Chapter 23
Vale
“You’re quiet tonight.”
I blink and look up from my plate.
Across the table, Quentin arches an amused brow as he bites off a piece of broccoli from his fork. Something tells me this isn’t the first time he’s tried to get my attention.
Swallowing the chunk of juicy red steak I was chewing—steaks we were supposed to have last night—I reach for my glass of water and take a few sips, washing it down. Clearing my throat, I say, “Yeah, just got a lot on my mind.”
He hums, brown eyes squinting in thought. I stare him down point-blank, not giving anything away.
“Would it have anything to do with why you didn’t come home until well after midnight last night?” he asks, more curious than annoyed. I think I even detect a bit of concern. His gaze flicks to my bandaged forearm. “Or that?”
I feel my jaw start to tick, pulsing in time with the faint throbbing where Aston cut me yesterday. I quickly shove some mashed potatoes in my mouth, hoping Quentin doesn’t notice.
“I take that as a yes,” he says slowly, and I can practically hear that quick lawyer mind of his working.
Swallowing the potatoes, I glance down at my plate as I slice off another tender piece of filet, the serrated knife scraping loudly against my fork, piercing the heavy expectant silence.
I was wondering when he’d bring it up.
After I eventually exhausted myself out, I unlocked my phone to find two missed calls and several missed texts, most of which from the man sitting before me now. I told him the truth, or the partial truth, in the form of a single word, one I knew he’d understand. Air.
In other words, I needed to blow off some steam and get my emotions under control before I did something stupid I couldn’t come back from. Luckily, he knew better than to start on the steaks until I got home, so he just whipped something else up for himself to eat.
While I wouldn’t have felt guilty about it, if he had it all cooked and laid out, I don’t like waste. He knows this. Knows I get irrationally angry when I go to restaurants and see plates piled with food getting taken back to the kitchen to be tossed.
Doesn’t take a genius to know where that little quirk came from.
Quentin’s gaze drifts from the bandage to the faded scratches going up each of my exposed arms, eyeing them with scrutiny. Those aren’t from yesterday though, but it is the first time he’s seeing them. He’d been out of town on business since Thursday and just got back yesterday afternoon.
I bite back a curse, silently berating myself for not throwing on a long-sleeved shirt, if only to avoid questions. But then just a quickly, I remember why I didn’t.
Hiding the marks just feels wrong—like I’m somehow admitting defeat.
Okay, and maybe a small part of me wants the visual reminder of what happened.
Not the part where it felt fucking amazing, but the part that came after.
The part that led me to trashing an abandoned building and questioning if the life I’d been so set on having was worth it, all because of a fucking blow job.
Across the table, Quentin sets his fork down and grabs his cloth napkin from where it was hidden on his lap, bringing it up to pat the corners of his mouth.
Setting it off to the side of his mostly clean plate, he leans back, crossing his arms. Waiting with a stern, yet patient, expectant arch of his brows.
It’s an expression I’ve grown quite familiar with over the last five years. Even back when he first took me in, when I still didn’t talk, he never treated me like I was less than. Or as someone not worth his time. Even when he didn’t know me, but especially after he did.
And for a mute foster kid, orphaned at the fragile age of eight and thrown into a system that almost only ever benefited the evil in this world, that meant everything. Even to someone like me.
It’s probably half the reason why I rarely ever felt the need to keep things from him.
He’s consistent and reliable, and I know for a fact he won’t be burdened by his own biases. He’s a lawyer first, a human second. And maybe that might rub some people wrong, but for me, it’s a relief. A comfort.
Because no matter what sort of trouble may have tempted me over the years, he’s always made an effort to understand where I was coming from. Never judged. Never condemned. Just tried to understand why, so he could help me figure out the best and safe way to achieve what I want.
Even back when I didn’t talk much, he’d have me write everything down. Make a pros and cons list. Then we’d analyze the shit out of it, examining it from every possible angle.
And then, when all was said and done, he’d simply sit back, nod, and say, “Just be smart,” trusting me to… Well, not so much to make the so-called right choice, but to make the one that presented with the least amount of negative fallout.
