing my kneecap. “And I’m sorry if you feel like I’m pushing you too hard, but…I mean it when I say it’s for your own good.” He stroked his palm up my leg.
I turned to stone.
His touch…
His closeness.
Flashbacks of him enjoying a blowjob from Peter crowded my head.
Leaping to my feet, I paced with my hands buried in my hair.
Did he just come on to me?
And if he did…how far would I be willing to go to protect Ily from him?
Offer myself up instead?
Get on my knees and—
“Enough, Henri. Jesus, calm down.” He tracked me as I paced. “You say you don’t need a fuck? I hate to tell you, but you’re beyond need. It’s a matter of survival.” Clicking his fingers, he ordered, “Rachel, come here, please.”
Immediately, his pregnant jewel—fuck, she’s pregnant. He wants me to sleep with a pregnant slave—crawled to us and rested on her knees.
Keeping her chin down and hands loose on her lap, she glowed like an angel in white lingerie. I did my best to see her like the old me would’ve. I would’ve appreciated the fall of her dark hair, the ice of her blue eyes, full breasts, and sultry pink lips.
But nothing.
My cock barely twitched. If anything, it crawled even deeper inside me.
Ily sucked in a breath, wrenching my gaze to her golden ones.
And there it was again.
The heat, the crackle, the profound knowingness and calm.
Just do it. Her eyes narrowed.
I’m okay. Her lips thinned.
I shook my head. I wanted to clean out my ears because no fucking way could those thoughts be real. She wouldn’t give me permission to screw another because no way in hell could I survive the thought of her being with someone else.
That part of the night is already a done deal.
As if Victor snatched that thought out of my head, he huffed and crossed his arms. “I’m getting a little tired of your dramatics, mon ami. In fact, I’m well on my way to becoming offended that you’re not accepting my offer of Rachel. Is she not beautiful to you? Don’t you see the honour I’m giving you?” He canted his head. “Would you prefer Mollie? You won her too, but I’m afraid she’s otherwise disposed with Roland tonight—”
“I told you, Vic.” My voice came out black and thin. “I can’t help how I’m wired. I’m loyal…” My stare snagged with Ily’s again. “I have a crush—”
“A crush?” He burst out laughing. “Oh, dearie me.” Turning on the ball of his foot, he studied me, then Ily, then back to me. “You think you merely have a crush?” Laughing again, he marched into me and grabbed me right between the fucking legs.
“What the actual fuck, Vic?” I shot backward, cursing the sensation of his hand on my cock.
He rubbed his fingertips together. “You’re softer than a slug. Figured as much. Stay there.” Stalking barefoot into his bathroom, he came back a few seconds later. Taking my hand, he smacked a little blue pill into it. “Take this, or I’ll force it down your throat.”
I scowled. “Viagra? No chance—”
“You have three seconds.” Grabbing my abandoned vodka on the coffee table, he forced my fingers around the cool crystal. “Swallow it because I’m not letting you out of my chambers until you’ve fucked Rachel, and I’ve fucked Ilyana.” His smile turned soft and dreamy. “We will enjoy a mutual evening of pleasure, yes? I told you I wouldn’t hurt yours, and you won’t hurt mine. I’ll even let you watch. In fact, we’ll do it together. How about that?” Turning around, he pushed the food-laden coffee table to the edge of the huge circular carpet, leaving the centre free. “We’ll share in our lust right here. No secrets between us. Only fun.” His eyes narrowed. “I won’t ask you again to take that pill, Henri, and I know you’re probably cursing my strictness, but allow me to tell you why you need to do this.”
Giving me a sad smile as if he truly cared about the fucked-up state of my soul, he murmured, “I hate to tell you this, Henri, but you don’t have a crush.” He clucked his tongue. “You’re so past a crush it’s a disease at this point.”
“A disease?”
“In our lives? Yes. Love is a disease that needs to be cut out, eradicated, and cured.”
“Love?”
“Oh, come now. You can’t be that na?ve. You’re in love with her.”
My legs threatened to buckle.
I wanted to deny it.
I needed to.
But…hadn’t I had the same thoughts lately?
Hadn’t I felt it taunting me beneath the black blanket of depression?
I watched her when she slept, my heart ballooning out of my chest with tenderness.
I hung on her every word, desperate to hear more.
I begged for a single tear, grateful when she was too strong to cry.
Fuck.
“The fact that you’re not denying it proves I’m right,” Victor said quietly.
Ily made a noise behind him, wrenching my stare to her. Even Rachel looked over her shoulder, studying Ily’s reaction.
My entire heart felt like it was on fire. A never-ending fire growing wilder, hotter, and far, far too destructive.
Victor tapped my chin, bringing my gaze back to his. “We are monsters. We’re at the top of the food chain and that’s why you’re struggling so much. Every atom in your body is telling you to let go and be free, but your heart—that stupid human heart—has latched onto the final thing holding you back.”
Fisting my wrist, he pushed my hand toward my mouth.
The blue pill rocked on my palm.
