The Reaper Prince

CHAPTER 21| The Feral Priority

I sent my parents back to Paris the moment we received Leah's location. Not because I don't appreciate their help—I do, in whatever limited capacity I'm capable of appreciation—but because what comes next needs to happen without witnesses.

What comes next is going to be messy.

Viktor is waiting on the garage with a black SUV and a tablet containing updated surveillance. I take it without speaking, my eyes scanning the information with mechanical precision.

Leah Harrison. Still registered at Ardencrest University but hasn't attended classes in four days.

No activity on her student account. No contact with administration.

Security footage shows her leaving campus on foot four days ago, but the trail goes cold after she boards a city bus that I watched with something I never understood.

Except it doesn't actually go cold. Because I know her. Know how she thinks. Know that someone as traumatized as Leah doesn't just disappear into a new city with forty-three dollars and broken hearing aids.

She stays close to what's familiar. Hides in plain sight. Finds the cheapest, most anonymous place she can and goes to ground like a wounded animal.

"Hotels within walking distance of campus," I say, my voice flat and controlled even though something feral is clawing at my chest. "Motels that take cash. Places that don't ask questions."

Viktor nods. "Already compiled. There are six locations that match the profile. Teams are positioned at each one, waiting for your order."

"No teams." The words come out sharper than I intend. "I go alone."

"Nikolai—"

"Alone, Viktor." I look at him with eyes that must be completely empty because he actually takes a step back.

"She ran from me. From my control. From everything I built around her.

If I show up with security and muscle and all the machinery of my power, she'll know I haven't changed.

That I'm still the monster who caged her. "

I pull out my phone, already calling up maps and routes.

"I find her myself. I approach her alone. And whatever happens next happens without an audience."

Viktor studies me for a long moment. Then nods once. "The motorcycle is in the vehicle bay. Keys in the ignition. Your personal phone is charged and encrypted. I'll maintain distance but stay available if you need extraction."

Extraction. Like Leah is a hostile situation instead of a small girl I consumed so thoroughly that her absence is killing me.

Maybe she is both.

I take the motorcycle—the matte black Kawasaki that's faster and more maneuverable than the SUV in city traffic. Strap my phone into the mount on the handlebars. Pull up the list of six motels and start working through them systematically.

The first three are wrong immediately. Too close to main roads. Too visible. Not the kind of place where someone trying to disappear would feel safe.

The fourth one makes my instincts scream.

It's a squat, ugly building on the edge of a neighborhood that's seen better days. Peeling paint. Cracked parking lot. The kind of place that rents by the hour and doesn't care what happens in the rooms as long as you pay cash.

Perfect for hiding. Perfect for someone who needs to be invisible.

I park the motorcycle two blocks away and approach on foot. The afternoon sun is too bright, the air too warm, everything too normal for the way my chest is crushing itself.

The motel office is small and smells like cigarette smoke and resignation. The clerk is maybe sixty, wearing a stained shirt and the expression of someone who stopped caring about anything years ago.

I pull out five hundred-dollar bills and set them on the counter. "Small girl. Dark hair. Probably checked in four days ago. Wearing old clothes. Paid cash."

The clerk's eyes go to the money. Then to my face. Something in my expression must convince him that lying would be a bad idea because he nods slowly.

"Room 7. End of the building. Hasn't left much. Quiet."

"Has anyone bothered her?"

"No. People mind their business here."

I take the money back except for one bill. Leave it on the counter. "Keep minding your business."

Room 7 is exactly where he said—end unit, curtains drawn, no sign of activity. I stand outside the door for a long moment, my hand raised to knock, my entire body vibrating with the need to see her, to confirm she's alive, to somehow make this crushing sensation in my chest ease even slightly.

But I don't knock.

Because this is the part where I'm supposed to be vulnerable. Honest. Stripped of every mask and performance. And I don't know how to do that through a closed door.

I need to see her. Need her to see me. Need the truth to happen face-to-face instead of through barriers.

So I turn away from the motel. Get back on the motorcycle. Start riding with no particular destination except away from the temptation to break down that door and drag her back to the penthouse by force.

Because that's what the monster wants. What every instinct is screaming at me to do.

But Papa's words echo in my mind: "You give her the choice instead of making it for her."

The choice requires her to see what her absence has done. Requires me to stand in front of her bleeding and broken and completely honest.

And I can't do that if I corner her in a motel room where she has nowhere to run.

I'm two blocks from campus when I see her.

Small figure in an oversized gray sweater. Dark hair pulled back. Walking with that careful, measured gait that says she's navigating the world on high alert.

