Chapter 14 #4
Bohnes yawns dramatically, seemingly unconcerned by any of this.
He’s got big dick energy even in a room of other dudes with big dick energy.
His moneyed client is standing in the house of the man who wants him dead.
Jonas’ life depends on ending Alexei’s. This is beyond risky.
Ash really could ruin us from his current position.
Widow is understandably suspicious.
I take in everything the guys are discussing, watching these sexy marionettes perform their man-pissing contest onstage for my personal pleasure. Enjoy my wine. Breathe, Scarlett. Facts and not feelings. Dead-betraying-sister-house-on-fire-Gram-hates-me. Gulp my wine.
“They’re in Washington, both Chet and Jonas.” Ash is confident, like he’s got it all figured out. “Sometimes, the least likely place for someone to be is the very best spot to hide them.”
“I’m here because Ash made a compelling case.
” Alexei speaks up for himself, not as a target but as an active participant.
If Ash was born with a silver spoon in his mouth, Alexei got a gold one encrusted with rubies.
Not just wealthy but loved. He carries his happy childhood in every strong, fearless step he takes. “And because he won the race.”
“We can’t all be track-rule-breakers, you know.” Bohnes murmurs this while smirking in Widow’s direction.
Glass shatters in my hand, and I look down to see that I’ve clutched the stem of my own wineglass hard enough that it’s just snapped. Shards dig into my fingertips and blood drips down to the expensive rug under my heels.
Alexei knocks the broken bits of glass to the floor, spilling wine everywhere, and takes my hand in his gloved ones, as if I’m not bleeding all over him.
My lips part as he raises his pale eyes to mine, almost in challenge.
Guess if he can handle me shoving my dirty panties into his mouth, he can handle a little bit of my blood on his hands.
“Hold still,” he commands, and my lip curls. Widow makes a sound, like a wolf stuck in a steel trap. Bohnes sighs, and Ash sets his glass aside. His eyes are dark enough as it is, but with his pupils dilated like that, it’s hard to tell if he’s a demon or if he’s just concerned for me.
“I brought you all here, so that we could end this.” Ash swings around behind the bar and emerges with a first-aid kit that Widow snatches away from him, storming over to me with his hackles raised.
The very second that Alexei removes the last shard of glass from my trembling fingers, Widow takes over.
He swipes my skin with an alcohol swab and bandages me up while the others watch.
Bohnes cants his head to the side as he studies me with an unnervingly penetrating gaze.
His expression promises remote locations and grave dirt and rough sex.
I feel like my skin is about to split, like there’s something much darker and meaner inside of me. Something violent. Something without limits that could do bad as easily as it does good.
Bohnes sees it immediately, that shift in me. And he smiles because he loves it. That hidden thing he’s seen inside of me all this time. It was only a matter of time before I became a monster, too.
Widow’s eyes are windows to a loyal soul, but his distrust in the situation is at an all-time high.
He peers at me while tending to my wounds, like he’s frustratingly waiting for me to say something that makes sense to him.
Alexei is peeling his gloves off to replace them.
Before he does though, he lifts one up to his face and smells it.
I scrape my teeth over my lip.
“Boys.” My voice is steady, despite the incident with the glass.
There’s a lot of big dick energy in this room, but who’s swinging the most cock, Scar?
You. Put these fuckboys in their places, bitch.
“Ash is going to use his privilege as the winner of tonight’s race to put me in charge. Go on now. In front of everybody.”
It’s like a cork has come loose, and the champagne of violence is ready to blow. It’ll splash bubbly red all over the walls in celebration. I have to keep a thumb on the top of that bottle, wait for the right moment to let it all spill out.
I push Widow away from me, stepping into the center of the room. The energy in here is esoteric and charged.
“Scarlett—” This is Ash, the one who’s pissing me off the most today. He’s planning on dying for me? Since when did I give him permission for that? His life belongs to me, and he’s not allowed to take a piss without my say-so, let alone put himself in an early grave. “I…”
I lift a single brow in question.
“Ash.” I show him my hand, the diamond ring that he gave me crusted with dried blood. His eyes go hooded because he’s got that solid core of hope inside him still, despite all the odds. Jonas and Aspen tried and tried to murder that part of him and never managed to succeed. “Hurry up.”
He looks at me, and I look at him, and his obsession is tearing across his dark irises in a violent storm.
“Fuck,” he whispers, voice shaky and freaked-out. “FUCK!”
He sets his wineglass aside and grabs at his dark hair with both hands, squeezing his eyes shut and gritting his teeth.
This is physically painful for him. I understand that.
The possibility of being happy in the future is terrifying because it also comes with the possibility of experiencing new levels of pain.
“I’ve never been allowed to love something and not see it die.
” Ash puts his face in his hands. His shoulders droop inward.
He trembles, an explosive, frenzied violence crouching in every muscle of his body.
He’s ready to start indiscriminately killing people, consequences be damned.
