CHAPTER NINETEEN
MASON
The club comes alive around me as I enter the midnight decadence.
I move straight to the bar, squeezing through the sea of bodies on the dance floor.
High barstools line the black marble counter under the glow of the blue lights.
Bottles line the shelves like trophies, reflecting the light.
I sit on the stool opposite the average-height young woman in her work uniform.
“What would you like to have?” She quizzes.
“A tequila would do.” I smile at her just as Saint’s cologne hits me. Of course, he followed me.
“Put it on my tab.” He tells the young woman.
“Don’t worry, I can pay for my own drinks,” I tell her with a forced smile, not even acknowledging the man sitting beside me. She pauses and looks at us.
“Just put it on my tab and get me a scotch.”
“Alright, sir.” She nods at Saint and pours us two shots. One tequila. One scotch.
Saint extends his hand to the shot glass and lifts it to his lips, downing it in one go. He slides the shot glass. “More.”
“You know you could have just gone home.”
“And leave you here all by yourself.” He cocks his head toward me. The look in his eyes makes me uncomfortable. All I can think about is that journal and the horrible things he’d written in it. I break eye contact and throw my drink down my throat.
The bartender refills his drink, and he downs the second round. I scoff and turn around, looking at the dance floor.
“Here’s your refill.” The woman says.
“Thank you.”
My phone buzzes with a message. I open my phone and click on the image sent to me, waiting for it to load.
When it does, what I see is a single bullet and a gun. The bullet has my name etched on it. A cold shiver runs through me. My hand trembles, and I almost drop my phone. I turn off my screen and grab my shot, downing it in one go before I get on my feet.
I know what this means.
And I have what can save me from it. Hopefully, that map has something that could end it all.
That could set me free. And I already have saved it in my phone, yet I can’t bring myself to send it to Vincent.
If I do this and get my freedom, what’s to say that Saint doesn’t come after me when it’s all over?
What’s to say that I don’t become Vincent’s personal pawn in his twisted games of power play?
I put my phone in my pocket and slide into the thrumming heat of the dance floor, getting swept off my feet with the music. I lift my hands, looking at the flashing strobe lights above my head. When I look at the bar, Saint faces me, shot in hand, eyes on me.
My shoulders shudder with an emotion I can’t name.
Why does he do this? Why does he do this to me? Why do I let him?
I break eye contact and turn around, bumping chest-to-chest with a stranger. He smirks, eyes raking over me. His hand circles my waist, and he pulls me closer. He leans into my ear and whispers. “You alone?”
“Yeah.” I look into his eyes with a smile.
“Do you want to join me outside for some fun?”
I swallow hard, and a faint thrum of unease runs along my neck.
“No rush, of course.” He retreats two steps and dances back to me.
“Move.” A deep, cold voice reverberates behind us, and my head snaps back. Saint towers behind me, eyes glinting with pure rage. How the fuck did he move from the bar to the dance floor so quickly? He glares at the guy standing close to me, fists clenching as his jaw works.
“You don’t have to listen to him.” I tell the guy with a nervous chuckle.
That’s when he snatches me away from him, knocking a sharp, unexpected breath out of my lungs.
His rough hand snakes around my arm as he forces me to stand by his side.
Saint’s eyes darken at the other man. The unknown guy takes the hint and disappears into the crowd.
“What the fuck is wrong with you, Saint?”
He doesn’t look at me.
“This is what you do all the time.” I shake my head and turn away from him. He’s not about to ruin my night. I look through the crowd and find the guy heading out through the back exit.
“Where do you think you’re going?” He demands.
“Far away from you.” I snap. I expect him to stop me from walking away, but he lets me.
I weave my way through the crowd, leaving through the door and appearing in the dark alley.
Looking to my right, the same man from the club leans against the wall with a lit cigar in hand.
Smoke billows from his lips as I walk toward him, in slow strides.
“You’re here again.” He takes a drag from the cigar and puffs out smoke. The gesture reminds me of Vincent, and an intense discomfort knots in my stomach.
“Yeah. Start by telling me your name?”
“Come here.”
“Your name first.” I smile, chuckling awkwardly.
He leans off the wall, throws the cigar down on the ashen floor, and stomps it with his boot. He walks closer, erasing the gap between us. His hand rests around my waist, and he pulls me in. “You’re coming home with me tonight?”
“That’s how you ask.” I scoff and roll my eyes.
He exchanges our position and backs me against the wall.
My eyes snap to the green dumpster opposite us.
I swallow hard, mouth slightly agape, as he redirects my gaze to him.
My chest heaves for air, and I clench my throat as I try to focus on what’s happening in the moment.
But my mind is all over the place, and my skin burns with a mix of anxiety and discomfort.
“Stop… stop. Stop.” The words stumble out of my mouth, but he holds me against the wall. “Stop. I don’t want to do this anymore.” I try to shove him off me, but he holds me still, eyes going a shade darker. My shoulders tighten, and I blink rapidly at him.
That’s when a large hand grips the other man and shoves him against the wall beside me.
It’s Saint. Of course, it’s him.
“When someone tells you to stop,” his veins strain against his arm; he pulls out a pocketknife and flicks it open. I step aside, watching as he shoves the man’s head into the concrete twice. The collision sends a shiver through me. Saint slips his hand into the man’s mouth and holds his tongue.
Saint cuts off his tongue so precisely, blood leaking over the silver steel of the blade. A tortured, muffled scream rips through the man’s throat. He tosses his tongue aside and shoves the man to the ground.