My butterfly. Alive. Safe.

The relief that floods through me is almost physical. Almost enough to override the crushing weight for a moment.

Then I see where she's walking. Toward campus. Toward the courtyard entrance that's usually empty on Saturday afternoons but today has scattered groups of students.

Toward danger she doesn't recognize because she's so focused on just surviving that she's not calculating threats the way she should be.

I follow at a distance. Not hiding but not approaching. Just maintaining visual contact while she crosses into campus property.

She's halfway across the courtyard when I see him.

Legacy student. Tall. Broad-shouldered. The kind of entitled fuck who treats Ardencrest like his personal hunting ground. I recognize him vaguely—Carter Morrison's friend, probably. Someone who knows exactly who Leah is and what she represents.

The girl who belonged to the Reaper Prince.

Past tense. Because I let her go. Because everyone on campus knows by now that she left. That the untouchable protection she had is gone.

Which makes her fair game.

He steps into her path deliberately. I'm too far away to hear what he's saying, but I can read the body language. Aggressive. Entitled. The posture of someone who's used to getting what he wants through intimidation.

Leah tries to step around him. He blocks her again.

My hand moves to the throttle. I should intervene now. Should make my presence known. Should remind this stupid fuck what happens when you touch what's mine.

But I hesitate. Because maybe she can handle this. Maybe she doesn't need me. Maybe I'm about to watch her prove that she's strong enough to survive without my protection.

Then he grabs her shoulder.

And everything goes white.

Not metaphorically. My vision actually whites out for a second as something primal and violent surges through my system. Not the cold calculation I usually operate with. Something hotter. More feral.

Mine. He's touching mine.

I'm moving before conscious thought engages. The motorcycle screams across the courtyard, students scattering. I don't care about witnesses. Don't care about consequences. Don't care about anything except the fact that someone is putting hands on my butterfly and she's clearly in distress.

Then I see him reach for her head. See his hand near her ear.

See him rip something away.

See blood.

The world goes absolutely silent.

I hit him at full speed. Not with the motorcycle—I dump it a few feet away and let momentum carry me forward into a tackle that takes him completely off his feet.

We hit the ground hard. He's bigger than me, more muscular, probably played football or wrestled or something that makes him think he's dangerous.

He's not dangerous. He's prey.

I'm on top of him before he can react, my knee driving into his solar plexus hard enough to force all the air from his lungs. My hands find his right arm—the one that touched her, the one that made her bleed—and I wrench it backward with all my strength.

The snap is audible even without enhanced hearing. Compound fracture. Bone tearing through skin. Blood immediately welling up.

He screams. I don't hear it. Don't care.

My hands move to his knee. I position myself carefully, precisely, and drive my heel down with every ounce of force I possess.

Another snap. Louder. More devastating. His kneecap shatters completely, fragments of bone and cartilage turning the joint into something that will never function properly again.

He's screaming continuously now, his face twisted in agony. Students are running. Someone is probably calling security.

I don't care about any of it.

All I care about is the fact that his blood is on my hands and it's not enough. Not nearly enough to satisfy the feral thing inside me that's screaming for complete annihilation.

I want to kill him. Want to wrap my hands around his throat and squeeze until the light goes out of his eyes. Want to make him suffer for hours before I let him die. Want to turn his death into an art form that demonstrates exactly what happens when you touch what belongs to me.

But I can't.

Because Leah is on the ground a few feet away, curled into herself, her hand pressed against her bleeding ear, and the priority calculation my brain is running says she matters more than vengeance.

She's bleeding. Possibly injured beyond just the ear. Definitely in shock. And every second I spend destroying this piece of shit is a second she's suffering.

The choice is instant and absolute.

I leave him alive. Broken and screaming and bleeding, but alive. Because I can come back later. Can find him in whatever hospital they take him to. Can make his death slow and methodical and completely off the record.

But Leah needs me now.

I cross to where she's huddled on the concrete. She's shaking violently, her eyes squeezed shut, her breathing too fast and shallow. Her right ear is bleeding where the hearing aid was ripped out, taking skin and probably part of her earlobe with it.

Rage floods through me again. Not the cold kind. The hot, visceral kind that makes me want to go back and finish what I started.

But I don't. I drop to my knees beside her instead.

"Leah," I say, knowing she probably can't hear me with only one barely-functional hearing aid. "Leah, look at me."

She doesn't respond. Just keeps shaking, her hand pressed against her bleeding ear, lost in whatever trauma response this triggered.

