37. Hendrix #2
Don’t even get me started on his son...
Archer screws up his face. “But he’s already got you in a provisional.”
“A provisa-what-now?”
Saint’s urge to throttle Archer turns full on homicidal as he bares his teeth at him. “Nothing.”
Archer’s face falls, then he backpedals with a nervous chuckle. “Yeah…totally nothing.”
I look between them, squinty and ready to knock heads together. “One of you better spill before the bell rings.”
Which will be in the next sixty seconds.
Archer seems to have sewn his own damn lips, because they’re forming the straightest line I’ve ever seen. I’d be furious with the guy if I didn’t already hear Saint’s plan B involving his eyes.
So, I allow my best friend to live to see another day, and turn my fury on the chiseled marble to my left.
“Saint.” I grind his name through my teeth.
“Jimi,” he grinds back, still death glaring Archer.
“Easy way or hard way…” I demand, and I can tell by the rumble in Saint’s throat he knows exactly what my hard way will not include.
His Royal Cock .
“Fucking fine, woman.” Saint groans, just in time for the bell to ring. “But we gotta do it now while nobody’s in the dorms.”
The trek back to the dorms played out similar to the club: with Saint furious, cursing, and dragging me along like a child being sent to timeout.
Except, timeout wasn’t in the middle of a crowded dance floor as he grinded his dick into my ass. It was in the middle of my room, with him pushing a button on his phone, and me watching as every entrance was sealed shut by metal plates appearing out of the ceiling.
“Ho-ly-shit.” I gawk around my dorm room-turned-panic room. “And here I thought Vic was extending an olive branch by putting me up in the fancy shmancy quarters.”
“Why would he be extending branches?” Saint asks as he organizes the fully stocked mini fridge.
That rose up from under the floorboards.
Running my hand along the steel front door, I tell him, “For his son being a fuckwad dickhead.”
“You really need to come up with better insults, Jimi. Or at least ones that include actual words.”
I ignore the grumpy attitude and continue my exploring over at the sealed windows. “So the entire room is made of reinforced steel behind the spackle?”
“Amongst other things,” Saint responds from right behind me, making me jump out of my damn skin. He twists open a bottle of Pepsi, then hands it to me. “It’s impenetrable, and the door only opens with voice recognition and a facial scanner.”
After a quick sip of soda, I ask, “So, like, what? You sing into it or some shit?”
“You speak a phrase.”
“Ahhhhhh…” I wiggle my eyebrows. “So what’s the phrase?”
He snatches the bottle from me, guzzles half of it down, then relays satisfaction in the form of an obnoxious burp.
So gross.
But an even grosser part of me kind of likes it.
“It’s actually adorable you think I’d tell you.” He takes another sip. “Like almost as adorable as the pink hearts you got goin’ on your granny panties.”
“Oh my God!” I wretch the bottle back from him. “They’re my first day period underwear.”
He grimaces. “Good thing I didn’t try sticking it in this morning, then.”
“Can we focus on the tour?!”
“The tour of what?” Saint holds an arm out behind him. “This is it. A hidden row of metal boxes aligning the floor for our families’ safety. Sliding down doors. Sliding up fridges. Sliding horizontal windows.” A moment passes before he says, “Oh, yeah…and a secret escape through the fireplace.”
Curiosity getting the best of me, I peek my head inside it, finding handles climbing up the stone chimney to, you guessed it, another steel trap door.
“How the hell do you get out of here?”
“Another code.”
“Facial? Or voice?”
Saint grits out, “Digital.”
When my entire body is back in the room again, I blow out a breath. “Would’ve never been able to tell…”
Or imagine anything was able to drop down or pop out of this old ass castle-building. Let alone scan your damn face and expect conversation.
“That’s the point, Jimi.”
Duh.
“Why didn’t any of you guys stay in yours until now? I mean…even without the secret gadgets and trap doors these rooms are nice.”
Saint has clearly had enough of the conversation, because he collapses backwards onto my bed, covering his face with his hat. “Because even though they’re hidden, we can’t risk exposing them by bringing people in here.”
“By people…you mean girls.”
“By people…I mean anyone the Royal families don’t trust.”
I plop next to him on the bed. “Guess that says a whole lot about me, then.”
He replaces the hat with two hands scrubbing down his face, then shoots to his feet. “Fuck, Jimi. That’s not what I meant.”
“Then elaborate because right now all I’m taking from this is that you see me as an outsider.”
“You are anything but an outsider.”
I fold my arms and wait.
“I don’t know. I guess I felt like telling you would be relinquishing my control over protecting you.”
