CHAPTER 21 ELODIE
ELODIE
Maybe he won’t come over here. Maybe he’s going to someone else. I don’t meet those haunting eyes, and my head’s swimming in too much terror to really take his features in. But I know it’s him. The tall frame, the silhouette that birthed a monster in my nightmares.
When he inches closer in this direction, my hand flies to Caden’s lap. I don’t know why. I have no time to question it as the fear takes over. I clamp onto his leg, desperate to anchor myself before I have a full-blown meltdown.
His face instantly flings to me. “Elodie? What’s wrong?”
But no words form. I’m tongue-tied. Nothing but a choked sound bubbles up from my constricting throat.
Caden’s hand comes onto mine, warm fingers curling around my clammy ones, his body angling towards me. “Elodie, talk to me, what’s wrong?”
But then he’s nearly here. He’s on the other side of the table, just feet away, about to make all the nightmares swim to the surface and strangle me.
I dare to look at his face. Smirking as he smirked the last time I saw him. Devilish. Pure fucking evil.
I leap to my feet. “I have to use the bathroom.” I start to dash off but Caden grabs my wrist, jerking me back. I beg him with my eyes. “Please, I’ll be one minute.”
Caden’s eyes flick behind me, possibly at the other two. He’s confused, his eyebrows coming together. “I’ll come with you.”
I laugh, breathless and pathetic. “To the ladies? I’ll be fine.” I wriggle my wrist within his grip. With a reluctant frown, he lets me go. I dart off.
Once I’m in the restroom, I lean on the sink, avoiding looking at the mirror while I focus on feeling the cold porcelain beneath my palms, grounding myself.
I’m not there, I’m here. I’m free.
I can’t gain control over my rapid, shallow breaths. I feel like my makeup’s melting off my face from all the heat and sweat and ice-cold fear.
I’m not there. I’m here. I’m free.
I stare down at my wrists.
I’m not cuffed. I’m here. I’m free.
I suck in loud gasps of air as my chest tightens even more. The flashbacks shooting into my vision from every fucking angle.
Red lights. Black silhouettes. Metal cuffs. Skin. So much skin.
I squeeze my eyes shut, shake my head vigorously. Caden’s blazer suddenly feels like a weighted blanket. A hot cage. But I don’t take it off. Despite the sudden weight of it, the smell of him is weirdly anchoring me, keeping me from falling straight through this floor.
My legs are about to give out when the restroom door opens. I force myself upright and turn the tap on to wash my hands, willing my face into a blank expression while my heart continues to pound.
“Well, well, well,” the person says. And it’s not a fucking lady. “I wondered when I’d get to see you again, my little superstar.”
I close my eyes and take a breath. I’m free, goddammit. I will not be scared.
I straighten my back and turn to Rosco. He’s as formidable and repulsive as I remember.
Suffocating and deadly menacing. Tall but strongly built, I know all too well the strength he contains in that lean physique.
He’s got on a black suit, like everyone else here.
I’ve never seen him with clothes on before.
I know every line and every vein, every blemish and every scar, every tattoo and every freckle that’s hidden beneath the fabrics.
Short, dark brown hair, blazing amber eyes.
The skull tattoo across his throat, below his sharp jaw, stares at me from across the room, the two hollow holes where the eyes should be still burn into me. Still stains my nightmares.
If he’s here, are the others here too?
“This is the ladies, Rosco, get the fuck out.” I’m surprised by how calm I sound. My heart says otherwise.
He chuckles, hands in his black trouser pockets. He circles closer. I instinctively back up. “And there’s a lady in here I want to see.”
I swallow hard, continuing to back up to the wall. I could scream. I could scream right now and Caden would come and save me. Whether he cares about me or not, he cares about protecting what’s his. And tonight, that’s me. I’m his.
“I don’t want to see you. I never wanted to see you again.”
“Yet here we are, reunited, as if it were meant to be.”
“Don’t be thick, you sick fuck. You’re here because you were invited. Because you’re connected to the Blackwoods. That’s it.”