“This will stop all that pain inside you.” He nodded encouragingly as my strength wavered. “All that second-guessing? All that suffering? Poof.” He smiled as my palm touched my lips. “I promise you, Henri…if you cut those ropes and break out of that prison that love has bound you in, you’ll be free…once and for all.”
I hated my weakness.
That my despair perked up at the very notion of no longer feeling this way.
She said it was okay…
I sighed and hung my head.
Nothing was okay.
But nothing about my life or childhood had ever been okay.
Perhaps…maybe…I could be okay if I did this. If I allowed Vic to free me, maybe I wouldn’t have to use my switchblade to reopen my scar and end it.
I didn’t have long.
The misery and melancholy were winning, crushing.
I honestly didn’t know how much longer I could fight the urge to rest, to sleep, to die.
Q isn’t coming…
If I died, Ily would be alone.
But if I cured my affliction of loving her, then perhaps…just perhaps, I could learn how to be better at this. I could still be her Master. We could still have a life together. Just without the mess and agony of feelings.
With a groan, I allowed Victor to tip the pill onto my tongue.
I didn’t fight as he took my glass from my shaking hand and pressed the drink to my lips like I was a child.
The wet stabbing pain behind my eyes came again.
He cared.
He truly cared.
I swallowed.
He hugged me, and I sagged into his embrace.
The wretchedness inside me crashed too hard, too deep.
I sank into it.
Darkness tugged me down and down.
Guiding me to the couch, he sat me down, then padded toward Ily.
My fists balled to stop him.
My body fought the sluggish riptide inside me, making everything so slow and stilted and sad. Just so fucking sad.
I’d never felt such pain.
Such heartache.
Such despair.
I didn’t know what was wrong with me.
Why I could barely move.
Why I felt utterly spaced and seedy.
Closing my eyes, I tried to get a better grip on my rapidly fraying sanity.
Surely, I could come up with a way to prevent Victor from fucking Ily. Didn’t matter I’d agreed to it. Didn’t matter he’d probably try to kill me if I forbade him. I just couldn’t put her through that. Couldn’t run the risk of him breaking her like she’d broken me.
He expects you to fuck Rachel.
I swallowed hard as nausea clutched my throat.
The thought of being inside her. The thought of feeling another woman’s heat around me.
Jesus.
Every inch of me recoiled. I shrivelled inside.
The room swam; white noise hissed in my ears.
Stand up.
Tell him no.
Grab Ily and leave.
Do it!
Before it’s too late.
Shifting on the couch, I went to stand, but my heart didn’t beat right.
I groaned as I collapsed backward, weighted down in every possible way.
The blackness inside me—the thick, impenetrable depression—buried me alive, handcuffing me, gagging me, throwing a hood over my head, and blinding me.
Forcing my eyelids up, I fought against the current and blinked back the dreadful despair.
Victor pushed Ily onto all fours.
He pulled down her G-string.
No…
My heart cracked as Victor landed on his knees behind her and smiled in my direction.
Do something!
Shimmying out of his pyjama bottoms, he said something I couldn’t catch. Words warbled and echoed like pecking crows at my broken brain.
I felt drugged.
Woozy.
His voice came again down a long, thin tunnel.
Fractals of black and white scrambled my eyesight.
Time skipped.
My breathing quickened.
My lower belly grew hotter. The clock on the wall ticked louder. My trousers grew tighter.
“—aren’t you?” Victor’s voice cut through my daze.
What did he say?
I blinked and lurched forward. The room turned upside down.
Was this panic?
Could a person snap and lose all their faculties?
Wedging my elbows on my knees, I rubbed my eyes, trying to make sense of why I was so lethargic, so goddamn tired. I felt utterly drunk, drowned by the fermenting depression that just wouldn’t leave me the fuck alone.
I winced as my cock speared upright, trying to break through my pants.
Adjusting myself, the tip crawled out of my waistband, hard as stone but without any of the usual sensitivity.
Everything about me felt dead.
Dull.
Bloodless.
Lifeless.
Not panic then.
Death.
So this is what it feels like to die…
A fading.
A falling.
A perishing beneath hopelessness.
“You’re acting as if I roofied you.” Victor laughed. “Come on. I’m being patient, but I can only wait so long.” He flicked a look at the clock hanging by his bathroom door. “It’s been fourteen minutes. You should be good to go.”
Fourteen minutes?
What?!
I scowled and begged my eyes to focus on the clock.
He had to be lying.
It wavered and wobbled, the hands flickering with every heavy thud of my very heavy heart.
“Come on, Henri.” Arching his chin at Rachel, he ordered, “Present on all fours, my pet. That’s it. Remove your underwear. There’s a good girl. Come a little closer to Ily. You can hold hands if you like, I know you jewels get comfort from one another. Good, now face me. I want to watch you as he rides you.” He grinned. “You better not enjoy it too much.”
“No, Sir V.” Rachel shook her head. “I only ever get pleasure from you.”
“That better be the truth.” He chuckled.
The room spun as Victor raised his voice. “Henri, hurry the fuck up.”