I won’t let him end up in jail. “I won that race without breaking any Prescott track rules.”
“Yes,” I say sweetly, reaching out a hand to touch my fingers to the back of his arm.
Ash melts into the warmth of my touch, starved for a lifetime of affection.
“So, pass the baton and rest easy knowing you made the best possible choice out of the ones you were given. I don’t want you dead, honey: I want you on your knees, pleasuring me with your filthy tongue. ”
Ash is struck. His spine curves further, fingers digging into his face until he makes himself bleed with his nails.
I’m sure that I hear him mumble something like you are cordially invited before he says, “okay. Fine. Use me however you want. Anything. Say the word and it’s yours, no matter how depraved or suicidal it is. ”
Alexei is patiently receptive, casually studying the jealous lover boy who put a gun to his head like Ash is nothing more than a pinned butterfly.
We exchange a measured look, me and Marie.
Bohnes grins wildly down at Ash, like he’s enjoying seeing the rich boy submit so gracefully to the poor girl.
Widow gapes like this behavior is nothing at all what he expected.
He’s confused by it. I’m not. I knew this was the real Ash hiding inside all along.
My king doesn’t believe a word of this storyline, and I don’t blame him.
He’s like me: actions over words. If only he’d put aside his Ash-prejudice long enough to examine the situation objectively.
“You’re giving into her that easily? Bullshit.
” Adrian tucks his hands into the pockets of his well-worn jeans.
There’s dried blood on his face and clothes that belongs mostly to him.
I hate that he got hurt tonight. I’m going to enjoy hurting Ash now though, with the heel of the expensive shoe he just gifted to me.
“Maybe it’s not so easy?” Alexei murmurs, retrieving his own wine from the side table.
Satisfied with something about Ash’s performance—or lack thereof.
This is raw vulnerability from Kelly. “Scarlett could tell the twins apart even when I couldn’t.
Perhaps she and Ash have been working toward this moment from the start? ”
“Ding, ding, ding. Point goes to the Russian oligarch brat.” I withdraw my fingers from Ash’s arm, taking touch away to show him that I am both the carrot and the whip.
“You’re not always right, Scarlett: you trusted Alexis.” Widow waves his hand, like he’s said his piece, but is reluctantly willing to follow my lead. He has to. He can’t break track rules ever again.
“Ash looks like a kicked puppy to me.” Another censuring one-liner from Kellin. “I suppose we can keep him.”
“You’ll never be able to keep me alive.” Ash drops his hands from his face and then falls to his knees on the floor with a thunk, looking absolutely dejected and completely wrung-out.
Eyes glazed. Staring at nothing. Whatever happened this week has fucked him up bad.
So bad. I’m glad we’re rescuing him today because I’m not sure if he would’ve lasted much longer.
“But I am apparently incapable of denying you the chance to try.”
He sounds sooooo British right now. It’s a beautiful, tangible example of the real Ash wiggling free of his Aspen cocoon.
“Not good enough. More.” I lift my heeled foot, pressing it down on his left thigh and leaning in. Faces too close. I can smell the sex on him, can see the surrender carved into his perfect mouth. My fingers alight on his chin, a single nail stroking the length of his jaw. So handsome.
“I acquiesce to your demands.” Ash glares up at me in defiance.
Convinced that he’s right but willing to be wrong because he’s already accepted death.
He probably figures he can always kill himself later.
“Take control, Scarlett-sama. But if someone has to die to keep our ship from sinking, make sure it’s me. That’s all I ask.”
It’s hard not to smirk.
“Good boy. Now, where is Emma Jean?”
“Down the hall, first door on the right.” Ash tugs the skeleton key from his pocket and offers it up to me on a shaky palm. I remove my high heel from his leg and he hisses through his teeth.
“Patricia is across the way,” Bohnes adds helpfully, stretching his own arms above his head and flashing a bit of taut belly at me. A wink, when he catches me admiring him.
“Too good to be true.” Widow is pacing again. Alexei is enjoying his wine, eyes on the red liquid like he’s imagining Ernest Bolin’s blood.
“I’ll take a phone, too, thanks.” I pluck the key away from Ash and, after a brief moment of hesitation, he gives me my phone back.
He somehow had it in the pocket of his new pants.
Brilliant. I didn’t expect that. I meant give me any phone at all.
I sort of figured mine had burned along with the house.
And Lexi’s corpse. “I need to call Nisha and Basti, check on my crew. I need to call my aunt. Oh, and my mom. Fuck.” I nibble on my thumbnail.
“Do not leave this room until I come back.”
Reptile brain. Logic. Infernal calm.
I’ll rescue Prescott from Mayor Kelly and Chet Archer, but then I want us to leave. I don’t want to rule over this hellhole. I want something better. Some other black-hearted bitch can be the queen of this horrible place.
I turn and exit the room, and then, on a whim, I lock it from the outside.
Stay, you tail-wagging, teeth-baring, flea-ridden little fuckboys.