Chapter 25
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
SUMMER
The tip of one of the knives Kage strapped to me presses deeply into my thigh, the blade on the verge of splitting my flesh and flooding the hundred year old wooden floors beneath me.
I should be afraid of the unknown, but all I can focus on is the voice of Kage’s vile brother, and with a stifled snort, my shoulders bounce with laughter.
It’s so high pitched. Nasally, snobbish, and simply strange.
As though rehearsed to sound less threatening than he truly is.
A wolf masquerading as a sheep; a psychopath impersonating a knight.
God, that douchebag really fucked up my head, slamming it on the concrete like that. I’m likely about to die a horrible, painful death, and I’m laughing at the sound of my impending murderer’s voice.
There’s just this primal satisfaction in knowing that—despite Kage’s voice being stolen—I know it’s deeper, smoother, and far more beautiful than his brother’s.
My mind’s eye tries to fill in what he must look like standing before an imposing Kage; are they similar in height and build?
Is their facial structure the same, or does Carter look as foul as the soul that festers in his body?
A thudding sound shakes me from my errant thoughts, followed by the slapping of viscous liquid dripping to the floor.
I grin beneath my fingers; I’m hoping the paint thinner burns his skin, maybe even blinds him, but Kage warned me that his brother is more beast than human.
It’s going to take more than a few of the traps I laid to bring him down.
I’ve always been a steadfastly optimistic person, doing what was within my reach to make this world a better place, so it makes sense that I don’t really feel an ounce of fear pumping through my veins.
Maybe that’s just my psyche protecting me from more trauma, because the way my body has been constantly trembling since Kage’s deft fingers tied all these knives to me is proof that a predator is near.
My stomach churns as my mind scampers to the book he wrote me, to a part that I wasn’t sure was literal—or perhaps, I didn’t want it to be true, didn’t want to acknowledge that level of evil in this already fucked up world.
But imagining Carter doing the things to me that Kage said he would before literally devouring my flesh like a Thanksgiving feast is something I can’t quite wrap my head around.
And now with the understanding that all of those hellish things were Kage’s reality growing up makes so much sense. He hasn’t been free long enough to learn the nuances of this society and culture, and so kidnapping me and keeping me hostage in order to keep me safe made the most sense to him.
The most baffling part of all is how I believe every word he wrote to me; the proof is arguing in the living room just a few yards away.
“You’d give up a life where you could have her and any other woman you want, for this?”
My metaphorical hackles rise, my molars slipping and gritting as I grind my teeth.
This overwhelming, desperate need to defend the man who kidnapped me is strange, but it washes over me and consumes me like a flame to gasoline.
Kage was backed into a corner with no other choices, and I will defend him and the goodness that resides in his heart until mine stops beating.
There’s a tense, heavy moment of silence, and then it’s as if a dam breaks loose, all of the pent up rage building between two opposing forces clashing in epic proportions while I’m destined to wither away in anxiety under a fucking bed.
I’ve never been brave. The notion swirls in my mind while glass shatters, flesh and bone connect, and furniture is toppled.
I’ve always run from confrontation and pain, but I’ve always peeked at hell between the pages of a book and within the perceived safety of my home. Some twisted part of me has always been fascinated with the darkest corners of the world because I knew I was never in any imminent danger.
A thought jolts my veins, striking it like lightning and forcing my muscles to stiffen.
Life isn’t safe. It never has been and never will be. No matter how hard we as humans toil to delay the inevitable, it comes for us all anyways. Death is the one sure, final thing in this life, and in death there is nothingness.
There is peace.
Pain ends. Suffering ends. Happiness ends.
So why have I always been frozen in fear to enact any real changes, when this is all fleeting?
It isn’t bravado that forces me to pull my way out from under the bed, but it isn’t bravery, either. It’s this knowledge that Kage is out there alone protecting me from a terrible fate, and I have the power to help him. At this point, what is there to lose anymore?
His clothes are baggy on me as I stand, sweatpants pooling around my ankles despite the shoe string belt tied around my waist. The short sleeve shirt is tucked into the waistband, and there’s still blood crusted to my curls that haven’t been this untamed since childhood.