I don't touch her. Not yet. Not when she's this triggered. Instead, I position myself in her line of sight and wait for her to open her eyes.

It takes maybe thirty seconds. Thirty seconds where sirens are starting in the distance, where the legacy fuck is still screaming, where students are filming on their phones like this is entertainment.

Then her eyes open.

Gray-blue and swimming with tears and absolutely devastated.

She sees me. Recognition floods her features, followed immediately by something that looks like betrayal and relief and fear all twisted together.

"Je suis là, papillon," I say softly, my lips forming the words clearly so she can read them. I am here, butterfly.

She makes a sound. Broken and desperate. Not quite words but not quite sobs either.

"I'm going to touch you now," I tell her, speaking slowly and clearly. "Just to pick you up. Just to get you somewhere safe. Nod if you understand."

She doesn't nod. Just stares at me with those devastated eyes.

I take that as consent because the alternative is leaving her on this concrete and that's not happening.

I scoop her up carefully, one arm under her knees, the other supporting her back. She's so light it's almost frightening. Four days of not eating properly. Four days of running on adrenaline and fear and whatever money she had left.

She's been starving herself the same way I've been starving.

Her head falls against my chest. Not because she wants to but because she doesn't have the strength to hold it up. Her hand is still pressed against her bleeding ear, blood seeping through her fingers.

The motorcycle is where I left it. I settle her carefully onto the seat, her back against my chest, and pull my belt free from my trousers.

Leather. Heavy. Expensive. Perfect for what I need.

I wrap it around both of us, threading it through itself and pulling tight enough that she's strapped flush against me. Her small body pressed against mine. Her bleeding ear against my shoulder. Her trembling secured by expensive leather that cost more than most people make in a month.

She makes another sound. This one might be protest. Might be resignation. Might be the last desperate attempt to maintain autonomy while being physically restrained.

I don't care which it is. I just pull the belt tighter and start the engine.

The ride to my private medical facility takes eleven minutes.

Eleven minutes of navigating traffic with one hand on the throttle and the other wrapped around Leah's midsection, holding her steady.

Eleven minutes of feeling her shake against me, her blood soaking into my shirt, her breathing hitching with silent sobs.

Eleven minutes of absolute certainty that I will go back and finish what I started the moment she's safe.

The medical facility is technically part of a larger hospital complex, but the wing I own operates independently.

Private entrance. Private staff. Private everything.

The kind of place where no one asks questions and patient confidentiality is guaranteed by contracts and money and the implicit understanding that violating my trust would be catastrophic.

I carry her inside still wrapped in my belt. The on-call physician—Dr. Sarah Chen, fifties, competent, has treated enough of my family's various injuries to know not to comment on circumstances—takes one look at us and immediately starts directing nurses to prepare a treatment room.

"Ear laceration," I say, my voice flat and controlled even though I can feel Leah's blood cooling against my skin. "Possibly deeper damage. She's been without proper food or sleep for four days. Check for dehydration and malnutrition. Name is Leah Harrison. 18, severe trauma history."

Dr. Chen nods once. "Room 3 is ready. I'll need to examine her. Sir, you'll have to—"

"No." The word comes out sharp. Absolute. "I stay with her."

"Sir, I need space to work—"

"You have space. I'll stand exactly where I'm standing now and I won't move. But I don't leave this room. Non-negotiable."

Dr. Chen looks at me. Looks at Leah strapped to my chest with a belt. Looks at the blood and the trauma and the absolute inflexibility in my expression.

"Understood," she says quietly. "Room 3. Now."

I carry Leah into the treatment room. White walls. Sterile equipment. The smell of antiseptic that would probably be comforting if I was capable of being comforted by anything except her presence.

I set her carefully on the examination table, then work the belt loose with fingers that are almost steady. Almost. There's a tremor at the edges that I can't quite control, like my nervous system is finally catching up to the fact that she was bleeding and hurt and I wasn't there to prevent it.

The belt comes free. Leah immediately curls inward, her knees drawing up to her chest, her hand still pressed against her ear.

Dr. Chen approaches slowly. "Miss Harrison, I'm Dr. Chen. I'm going to examine your ear now. This may be uncomfortable but I'll be as gentle as possible."

Leah doesn't respond. Doesn't look at the doctor. Doesn't acknowledge that anyone spoke.

Her eyes are fixed on the wall, empty and distant, lost in whatever place her trauma sends her when reality becomes too much.

Dr. Chen looks at me. "Does she—"

"She's deaf," I say. "Or mostly deaf. She wears hearing aids but one was destroyed. The other barely functions. You'll need to make sure she can see your lips when you speak."

