Chapter 26
Light
Bob leads me through a large metal roller shutter door and into a large warehouse, bare bar a large shipping container in the middle.
After Damon dropped me off at Requiem, telling me to get dressed into something warmer, Bob fetched me an hour later and brought me here.
Damon approaches us, dipping his head in acknowledgment to Bob, who leaves.
His chocolate brown eyes sweep my face, and concern is etched into every line surrounding his chocolate brown eyes.
I can feel how pale my face is—it’s been that way since we left Lola’s. Even Trixy and Roger noticed when we told them we were leaving early, asking if I was okay. My blood must be working overtime, trying to warm the rest of my body, but no matter how thick my coat is, a bone-deep chill lingers.
His hand palms my cheek, and the gentle stroke of his thumb across the flesh is comforting .
“Are you ready for this?” I love that he doesn’t ask me if I still want to do this. He knows better than that. I have to do this. I have to face the man who has played such a significant role in my life—a man I no longer wanted to have a leading or supporting role in my life.
I nod my head, and Damon takes my hand, his hand as icy as mine.
His eyes squint, and then he lets go of my hands, fishing in his pockets before pulling out a pair of gloves.
He takes one hand and then the other, slipping a glove on each.
They are too big for me, but they do the job of protecting my hands against the nip in this cold environment.
I feel overwhelmed with the way he loves me. I am his priority.
He takes my hand and leads me towards a black door on the right-hand side of this ample space.
Men stand guard at all the entrances, their faces emotionless.
They are burly. The typical type of guard one would expect from a man like Damon in his line of business.
The black door leads into a long passage, past several closed wooden doors.
This space was definitely not luxurious like Sin .
I’ve been trying to process all the information Damon gave me in a fairly short time.
The time limit we are being held hostage to does not leave any grace period.
My stomach turns as if sensing we are getting closer to the man responsible.
Lowrens Briar. The Reaper.
I’d tried to imagine how he looked from the few visuals I was afforded at Lady Chatman’s, but I knew nothing would match the reality. I dip my hand into my pocket, the gloves not allowing me to grasp the folded picture I know is there—the one he took from my father’s house.
Damon says that Lowrens’ obsession with me formed in prison and was fed by the copious amounts of time he was afforded in that environment—five years of time.
I can only imagine all the warped and insane thoughts he conjured up.
While I couldn’t understand obsession, I could see it with Damon sometimes.
But they showed it differently. Damon adored me obsessively, while it felt like Lowrens’ infatuation was objective.
I’m not a person to him. The fabricated person in his mind who wears my appearance and to whom he has done so many things in his imagination isn’t real. She is an object.
This is the only way I can justify it. But I still keep asking myself how this happened. First with Lowrens and then with Damon. What had attracted these men to me?
Damon says it is my light, that I am a beacon of shining innocence that calls to black souls like his. Like Lowrens. I don’t know what that means. I am just Sienna.
Damon halts before another black door, turning to face me while his hands lightly grasp my shoulders.
“Prepare yourself. He is naked and injured. But not dead. That will come later.”
I take a deep breath and then shake my head to clear my thoughts. I could do this. I could be strong and do this. I wanted to. I wanted this.
I nod, and then he turns and opens the door.
The first of my senses to be assaulted is my sense of smell. Urine and sweat. Potentially even faeces. I pull my nose up in disgust but follow Damon into the room.
I thought I was prepared, but what I see is nothing like I expected.
Lowrens is naked and chained to a wall, hanging from his hands.
His body is filled with cuts. Small one-inch gashes that are not too deep but deep enough to draw drops of blood.
I imagine it would be like having paper cuts all over your body.
“A cut for every tear he caused you to cry, rainbow. Starting with his hand. The place the first one touched as he held you in that bathroom, trying to steal your light.”
I nod, my eyes drifting from Damon's back to The Reaper, who is unconscious. I’m grateful for that. It gives me a moment to prepare myself.
Damon must have known that. In this strange moment, that comforts me. Damon comforts me with his presence and with his actions.
I approach Lowrens and bend down so that I can see his face.
