Chapter 2
My New Home
Killian Klebs
My fingers itch to touch the canvas. I want to feel her skin beneath my fingertips. I want to drag them across every scar her body holds. But most of all, I want to study her. I want to fix and repair what was taken from her.
I haven’t had such a fixation in a couple of weeks.
Not since being caught and taken away. Prison is not for me.
I tried it. I’m useless there according to the suited asshole that calls himself ‘Master.’ He came to my arraignment—interrupted the entire hearing.
Judge Fitzgerald didn’t seem to have a problem with it.
It was an interesting exchange, one that I was heavily interested in.
Apparently, ‘Master’ looked at my file and assumed I’d be a great commodity for his collection.
So now I’m here. For what? I haven’t entirely figured it out just yet.
I keep playing that day over and over in my mind trying to put all the pieces together.
The courtroom wasn’t loud, and I remember the way the fluorescent lights hummed and the way the man on the stand wouldn’t stop talking. Everything about him was wrong. His breathing, posture, and the words spilling out without structure. Messy, and I fix messy things. That’s all I ever did.
“Killian Klebs,” the judge calls out. My name sounds so clinical coming from him.
So detached like I’m just another number to tick off his checklist. Good.
Then the doors opened behind me and a man stepped into the room like he owned the place.
No one announced him but the air changed and the judge paused. This is how I knew he mattered.
“Proceedings are concluded,” he says calmly.
Not a request but a decision. Papers shuffled as voices dropped into a hushed frenzy.
And just like that I wasn’t theirs anymore.
Transferred. Reassigned. Reclassified. Not a criminal but a subject.
The suited man came in like a wrecking ball, shook my hand and told me to call him ‘Master’ and that was it.
Walking into the place, I was blown away by the girl posing as a clown.
She’s absolutely stunning, nonetheless, and I need to know everything about her.
What I would give to find out which room she sleeps in so I could sneak in—remove every single piece of clothing and roam her body, analyze all her markings.
I want her bare for me like a brand new canvas.
“You are all dismissed. See you next time,” Dr. Petrova tells us, taking me out of my thoughts.
The girl, Logan or Lolli—I really don’t like either of those names.
I’ll come up with one that suits her, but nonetheless, she doesn’t move like the rest of them.
She waits a half a second longer. Interesting.
Metal chairs scraping against the floor make me grit my teeth.
It’s like nails on a chalk board and it hurts my ears.
I don’t do well with loud noises or dirty objects.
Everything needs to be cleansed and quiet.
My fists tighten at my sides and I breathe in through my nose and out of my mouth.
I can feel eyes on me, hear the footsteps around me as a guard grabs me by the bicep, hauling me up.
“Get in line,” he yells out, his voice going right through me as everyone walks to the door in a single file.
“This is when it starts.” Her breath tickles my ear as she giggles. I jump, not expecting her to be so fucking close to me.
“No talking!” the guard yells which makes her giggle even more.
The hallway smells like bleach and something older underneath it.
The same smell when you walk from the outside into hell.
Rot. I wish she would breathe on me again.
She smells like fresh cotton candy you get at a carnival.
The melted sugar spinning together into strings of deliciousness.
She skips past me to stand behind another girl as the guard yells yet again.
No one is listening, not really. I narrow my eyes as a patient is shoved.
“Keep moving,” a guard barks. Like why must we be so rough?
I don’t look at him. I don’t need to. I already know what he is—Imprecise.
My hands rest at my sides, fingers still.
They don’t shake—that’s what they notice first. Not what I did but how calm I was after.
A patient bumps into me hard but I don’t react as he mutters something under his breath.
It doesn’t matter though. They are all the same here—uncontrolled and unfinished.
My gaze shifts towards my Canvas as she continues to skip the best she can while humming and speaking to herself.
Lucifer steps behind her and whispers something that I can’t hear, but I watch the way her head tilts towards him and the way her fingers move like something is holding her back from touching him.
A smile spreads across her face as he continues whispering to her, which causes her to giggle.
“She’s unstable,” a guard murmurs from nearby, and when I go to correct him, Jagger growls behind me.
The guard eyes him, and I shake my head.
He wouldn’t understand the difference. I don’t care how long he’s worked here.
Unstable things collapse and she doesn’t look like she’s ready for that. If anything, she’s still forming.