Rosco bares me a sick, wolfish grin. “You remember I’m thick as fuck, huh?” He brings a hand from his pocket to grope himself and I shudder, ice-cold sweat trickling down my spine. “I remember how loud you screamed at it too.”
He closes the distance and I can’t fight the tears anymore. He’s too much, he brings too much pain with him. He brings too much fucking bad darkness.
I drop my head in shame, guilt, regret. “Please, just go,” I whisper, hating how I can’t summon enough strength to be brave in front of him. How much his presence crushes me. How small he makes me feel.
“Oh, baby,” he drops his voice to a quiet, smooth tone, as if talking to a lover.
“Don’t be sad. It’s good. I’ve missed you so much.
” A crooked finger comes up and hooks under my chin, and I’m powerless to stop him tilting my head up to him.
He’s about Fiz’s height, but when he looms over me, he shrinks me a lot more than Fiz does.
Those amber eyes that glow like the flames of Hell. The flash of metal and fire and razor-sharp pain that flicker there as I’m held hostage by his gaze throws me back into the black hole of my nightmares.
I keep my lips pressed together to stop them from wobbling.
He runs his other hand down the front of Caden’s blazer, down my stomach. The sensation of him touching me is like having a hundred spiders crawl all over me. “I can’t say I’m thrilled to see you wearing another man’s clothes, though.”
“Fiancé,” I spit.
Rosco snorts, dismissing the correction completely. “Did you miss me?”
I sniffle, a tear escaping as I blink. “No, Rosco.”
His thumb comes up and grazes my bottom lip and I quiver.
Please, make him go away, the darkness whimpers.
I can’t, I silently reply. He won’t ever go away.
“Now, now, baby, don’t cry for me. This is good. Now you’re a part of the Blackwoods, we can work closely together. We can see a lot more of each other.”
The very thought has my body summoning strength it had temporarily been zapped of. I use both my hands and shove him hard in the chest, getting a couple steps between us as he staggers back.
He just laughs. “There’s my little fighter.” He advances towards me again.
I’m about to scream. I open my mouth wide and suck in a long breath to scream this fucking place down when the door bursts open.
I swear I could crumble into a pile of tears and bones at the sight of Fiz.
He takes the scene in for a moment, a confused, unhappy expression on his face, before it dissolves and the aloof Fiz appears again. “Your fiancé wanted to know what was taking so long.” His eyes dart between me and Rosco.
I gulp down the fear, knowing I’m safe now. “I’m sorry, I was trying to –”
“Trying to climb out the damn window.” Rosco cuts in, then sneers. “I was helping.”
Fiz tilts his head and narrows his eyes at him. “I bet Caden would love to know you were helping his bride escape his clutches.”
Rosco laughs, straightening his shirt. “Can you blame her? You’d have to lack brain cells and common sense to willingly marry him.”
Fiz’s eyes flick to mine and, for a moment, it looks like he might believe I was trying to escape. I shake my head slowly.
Fiz’s attention goes back to Rosco. “It’s more believable that she saw your ugly ass waltz in here and tried to flee out the window. That would make more sense.”
Rosco waves it off. “Whatever.” He starts toward the door.
Fiz doesn’t move out the way. He folds his arms across his chest and becomes a brick wall.
Rosco’s shoulders lift and he pauses. Finally, he mutters, “Excuse me.”
Fiz’s eyebrows raise in a challenging way, and he even juts his hip, all try me, bitch sass. “What’s the magic word?”
All my fear dribbles out from my pores and is replaced by this manic and intense need to burst out laughing. The fear Rosco strikes in me is overwhelming and paralysing, and here’s Fiz Hart showing that this man is nothing compared to him. He’s unbothered by him, daring him to take him on.
Rosco stuffs his hands into his pockets. “Please.”
It’s not just Caden who outranks most here. Seems anyone tied to him. The superiority emanates off Fiz in great dominating waves. That doesn’t make Fiz any hotter. At all.