His command.
So similar to my father’s.
Memories opened a trapdoor.
I tripped—
“Onn Ree, whip her, there’s a good boy. Onn Ree, taste her tears, aren’t they sweet? Onn Ree, touch her there. Go on, I won’t tell. Onn Ree, cut her and maybe you’ll be the one to inherit everything instead of my legitimate son.”
With my father’s voice in my head and my mind back there, I couldn’t reach dry land. I drowned beneath the kid who’d had no choice. The prisoner who couldn’t say no. The man who thought he wanted this but now would rather die.
“Henri!” Victor barked. “Don’t make me show you how to fuck her. Just do it.”
“Onn Ree, feel her. Squeeze her. That’s it. Now…put your cock in, it’s alright. She likes it…see? Onn Ree, are you not enjoying yourself? Move faster, boy. Go on—”
My teeth clenched as another gush of nausea threatened to evict every recollection I’d ever repressed. I wished I’d never unlocked them through writing. Wished I could go back to that amnesiac existence where I had no idea why I was the way I was. At least I could’ve survived then. Could’ve pretended I was happy.
But now?
Knowing what I’d done?
Remembering how much I’d hurt our mothers—
Fuck.
I fell off the couch as my stomach roiled.
“Henri, if you don’t appreciate my gift and fuck Rachel immediately, I’ll call the guards and have them help you.”
“Good.” I groaned, pushing to my knees. “Maybe they can beat this out of me.”
A few seconds ticked past. Victor’s heavy huff sounded like a cyclone in my ears. Finally, he muttered, “I told you, you’re sick. I’m helping you, don’t you see? Tell you what, if you don’t accept my generosity, I’ll call the guards in and give them a gift instead. I believe there are four in the corridor at present. I’ll let each of them have a piece of Ily. I’m sure they’ll be more than happy to—”
“No.” I crawled toward the woman kneeling on all fours. “I’ll do it,” I slurred.
Victor might’ve gotten me drunk before Ruby Tears, but tonight…my own grief had done that.
“Finally.” Victor sniffed. “I feel as if I’ve aged five years waiting for you to hurry it along.”
“Finally, Onn Ree, took you long enough to get hard. What’s wrong with you? Why can’t you come? Have you never had a wet dream before? Go on, try again.”
“Sorry.” I hung my head, unsure if I apologised to my father or Victor.
Rachel looked over her shoulder as I slowed behind her.
Her ice-blue eyes widened at whatever she saw on my face.
I couldn’t look at Ily.
Couldn’t breathe.
All I wanted to do was die.
“Tick-tock, Henri.”
“Time’s ticking, Onn Ree.”
A childhood of despicable instruction took over. Parts of my psyche that were so damaged, so dark that I’d done my utmost to forget them, rose and took charge.
In a fugue, my hands reached for Rachel’s hips.
They were a stranger’s hands.
An enemy’s hands.
A splicing vision settled over my eyes, replaying a piece of my past.
I’d seen this before.
Seen my boyish hand landing on the bare ass of one of our mothers. It blended with my own larger one as I reached for Rachel against my will.
I’d never been able to say no.
I’d screamed the first few times.
I’d fought his hold as he made me abuse them.
I’d tried to shut down, but he soon learned how to keep me present.
Kind words, nice praise, sweet encouragements.
Love.
Motherfucking love had shackled me to such atrocities.
“That’s it, Onn Ree. She’s all yours. They’re all yours. Do you like it?”
“That’s it, mon ami.” Victor’s voice rearranged my memories, inserting himself into them, replacing the role of my sadistic father. “Get your cock out and stick it in her.”
The noise of my zipper as I shoved my pants down merged with the sobs I’d made as a little boy, forced by his father to do such unspeakable things.
The similarities. The sickening déjà vu.
“Good boy, Onn Ree.”
I fisted myself with a quaking hand.
“Do it, Mercer.”
I choked as I notched inside a woman I didn’t want.
“All the way now.”
“You’re doing so well, my son…”
“Thrust, Henri.”
“Thrust, Onn Ree.”
My chin sank onto my chest as I pushed.
I didn’t feel a damn thing.
I checked out.
Went numb.
I’d forgotten for a reason.
I’d forgotten because I couldn’t survive.
The nausea in my stomach as I threw up the rich chocolate cake my father had given me the first time I’d drawn blood. The trembles and shakes as he came for me again and again. The horrors as he tried to make my prepubescent body come. The absolute despair as he taught me how to swing a flogger—
“My turn.” Victor let out a roar as he mounted Ily in front of me.
She cried out.
Her eyes snapped closed.
And that was the moment my entire existence shattered.
I didn’t help her.
I failed her.
Trapped in the past.
Shackled by the boy I’d been.
A boy who’d watched so many women being raped.
A boy who’d been forced to watch and never interfere until it was his turn.
And I couldn’t do it.
Couldn’t cope.
Not anymore.
Not now.
Not again.
My body and heart didn’t break, but my mind?
It snapped like a rubber band.
I flatlined—