“How?”
Saint straightens his back and clears his throat, as if about to perform a skit. “Oh, hey, Jimi. It’s me, Letterman. The guy you fought with, fucked, and hated. Fun fact…your room is called a provisional that I could easily lock you in with a single tap to my cell phone.”
Squishing my nose, I tell him, “Okay, yeah. Fair point.”
Saint lets out a deep, resigned breath. “You see? I didn’t hide this shit because I don’t trust you, I hid it because I’m scared to fucking lose you.”
“You’re not gonna lose me…and the reason has nothing to do with being locked in this room.”
“Yeah…it’s because you know I’d chase your fine ass all the way to Cyprus.” Saint’s lighthearted smile stands no chance against the exhaustion sinking the muscles of his gorgeous face.
For fear of him collapsing, I mark us officially done with tours and conversations.
“Alright, let’s go mister…” I stand, then pull down the blanket. “It’s time for you to get some sleep.”
He yawns. “No rest for the wicked, baby.”
“Well, there is for you.”
With a not so gentle push, I get Saint on the bed, then pick his heavy ass legs up on it one by one and twist off his shoes.
Another yawn commences, but this time while rolling onto his stomach. “I can’t sleep unless you sleep,” he mutters into the pillow as I cover him.
“You won’t have any trouble, trust me.”
“Oh yeah? And why’s that?”
Other than him already being halfway there?
“I know because for the first time in forty-eight hours, you won’t have to worry about where I’m going.”
A wave of excitement crashes through me as I squeeze the gun, peering down at my attacker lying helplessly on the ground.
His eyes are wide and filled with desperation as muted words rush from his lips. Please, I’m sure, to spare him, even though he had no intentions of sparing me. But I won’t. I can’t. Not when I can taste the flavors of death on my tongue.
A mix between sharp metal, smoke, and a painful end.
It thrills me in ways I never imagined.
Until the presence of something pure evil becomes all encompassing.
“Do it,” a cold, unfamiliar voice demands, and when I look up I find the shape of a man tucked away in the shadows, pure malice curving the edges of his silhouette.
“Who are you?” I ask, and when he steps into the light, a chill shoots like an arrow straight down to my bones.
A huge man stands at the head of my attacker, dark hair, beautifully carved face, and a Letterman jacket.
Identical in every way to the boy I fell in love with, except for one.
His eyes. The lively crystal blue has been replaced with a pitched out black, like doorways to oblivion.
He’s staring down at me, a self-satisfied grin laced with venom tipping the corners of his lips, as if he’s been waiting a long time for this very moment.
It has the tiny hairs on the back of my neck standing on end.
“Saint? Is that you?”
His frightening grin widens. “Don’t insult me now, Jimi. You know exactly who I am.”
“No…I don’t.”
Or at least I don’t want to imagine.
“Your racing heart says otherwise.”
Another wave crashes through me, but this one drowns me in terror, cutting off my air supply.
“You’ve been asking about me…” he states through a whisper so lethal, it has the words slithering from his lips like a snake. “So it’s only right to introduce myself.”
From my peripheral I can see my attacker still pleading, but with no sign it’s with him. Making it clear the man, or monster, is here solely to terrify me.
I blink rapidly until my eyes squeeze shut.
“This isn’t real…you’re not real.”
“I’m as real as you’re making me.” He comes closer, and I can feel a pull stemming from the emptiness inside him.
“No. You’re a figment of my imagination. The result of a traumatic event my mind is trying to fight.”
His sinister laugh grinds against my ears. “You’ve seen me enough times to know that’s not true.”
“I’ve seen nothing. Now get out of my head!”
“Only if you say my name.”
“I won’t.”
I fucking refuse to bring a theoretical monster to life.
The black doors widen as he swallows the distance, the pull becoming so intense my boots slide across the pavement.
“Stop!” I cry in hysterics.
“Say my name, Jimi,” he demands, spitting out my nickname like it’s poison on his tongue. “Say it.”
“I…can’t. Please.”
He doesn’t speak again until I’m flush to his chest, feeling the ice on his skin seeping through the Letterman.
“Why not? Hm?”
I shake my head vigorously.
“Answer me!” His voice claps like thunder in the night, making the ground shake and my feet rise. “Admit why you’re so afraid to say my name!”
My face draws closer to the black doors, and I try with all my might to stop myself from falling through them. It’s no use, though, black already surrounds me. But it isn’t until I’m hung over the depths that fear strikes cold, making me scream, “Because I don’t want to be sick too!”
“Well,” the monster’s icy whisper echoes through the dark, “it’s too late.”