I appear savage and barbaric, and I feel the fierceness in my bones as my toe takes a delicate step forward, causing the knives strapped to my thighs to jostle with the motion.
Harsh, guttural breaths issue from the open doorway, and another booming crash has me halting my slow approach, Carter hopefully stumbling into another trap.
Perhaps the rigged wrench dangling from the fan on the ceiling.
Or maybe he slipped on the vegetable oil coated floor and knocked the wind out of his lungs.
I’m praying that’s the case, and that Kage takes the opportunity to beat his face into an unrecognizable pulp like he did to the other guy.
But my hopes are dashed when I hear the triumphant glee in Carter’s sickening, breathless voice.
“You think…think you stand a chance against me? I’ll feed you piece by piece to my dogs after you watch me carve that pretty bitch up. Think she’ll scream with my knife in her—”
He’s cut off just as my eyes peer around the door frame, and my heart seizes in terror; Carter is atop Kage, hands around his throat. Orange flames creep along the floor, throwing bouncing shadows across the walls, and I have a sinking feeling Carter started it.
Kage bucks his hips and unseats his brother long enough to reach for the handle of the wooden bat just a few inches from his finger tips.
Carter—face bruised and nose bleeding like a waterfall—isn’t quite fast enough to stop him, and Kage wields the bat like a sword, clubbing Carter on the back of the head to his insane laughter.
Kage rolls away quickly as Carter stumbles to the floor, but both are on their feet faster than I can blink, circling one another like panthers aiming for the kill. Both wield a weapon; Carter, a short, deadly knife, and Kage, the bat.
They look nothing alike. Where Kage is tall and built, Carter is slim and lithe, his nose hooked at the end, his hair flat and nearly black. He would be attractive to some, but when side by side with his younger brother, the choice is obvious.
I’m ripped from my dazed, lust-fueled thoughts as Kage swings the bat. Carter ducks with a laugh as they continue to circle one another. The flames lick up the lace curtains that hang over the window by the front door, and the once-white smoke now begins to coil like black serpents on the ceiling.
Carter straightens as he rounds Kage, his beady eyes finding mine through the haze. A deranged smile splits his cheeks, and Kage whips his face in my direction, shoulders sinking in something like defeat, eyes flooding in fear as they land on mine.
“I’ll give you one victory, brother,” Carter spits. “She is stunning. It was cute, watching you fuck her when she was passed out. Was it your first time? Seemed like it.”
My entire body is awash in flames, and for a moment I assume I’ve caught fire, but tears of embarrassment and shame pool in my eyes; Carter watched, and I don’t know why that feels like such a violation, but it does.
There’s a distinct line carved in my soul separating what Kage did to me while I was unaware, and what his brother did while we were both unaware.
There’s a strange, implicit trust I share with Kage, a bond that goes too deep for me to fathom right now. I trust him to cherish me in my most vulnerable moments.
I would never have found that trust with Carter, should he have been the one to kidnap me instead.
Kage subtly shakes his head at me, disappointment and anger etched into the tight lines around his eyes. I swallow the lump in my throat, but instead of backing down like I would have four months ago, I square my shoulders and focus all of my attention on the psycho before me.
A plank of wood in the floor snaps and cracks as the fire rages and devours everything in its path, and my lungs burn more with every breath, tears streaming down my face.
“You sound jealous,” I hiss, loud enough for them to hear the ire in my voice over the rush of the flames. “I would be too if I was a limp-dicked, beady-eyed, beak-nosed fuck, and my brother looked like a greek god with a massive—”
Kage quirks his eyebrow, shock, awe, and delight replacing his fury and defeat from seconds ago.
I press my lips together to coyly hide my smile, holding his gaze as I finish.
“Cock.”
It seems my little performance has thrown everyone off, because Carter stares in confusion for a second too long, letting my words sink into his flesh like arrows, his wounds egregious and festering already.
The second Carter takes a breath to retaliate, Kage flings the bat around in a backhand-motion, connecting with his jaw as a sickening crunch sounds above the roaring fire.
My breath stalls as Carter’s head whips to the side, blood spurting from his mouth and dousing Kage’s face, the rest sizzling as it evaporates against the flames.
When he brings his eyes back around, the metaphorical mask has slipped, and the insanity within spills to the ground, threatening to drown us.