The man coughs, blood splattering all over the dark concrete floor as he crawls on his knees. “Run along, rat!” He spits on the man. He pulls out a white handkerchief, cleaning the knife carefully.
My heart pounds against my ears, skin crawling with a plethora of emotions. “What… what did you do?” My voice quivers.
“I saved you.”
“I don’t need your saving,” I yell through the quick breath straining through my lungs. “You know, if you hadn’t done whatever it is you did on the dance floor. None of this would have happened.”
“Oh, it would have.” He puts the knife into his pocket and strides toward the back entrance. Anger burns hot in my veins, and I stomp toward him, cutting him off before he gets into the club.
“I am still speaking to you!”
“Do you do this with everyone who helps you out?” He looks at me, expression conveying nothing. I hate when he does that.
“Help me out? How the fuck have you helped me, Saint? What is wrong with you? You won’t let me close to you. You won’t even let someone close to me.” This is supposed to be a job. Not something real. It’s not real, but everything about him makes my blood boil.
He doesn’t answer me.
Instead, he looks at me, jaw hardening, brown eyes darkening with skepticism. “Because he’s bad for you. They all are.”
“And you are good for me?” I point to his chest. Before I can speak, he grabs me and shoves me against the wall beside the entrance.
“Don’t ever put your hands on me.” He growls. My eyes drop to the bloodstain on his collar, and all the memories flood in.
The docks.
The suite.
Here.
The memories burn hot and unyielding, twisting with the heaviness in my stomach. My chest heaves, something vile coming to life inside of me. Something I have always avoided my whole life.
“I hate you.” The words taste like venom on my tongue.
“Well, the feeling’s fucking mutual.” He retorts, nose flaring.
“I hate you.” I shove him again.
He doesn’t utter a word for some seconds. I expect him to. But his eyes are on me even though his lips are closed tightly. “You love my violence. I see it in your eyes. I see it now.”
I lean away from the wall and step aside while he turns around and faces me. “No, no. This is not about me. This is about you.” I yell at him, chest tightening with restraint and frustration. “This is about the things you feel.”
“I don’t feel anything.” He advances toward me, and I stagger back.
“You’re a liar.”
“I don’t feel anything for you.” He says so calmly that it sends an ice-cold feeling down my spine. “I’ve done this for you twice.” He grits.
“Twice? I’ve never asked you to protect me.” I shake my head, gaze bouncing around the wall.
“I killed Kurt for you. Buried him alive without hesitation because he dared to put his hands on you. I cut off that man’s tongue for you because he couldn’t listen to one simple fucking word.
” He steps closer and closer, and we walk in circles until he traps me against the wall.
6’4 height towering over me. Strong arms caging me against the walls.
“I try to be good,” I whisper to myself.
Because Vincent asked me to. Because I don’t have any other choice.
“I have tried to be there for you so many times, and yet, you find a way to push me away.” Maybe because I want to.
He wasn’t supposed to let me go at the docks.
Some form of punishment would have been enough to keep us apart.
But he turned a fucking blind eye and let me walk away.
He steps back. “Because I’m not supposed to need anyone.
Not even you!” He reveals, voice vibrating as he roars at me.
The words break out of him with heightened intensity.
“And I hate that I need you. I hate that ever since you stepped into that fucking suite, I could never get you out of my mind. I hate that you’re everywhere,” his voice strains, teeth biting on his bottom lip.
At every declaration of his scalding hatred, he slams his fist into the wall, eyes holding mine.
“I hate what you do to me. Because no man has ever done that to me. And I have never felt this way with any man. And I hate myself for it. I hate that I’m weak.
I hate that I’m sick.” He grabs my shoulder and shakes me, voice trembling.
My breathing tightens when I realize what he means by sickness.
His journal. All those horrible things.
“Is that enough for you?” He says breathlessly.
“If you hate me so much, why don’t you fire me?” I wait for an answer. But all I hear is the sound of his heart slamming against his ribcage. The aggressive breathing that matches mine.
My hand slides into his pocket, and I pull his knife and lift it to his throat. “Get your hands off me!” He lifts his hand and backs away, and we exchange position. I hold him captive with the knife tight in my trembling hands.
He smirks.
He doesn’t fight me.
He stares at me. Eyes filled with luminous intensity.
Fear. Hate. Anger.
All of it.
And I don’t look away because I can’t.
For some reason, his eyes hold me captive. They’ve put me in chains, and I won’t fight it anyway.
“We are alike, little devil.” He grins at me.
Little devil?
He must see something. He must see the evil inside me. An evil I have hated for the past fifteen years. The monster I have kept locked inside me.
He’s seen it so easily.
“I am nothing like you.” I growl at him, hand tightening around the blade. I place it on his neck. The thrum of his carotid artery rattles over the silver steel, flowing into my veins. A sharp breath escapes me. “I don’t feel anything for you.”
“I know you hate me. You have to hate me. Hating me makes it all easier.”
The knife clatters on the floor as I drop it and walk away, leaving him in the shadows of the alley.
The bass from the stage thuds against the wall as I storm into the club.
Without hesitation, I make my way to the bar, pushing through the teeming crowd.
“Another shot.” I tell the bartender as I sit on the high stool.
She fills my glass and passes it to me. I drink it all and ask for more.
Then I unlock my phone and stare at Vincent’s message one more time.
Saint’s not safe for me.
I hate what he brings out in me. What he makes me see. I hate it all. And if taking a chance with Vincent will save me from all of this darkness. From the bullet made specially for me. From Saint’s unnamed emotions, then so fucking be it.
I want out.
I want it to end.
I select the photos and send them to him.