He gave me the tools, but he left it up to me to make the choice of whether or not I use them, and how I use them.
He taught me how to see the bigger picture.
What is my end game?
What are the possible ways this could go bad?
How can I work setbacks to my advantage?
And most of all, he gave me room to be myself. Within reason.
I’m reminded of all that now as I stare down my adoptive dad, debating how much to confide in him. He’s smart though. He has to know what this about. Or, rather, who.
“Aston remembers me.”
And just like that, all curious amusement from a moment ago winks out. His eyes harden and he straightens, leaning forward the slightest bit, telling me it’s no longer Dad I’m talking to, but the lawyer.
“You talked.” Not a question.
I suck in my cheek and nod, not giving him any more than that.
Images from our last two interactions flash across my head.
That infuriating mouth that never seems to stop moving, parted in pleasure, lips perpetually red and swollen.
That pale, smooth patch of skin, sloping down from his neck, blooming with blotches of discoloration.
That perfect peach of an ass with that tight pink ring in the center, begging for me to fill it.
It looked so tight, I think, recalling the other night.
He was so fucking greedy for my cock. Like a feral little beast.
I’ve no doubt if I rolled him over Saturday night, let him touch me as I played and fucked with him from the front—or didn’t restrain him yesterday and let him give as much as he took—I’d have scratch marks all up and down my back, my chest too, to go along with those on my arms…
Bruises too, mirroring the ones I no doubt left on his ass cheeks.
Maybe even some bites thrown in there. He’s such a mouthy little thing after all.
He’d have destroyed me, if I let him.
Desecrated every inch of my body, leaving nowhere untouched. Making sure the whole fucking world knows he was here. And he wasn’t going anywhere.
Possessive little shit.
My mouth curves as I acknowledge my hypocrisy. Not enough to get me to regret it though…
“How much does he remember?” Quentin asks after it’s clear I’m not about to fess up anything. Drawing me back to the present.
“Hard to say.” I lean back and cross my arm, tilting my head, and meeting my dad’s gaze. “But something tells me he’s not as stupid or crazy as he pretends to be.”
To my surprise, Aston was absent from school today. I didn’t really know what to make of it, and I’ll admit it made me a little uneasy.
Sure, I was dead fucking serious yesterday, when I told him to stay away. And I know I scared him—I saw the terror, the realization gleaming in his round, wet eyes; how he trembled and gasped…heard his whimpered pleas…
I just didn’t think it would be that easy. Getting rid of him…
I shift in my seat, ignoring the restless urge making me want to go find him. Make sure he’s still here. Someone would know if he wasn’t coming back, right? The Jennings kid, perhaps.
“You think it’s all an act.”
I shrug at Quentin’s statement. “It’s…something. I just don’t know what.” I glance away, working my jaw, hating that I have no fucking solid answers when it comes to this—when it comes to Aston.
“He’s hard to read,” I admit reluctantly after a moment.
“Just when I think I can write him off as a non-threat, he goes and does something that contradicts everything. Throwing me back to square one.” I shake my head.
“If this is all a game to him, and he’s not actually as crazy as he wants people to believe…
Why? What is his motive? Is he just doing this to fuck with me, or—”
“Or he has something else up his sleeve.”
Teeth clenched, I nod, hating this.
Hating how distracted I’ve become from the real threat here. Not Aston himself. But his memories. Memories I could’ve triggered yesterday…
Is that why he wasn’t at school?
Did he have a mental breakdown and get sent back to Ashwood?
A long, quiet moment passes.
“You need to be careful,” Quentin says quietly.
I snap a glare across the table. “I am.”
His lips thin into a hard line, telling me he’s clearly not buying it.
I tip my head in a show of concession. “I’m trying, okay? He’s just…he’s fucking infuriating. It’s like he knows exactly what buttons to push.” I clench my fist, drawing a shooting pain up my arm to where he cut me.
Quentin’s eyes fall shut. “Vale—”
I exhale sharply. “I know.”
“You were supposed to stay away from him. Not—”
“Poke the beast, I remember.”
But he poked first…
How the fuck was I supposed to let what he did to Seth go unpunished? How the fuck was I supposed to act like what he did was in any way, shape, or form acceptable?