“Not unstable,” I rush out before I can stop them. “Evolving,” I finish, and the guard glances at me confused then laughs
“A warm hole is more like it,” he whispers, causing Jagger to growl once again. He never learns. Even after all these years in lock up, he still never fucking learns. A sharp sound hits behind me then a body crashing into a wall and a growl cut short. SHIT!
“Get the fuck off of me if you value your life, bitch!” Jagger warns.
“I’d listen to him, Guard,” I sing as my Canvas whirls around, almost like a pirouette, narrowing her eyes at what’s going on behind me.
“Shut up and keep moving,” the guard states as he presses Jagger into the wall.
“Don’t tell me what to do,” she whispers, and I look around her to see if she is speaking to me or someone else, but it's only me and her.
“Excuse me, can you please get out of my way?” she asks me, but I shake my head.
“Can’t do that!” I grit as my fingers begin to twitch because I want to touch her so fucking badly.
“But why?” she asks as a guttural roar comes raging out of Jagger’s mouth.
I grab her as the orderly goes flying across the hall, slamming into the other wall.
His head cracks and the smell of fresh blood permeates the air.
Keeping her behind me, a choked sound comes from another orderly, then the splatter of blood.
In a normal setting, I might’ve even helped Jagger, but he creates his own messes and this one is all him.
I’m not getting put in a padded room because of his actions.
I spin around, not wanting to see the destruction because it will make me want to fix these men, but they don’t deserve it.
I’ll let them bleed out. I have someone more important to tend to.
I lift her by the hips as she thrashes in my hold and carry her down the hall as far away as I can get her while everyone is distracted by Jagger and his anger.
I wonder what made him snap like this? It couldn’t just be her giggling or the guards running their mouths. I bet it was the voices.
“You can put me down now.” She giggles, and I shiver.
“I’m not ready to let you go,” I admit, and her blue eyes look down at me, penetrating my soul.
“They won’t give you a choice. No touching. At least not until the lights go out.” She giggles again, and my eyes widen.
“What do you mean when the lights go out?” I ask, and her smile widens. I get to see a faint glimpse of the scars on her cheek that she tries so hard to hide.
“You’ll see,” she answers, and I set her down on her feet. She spins and rubs her perfect ass against my hard cock. “Oh, someone is happy to see me.”
“I’m sorry. I can’t help the effects you have on me,” I answer truthfully. There’s no sense in lying.
“Jethro doesn’t like you touching me very much. You’re making him very mad.” She giggles. and I look around us and there’s no one here. So I lean in and press my body into her which only makes her push into the wall.
“Do you like me touching you?” I ask, and she moans as I run my nose up the column of her neck.
“I do,” she says, then spins to face me. My hands land right above her head as her fingers outline the bulge in my pants. “Can I taste you?” she asks, then giggles. I lick my lips and take a deep breath.
“Only if I can see the real you,” I say, and her eyes widen.
“Hmm… I’ll think about it.” She giggles again, then dips under my arms and skips down the hallway. My eyes follow and watch as she dips into one of the rooms. Now I know where she is at night.
“Everyone to their rooms. Klebs, Davenport, follow me,” one of the nurses shouts. Lucifer comes to stand next to me as Jagger continues to scream and fight the guards trying to subdue him.
“You might want to sedate him. Inflicting pain by beating him is not going to do the trick,” I suggest, and the nurse nods, eyeing one of the guards.
“Come on, right this way you two,” she tells us and we follow past the clown's room, who I catch spinning and giggling by the window. She’s so weird, but yet, I need to know more. Lucifer’s laughter takes me out of my thoughts, and I narrow my eyes at him.
“You have white stuff on the tip of your nose and chin,” he tells me, and I grit my teeth. I don’t like being dirty. My skin crawls just knowing that bit of information.
“You just couldn’t help yourself. Same ol’ Lucifer,” I spit, and he laughs again.
“Yep,” is all he says as the nurse points him to his room and then mine directly across the hall.
I feel eyes on me and glance over my shoulder to see the mute kid eyeing me.
I stare at him longer than I should, but he doesn’t cower, he just simply looks away and walks into his room.
I wonder why he’s mute. All these people here fascinate me.
I never knew coming to an institute that I would find so many people who need repair.
Maybe that Master guy is right. Maybe I do belong here.
For the first time in a long time… I actually feel at ease and that’s saying a lot.
“Lunch is in two hours. Stay in your rooms until then,” she tells us, and I walk into my room. White walls, white sheets, white everything. Just the way I like it.