Dr. Chen nods and positions herself in Leah's line of sight. Speaks slowly and clearly. "Miss Harrison, I need you to lower your hand so I can see the injury."

Nothing. Leah's hand stays pressed against her ear, her eyes stay fixed on the wall, her whole body radiating the kind of frozen terror that says she's not actually here right now.

"Leah," I say quietly, moving to where she can see me. "Let the doctor help. I'm right here. I'm not leaving. Let her help."

Her eyes flicker to my face. Something in them shifts. Not trust—I destroyed that. But maybe recognition. Maybe the conditioning that's still embedded in her nervous system despite four days of withdrawal.

Maybe she's just too exhausted to fight anymore.

Her hand lowers slowly. Trembling. Revealing the damage.

The outer edge of her ear is torn. Not completely severed but badly lacerated where the hearing aid was ripped free. Blood has matted her dark hair, soaked into her collar, dripped down her neck.

Dr. Chen makes a soft sound of sympathy. "Okay. This will need stitches. Possibly surgical adhesive for the deeper tissue. Miss Harrison, I'm going to clean the wound now. It will sting."

She starts working. Leah's whole body goes rigid, her eyes squeezing shut, her free hand gripping the edge of the examination table hard enough that her knuckles go white.

I watch every second. Catalog every flinch. Every tremor. Every silent indication of pain that she's too damaged to vocalize.

And I promise myself that the legacy fuck who did this will suffer in ways that make Carter Morrison's shattered arm look merciful.

The stitching takes twenty-three minutes. Precise. Careful. Dr. Chen is good at her job, and she's working on something that matters to me, which means she's being extra careful.

When she's done, Leah's ear is bandaged. The bleeding has stopped. The immediate danger is past.

But she still won't look at me. Still has her eyes fixed on the wall like I don't exist.

Dr. Chen runs the other tests. Checks for dehydration—mild. Malnutrition—not critical but concerning. Blood pressure—elevated from stress and trauma. Pulse—too fast.

Everything points to someone who's been running on empty for days. Someone who's been barely surviving.

Someone who needed protection and didn't have it because I let her go.

"She needs rest," Dr. Chen says quietly. "Fluids. Actual food. And honestly, sir, she needs psychiatric evaluation. The trauma response she's exhibiting is severe."

"I'll handle it," I say.

"Sir, I really think—"

"I said I'll handle it." My voice drops into that register that makes people stop arguing. "Bill everything to my account. Put her prescription under my name. And Dr. Chen? This conversation never happened. Patient confidentiality extends to forgetting she was ever here."

Dr. Chen looks like she wants to argue. Professional ethics probably dictating that she should report this, should make sure Leah has proper support, should do something other than hand a traumatized girl back to someone who's clearly part of the problem.

But money and self-preservation win out. They always do.

"Understood, sir. The prescription will be ready in fifteen minutes. She should avoid getting the stitches wet for at least forty-eight hours. Follow up in one week to check healing."

She leaves. And then it's just me and Leah in this sterile white room.

She's still curled on the examination table. Still won't look at me. Her remaining hearing aid is still crackling with static, providing fragmented sound that's probably more disorienting than helpful.

I pull a chair close to the table. Not touching her. Not crowding her. Just close enough that I'm in her peripheral vision if she chooses to acknowledge me.

"Leah," I say quietly. "Look at me."

Nothing. Her eyes stay fixed on the wall.

"Butterfly, please. Just look at me."

Still nothing. But her hand tightens on the edge of the table. A small tell that says she heard me even if she's choosing not to respond.

"I know you hate me," I continue, my voice low and controlled even though something in my chest is fracturing. "I know what I did was unforgivable. I know you have every right to refuse to even acknowledge my existence."

I lean forward slightly.

"But you're bleeding. You haven't eaten properly in days. You're experiencing withdrawal from conditioning I inflicted on you. And I—"

My voice actually breaks. Cracks right down the middle like something fundamental is splitting apart.

"I can't watch you suffer anymore, Leah. I can't. It's killing me. Not metaphorically. Actually killing me. Every second you're in pain is another second I'm dying inside."

Her eyes flicker. Just slightly. Like she's considering looking at me but hasn't decided yet.

"So here's what's going to happen," I say, and my voice is steady again even though my hands are shaking.

"I'm taking you back to the penthouse. You can hate me there.

You can refuse to speak to me there. You can spend every waking moment planning how to leave again.

But you're going to eat actual food, and sleep in an actual bed, and let your body heal. "

I stand up slowly.