Fiz smirks at him. Flippant and smug as fuck. For once, I don’t want to smack it off his face. “Of course, my good sir. Your mama raised a fine young gentleman.” He even goes as far as opening the door for him. He marches out. Fiz flips Rosco off as he leaves and lets the door close.
I could kiss him. Totally wrap my whole body around him and kiss him. Platonically, of course, just to thank him for being him.
But that urge dissolves just as quickly as it formed when Fiz turns those dark eyes on me. “What the fuck was just going on in here, Elodie?”
I gulp. I can’t tell him. I won’t. I don’t need that bullshit to come to the surface again after spending weeks shoving it so far down. I don’t need to confirm their suspicions of me being a whore. “Nothing, he must have just got the toilets mixed up.”
Fiz crosses his arms again. “Really, bitch?”
I nod, mirroring his challenging stance. “Really, bitch.” I go to walk towards the door, but he blocks my way, so I roll my eyes. “I’m not saying the magic word.”
He narrows his eyes at me. “Elodie, do I need to tell Caden about this?”
There’s so much accusation lacing that question. Does Caden need to be aware of Rosco because we’re fucking, we’re friends, he’s a threat – which one will it be?
I drop my attitude. “Please, don’t tell him, Fiz. There’s no need.”
He bites his lip. “I suppose I can keep a secret for you. But it’ll cost you.” His smirk’s back and yep, I’m back to wanting to smack it straight off.
“Of course it fucking will. If it’s anything sexual, you can just go tell Caden right now. I’m not going near you.”
Fiz keeps that intense gaze locked on mine, threatening to buckle my knees. “Are you not just a little curious?”
“No.” I fear my body language might be betraying me.
“You haven’t thought about giving me a chance, Sleeping Beauty?” He’s suddenly very close to me.
I’m thrown back to all the chances he hasn’t taken for himself. Sure, he’s taken some, but not all. And it worries me.
“Why haven’t you come to Caden’s room again?” I ask tentatively. “Why have you left me alone?”
His eyebrows dart up. “I can happily amend that, if you wish to have my company.”
“No – no, I just…” I try to sort through my scattered thoughts. Find the right words that he won’t take as an invitation. “You’re so threatening and handsy, yet you don’t jump at every opportunity. I don’t think it’s because you’ve found respect for me.”
He lifts a hand, runs the back of a finger down my cheek.
Goosebumps rise all over me. “Because, baby,” he whispers in that velvet smooth voice, “you feel that anxiety when you hear footsteps outside the door, the phantom pain when you think of my teeth on your clit?” His dark eyes fix onto mine, setting my blood on fire.
“How on edge you are when we’re in the same room?
That’s what I feed off. What I live for.
” His hand reaches up and pushes back some hair from my face, his eyes now following his movement.
“I’ve embedded myself into your brain. You asking me ‘why not’ is proof of that.
” He looks back down at me. “I’m in your head and I’m going to stay there.
That’s all I need – for now. And when the time is right, Sleeping Beauty, I’ll make those dreams come true. You’ll beg me for it.”
I almost choke. From the disbelief, from the ambivalence, from the utter audacity this man has.
“Bold of you to assume I think about you so much,” I manage, my voice thick.
“Do you not?” He cocks a brow, dropping his hand down and nestling it in the crook of my neck, thumb brushing my jaw. “I sure think about you a lot.”
I bite my lip, trying to catch a coherent thought while this insufferable guy scrambles my brain with his hotness and silky voice and quivering touches.
Then, his thumb comes up and tugs my lip free of my teeth, and I almost crumble right then and there. “You think about me?” he asks again, eyes burning into mine with an intensity I could just dissolve from.
I’m pretty sure I have no breath in my lungs. “Not at all. You’re vulgar.”
Fiz just laughs, dropping his hand and backing away from me. “Oh, baby, if you knew what I can do with my tongue, you would not be so repulsed by me.” He goes to the door, ushering me out. “Come on.”
I walk out on shaky legs, feel him following me, feel his dark eyes burning into my ass, but my brain’s too preoccupied to care. What the fuck can he do with his tongue?