Chapter 22
“Scream, Your Grace,” Augustus commanded, his tone full of condescension as he stood in front of Evander.
In his restraints, Evander’s sweat-slicked naked body trembled with pain and exhaustion. Yet even so, he lifted his head, feeling fresh blood trickle down from the fresh laceration on his face, and drew back his lips in a disgusted sneer.
“No,” he gritted out.
Augustus lifted an amused brow as his lips twisted into an evil smile.
“Such a defiant man,” he purred, catching Evander’s chin in a painfully tight grip. He cocked his head, and Evander watched joy light up the man’s eyes as he took in the proof of his torture. “One would almost think you liked the pain. Is that why you tried to mess with the wrong lot?”
Evander dared a smile of his own as he drew in a ragged, painful breath.
“No. I simply find your fits of temper most entertaining,” he replied, still bold and defiant despite his condition. “You look so pathetic when you do not get what you want.”
Augustus’s men had made the mistake, days before, of loosening his bindings enough to drag him between cells, and Evander had used the opening without hesitation.
He remembered the way it had felt, driving his elbow back into the throat of the man nearest him, wrenching free of the second, and for one glorious, blood-singing moment believing he might actually make it, might see open sky again before they dragged him back down.
He had gotten as far as the door. He remembered the taste of salt air before three of them brought him to the ground and beat him senseless for trying.
They had not killed him for it. Augustus wanted him alive far too badly for that. But he had promised that defiance would be answered with fire.
Augustus’s eyes went cold as his evil smirk slipped into a mask of pure hatred.
“Bring the rope,” he said quietly, and something in Evander’s chest guttered out at the words.
Two men came forward with the rope, one end of it already smoking, and Evander thrashed against his restraints, some animal part of him still fighting even though he knew there was nowhere left to run.
They wound it around his wrists first. He felt the heat before the pain caught up to him, but still, he did not scream.
They moved to his ankles next. Then, almost gently, to his throat, and his vision went white at the edges as the rope bit into the tender skin there, burning him alive one inch at a time.
Agony blinded him as his lips drew into a silent snarl and his body strained against his cuffs, but no matter how deep the lashes burned into him, how harshly the pain stole most of his senses, he refused to scream.
Somewhere in the haze of it, he thought of Helena. Of their letters, the flowers he had sent her. He held onto the thought of her because it was the only thing left in that place that did not burn.
Evander took a ragged breath as he sat up in bed, his body soaked in sweat from his nightmare. He scrabbled at his clothes, desperate to cool the heat and pain dwelling inside him. It was too much; he could not breathe, could not think of anything but the pain that ripped through him.
Then a soft sigh broke the air, and he went still. Slowly, behind his open eyes, the visions of his nightmares faded, and he came back to reality. He turned his head, and a sob threatened to escape from his throat as he made out Helena’s sleeping, naked figure. So beautiful, so peaceful.
He reached out and stroked his hand over the curve of her side. Another soft sigh of contentment was released from her lips as her silken body undulated under his touch.
His heart raced as he watched her, and slowly, he eased back onto the bed. He pulled her close against his chest and pressed his lips to her bare shoulder, craving more proof that he was no longer in that terrible place but living the fantasy he never thought possible.
After every ugly, painful thing he had been through that had transformed him into the beast he was, how could something so soft, so beautiful, be his?
He had stymied her longing to feel and see his naked body by drowning her in pleasure, but how long could he keep up such a thing before she saw through his intentions and finally demanded that she see him bare?
He had to hold her off. Had to keep her distracted with his need to pleasure her.
For he was sure, even after her kind, impassioned words, even after hearing her beautiful moans, that the moment she saw what he truly looked like would be the moment she would walk away from him.
Even angels had breaking points.