"And tomorrow, I'm going back to campus. I'm going to find the boy who did this to you. And I'm going to make him regret every second he spent breathing the same air as you."

Finally—finally—her eyes move. Turn from the wall to my face.

The look in them is absolutely devastating. Betrayal and hatred and fear and something else. Something that might be the terrible, unwanted knowledge that she's relieved I'm here even though she shouldn't be.

Her hands move. Slow. Trembling. Signing with the kind of effort that says even this simple communication is exhausting.

I don't want to go back, she signs.

"I know," I say quietly.

I can't trust you, she signs.

"I know that too."

You broke me, she signs, and tears are streaming down her face now. You got inside my head and rewired my brain and made me need you and I hate you for it.

"I know, Butterfly. I know."

Her hands pause. Hover. Then sign one more thing:

But I'm so tired of fighting.

The confession breaks something in my chest. Not the crushing weight—that's permanent. Something else. Something that might be hope or might be the terrible recognition that she's giving up not because she wants to but because she doesn't have any fight left.

"Then don't fight," I tell her gently. "Not tonight. Tonight you just rest. Tomorrow you can hate me with your full strength. But tonight, you let me take you somewhere safe and you sleep."

She stares at me for a long moment. I can see the war happening behind her eyes. The part that knows going with me is giving up autonomy. The part that's too exhausted to care. The part that's been conditioned to feel safe with me even though her conscious mind knows that safety is manufactured.

Finally, she nods. Just once. Small and defeated and absolutely crushing to witness.

But it's consent. However reluctant, however broken, it's still a choice.

I help her down from the examination table carefully, supporting her weight when her legs shake. Collect the prescription from Dr. Chen—pain medication, antibiotics, something for sleep that Leah won't need because I'll make sure she's too exhausted to stay awake.

The motorcycle is still outside. I strap her to my chest again with the belt, feeling her small body pressed against mine, her weight a familiar and desperately needed presence.

The ride back to the penthouse is quiet. She doesn't fight. Doesn't struggle. Just rests her head against my shoulder and lets me carry her home.

Home. The penthouse that she ran from. The cage she tried so hard to escape. The place where I systematically destroyed her autonomy in the name of protection.

But it's also the place where she slept without nightmares. Where she felt safe enough to lower her guard. Where her conditioning tells her she belongs even if her conscious mind disagrees.

I carry her inside. The space is exactly as I left it four days ago when I went to find her. Dark. Empty. Waiting.

She tenses the moment we cross the threshold. I feel it through the belt, through the points where we're pressed together. The recognition. The memory. The terrible understanding of what returning here means.

"You can hate me," I remind her quietly as I carry her toward the bedroom. "You can refuse to forgive me. You can spend every moment planning your next escape. But tonight, you rest."

I set her on the bed—our bed, the one where she used to curl against my chest and call me home. She immediately pulls away, pressing herself against the headboard, putting maximum distance between us.

I don't push. Don't crowd her. Just remove the belt and step back.

"I'm going to get you food and water," I tell her. "You're going to eat and drink and take the pain medication. Then you're going to sleep. In the morning, we'll figure out everything else."

I head toward the kitchen, leaving her alone in the bedroom. Giving her space. Proving that I can give her autonomy even within the cage.

But as I'm preparing a simple meal—soup, bread, nothing that will upset her empty stomach—I hear movement from the bedroom.

Not the sound of her trying to leave. Just shifting. Adjusting. The soft rustle of expensive sheets.

I finish the food and carry it back on a tray. She's exactly where I left her—pressed against the headboard, as far from where I was standing as possible. But her eyes track my movement as I set the tray on the nightstand.

"Eat," I say simply. "Please."

She looks at the food. Then at me. Then back at the food.

Her hands move slowly: Why are you doing this?

"Because you're mine," I say, and the honesty is almost painful. "Because I consumed you so thoroughly that your suffering is physically destroying me. Because I'm a monster who doesn't know how to love but knows he can't survive without you."

I turn toward the door.

"Eat, Butterfly. Sleep. Heal. Tomorrow we'll fight about everything else. But tonight, just survive."

I leave her alone with the food and the silence and the terrible choice of whether to accept care from the monster who broke her.

And I go to my study. Pull up security footage from campus. Find the legacy fuck's name and address and every detail of his pathetic existence.

Tomorrow, I'll make him regret touching what's mine.

But tonight, I'm just going to sit here and listen to the sound of Leah moving around in the bedroom.

Eating. Drinking. Taking medication. Settling into bed.

Surviving.

And that will have to be enough. For now.