As I thought, none of my imaginings would have accurately depicted the very plain-looking features I am faced with.
Clearly beaten, but besides the injuries inflicted, no scar, freckle, or mole would set him apart from so many other men.
Maybe I imagined him to look more sinister or to have some hideous deformity, something to allude to what was within.
Instead, the monster is concealed in human skin.
My eyes drift down to his penis, which is flaccid, limp, small. Even it has not been spared a couple of slices, blood running down the flesh to drip off the tip. It is tiny compared to Damon, even soft, yet it felt much bigger when…
I shake my head, attempting to push away the vivid images of The Reaping that flood my mind, as clear as if it happened just yesterday. Damon's hand on my shoulder grounds me, and I grasp it with my own, trying to steal some of his strength.
“I’m going to wake him up. His revenge is waiting, but it has a time limit.” I nod, not quite understanding, as he cracks a capsule under his nose.
Lowrens jerks awake so forcibly that he hits his head against the wall while I stumble back in fright.
“Sienna,” he rasps, his hazel eyes no longer as I remember them. Instead, his pupils are blown out, and the sclera is a mixture of red and yellow .
This monster now looks like a man as fear crosses his features.
“Please. Help me.” I cannot reconcile the person in the bathroom at Lady Chatman’s with this man. They are chalk and cheese. But they are the same. This is the man who took from me unwillingly. This is the man who gave me an experience I can never give back.
This is the man who killed my father.
“No. You don’t deserve anything from me.”
Lowrens shakes his head, the action making him flinch.
“You are not like this. You are not a killer. You won’t be able to live with yourself if you let me die.
” His assumption of me might have been accurate before, but I am not the same Sienna I was.
These men, the one hanging from the chains before me and the one on my right, have changed me.
I have changed. I am stronger than I was.
“You caused this. You bear the responsibility, not me.” Lowrens coughs, and I step back as he leans forward, spitting out some blood and a tooth onto the already blood-splattered floor.
“She is not a killer. But I am,” Damon says, his tone dangerous and holding a warning.
“So are you.” I want an admission from him.
I want him to tell me he killed my father.
Perhaps as justification for what is happening here, as if The Reaping isn’t enough.
Lowrens isn’t entirely wrong. This is disturbing for me, and I do wonder at the repercussions.
How will I feel once everything is done and dusted?
When he says nothing and just looks at me, I prompt again.
“You killed my father.”
Lowrens’ gaze drifts over to Damon, and what he sees there must be what prompts him to respond.
“Yes. I killed your father.”
Pain.
It rips through me, and Damon must sense it. Before Lowrens can say another word, Damon slaps a piece of silver duct tape over his mouth.
Then he puts his arms around me, turning me so I can no longer see the monster.
There is no remorse on his face or tone as he crushes me with five little words. A sledgehammer made up of vowels and consonants. I know words have a beautiful power, like when Damon speaks to me. But that power isn’t always kind. Lowrens shows me just how destructive it can be.
I have got what I need. Damon will carry the burden of the rest.
He leads me out of the room, the fresh air and change in scent welcome. It also tips my upset stomach over the edge as I throw up on the cold concrete floor.
Damon rubs my back, holding the hair from my ponytail back as he waits for me to compose myself. When I right myself, Gavin approaches a bottle of water in one hand and a file in the other.
“Here, drink this,” he says, handing me the bottle while he hands Damon the file.
I thank him and take a sip while Damon flips through the documents in the folder, his body tensing at what he sees.
I don’t even ask. I just wait until he is finished before he closes the file and then guides us out of the passage and back into the large space with the shipping container.
Gavin walks beside Damon, their hushed conversation making my stomach turn again. There was more. I could feel it.
Instead of heading toward the exit, we walk toward the container and the open doors on our opposite side.
We stop just before the gaping entrance.
“When we went to Lowrens' house, we found a room. One designed just for you. It has been replicated here for another purpose. For revenge. One that you can choose to witness. ”
I nod, not sure how to answer this without knowing what is in there.
I have no expectation, but when we round the corner, what this is is nothing I could have conjured up in my imagination.