That’s what we’re blaming for yesterday now? The voice in my head scoffs. That’s why you got him naked in the first place? Why you all but fucked him…twice, now?
Gritting my teeth, I look away. “He caught me off guard. Being here…back in my life. Confronting me… I really didn’t think he remembered me. Weeks went by, and nothing.”
“He was feeling you out,” Quentin says softly. “Waiting for you to let your guard down.”
I nod, having already come to the same conclusion.
I walked right into his trap, and ever the passive, woe-is-me victim, Aston managed to orchestrate a domino effect that ended with me being the bad guy. Yet again. Well, that’s if what I did yesterday sent him back over the edge, that is.
“I’m going to call Bryce. We’ll handle this,” Quentin says sternly, pushing his chair back.
I snap my head up, eyes going wide as they follow him across the room, toward the hallway.
“Wait.”
He pauses.
My brows knit. “What are you going to do?” I ask more curious than anything. I don’t point out that I might’ve already handled it.
Quentin looks over his shoulder. “I’m going to do what I should have the second I learned who would be attending school with you. Even if I have to lie.”
I frown. “You’re going to get him expelled.” It doesn’t escape me that even I considered it, on multiple occasions. But it’s one thing for me to get him shipped the fuck out of here, and another for Quentin to handle it.
“He can go to Crowley High,” he says. “He’ll still be living here, for however long that lasts, but there will at least be far less chances for you two to run into each other if he’s attending school across the river.”
He goes to leave—probably to go call Locke from his study—when I stop him again.
“Don’t,” I say before I can think better of it.
Quentin stands under the archway with his back to me. To the foyer he says, “Why not?”
I’m not done playing with him.
It might be too late.
This is my fault as much his.
Not what he did back then, but more recently. I’m not so far up my own ass to not acknowledge that I could’ve walked away at any point.
Swallowing back all those reasons, I instead say carefully, “It’ll make him suspicious. More paranoid than he already is.” I pause meaningfully. “You said it yourself—don’t poke the beast.”
A long moment passes where Quentin remains quiet and motionless.
I can practically hear the wheels spinning in his head. Feel the words that sit on his tongue.
He knows.
He’s always known.
What I’m capable of…what lurks inside me like a landmine, just waiting for someone to stumble into it.
How much Aston meant to me back then, and the impact his actions had on me…
He’s always fucking known.
And he’s always known to never speak of it.
Quentin clears his throat and slowly turns on his heel. He crosses his arms over his crisp, white button-down and says casually, “You worry it might crack open his memories.”
I stare at him, and my mouth twitches. “I thought we already established he remembers.”
“You know what I mean.”
Sucking in my cheeks, I watch him for a beat.
Then, reaching forward, I grab my glass of water and bring it to my lips, not taking my eyes off his as I casually take a sip. Wordlessly pleading the fifth.
He pushes his lips out, nodding, looking at some distant spot over my head. “This isn’t good, Vale. If he remembers—”
“I know,” I quickly and succinctly cut him off, lowering the glass to the table. “But I’m not too worried about that,” I lie.
He huffs a short humorless laugh. “And why not?”
Grabbing my knife and fork, I go about sawing off some more juicy meat. “Because if there’s one thing about Aston Saint James I can be certain of, it’s this.”
I bring the chunk of steak to my mouth, pause, and look over it to find my dad watching me warily.
“He doesn’t need me to dig his grave. He’s perfectly capable of doing that all on his own.”
If anything, yesterday, I just showed him where to start digging.
Aston’s missing from school the rest of the week, and try as I might to feel relieved, I can’t.
Relieved not because I think he’s gone for good…
No, I already know he’ll be back. He’s been sick, apparently. More like sick in the fucking head.
But relief because I finally found a weakness. That for as mentally shattered as he already is—allegedly—there’s still something in him to break.
I should be ecstatic…and I am. I’ve got him right where I wanted, held like a fragile little bird in the palm of hand.
All it would take is a good, firm squeeze…
And, yet, it’s not relief I feel.
No, it’s something much more complicated…dangerous.
Something that ensures this will end in bloodshed.
Excitement.