Chapter 38
ANASTASIA
It’s the first day back since the incident with Jason.
I spent the entire weekend with Eryx. It was nice but its fucking with my head.
It has me thinking I could have a happily ever after.
Like someone might actually care for me.
Like I could be open to loving someone again.
After everything I’ve been through the thought of that terrifies me.
I’m walking through the courtyard when I see him. I almost don’t recognize him at first.
Jason.
He’s limping through the door that leads from the library, there’s a thick white bandage on his cheek and he has a full leg cast, fingers stiff and bruised holding on to crutches.
There's a cut on his brow, stitches tugging at his skin. His bottom lip’s split clean through the middle.
He’s breathing through his mouth, shallow and pained.
What the fuck happened to him?
Then it hits me, what Caine mentioned back at the shop. I told Eryx what happened when he found me. I didn’t think he would go this far. I mean why would he? I’m nobody to him. Right?
Jason make his way over to me. Even through all of that swelling, through the wince he tries to hide, he still smiles.
But it’s different now. Tight. Strained.
No teeth. Like he's plotting something. Did Eryx just put me in more danger by trying to defend me?
Men, I swear to... they think they are helping, defending your honor.
But they just make things worse. Now I have a target on my back.
A bigger one than I did before. On top of this I'm still getting anonymous texts.
I can’t move. My fingers curl around the strap of my bag, nails digging into the canvas.
“What?” he rasps, voice gritty. “Not gonna ask me what happened?” He already knows I know.
"I think the way you look says enough, don't you?
What's the matter, you find out just how hard someone bites?
" I mock back, referencing our last conversation.
He shifts, trying to adjust in his crutches.
The pain makes him grunt, low and raw. And that oddly brings a small bit of satisfaction to me.
“I guess your knight in shining armor plays dirty,” he mutters.
I tilt my head slightly. “You locked me in a closet. And you thought there wouldn’t be any repercussions? You must not have many braincells left.”
His eyes flicker. Just for a second. Then his lips twist into something uglier than a smile. “Didn’t think you were that fragile.”
“I’m not.” We stare at each other. The air between us is sharp, electric.
I should walk away. I want to. But something in me won’t let it go.
I turn and face him, leaning in just enough to lower my voice.
“I told him what you did,” I say quietly.
“I told him everything. And if you ever touch me again, if you so much as breathe in my direction wrong, I’ll make sure that he won’t leave you with just a broken leg next time.
Next time, I might be the one to do it. After all, I'm crazy remember, unstable. "
Jason doesn’t reply. His expression flickers again. I can see the fear in his eyes. Good. Let him feel an ounce of the fear I felt being left in that fucking closet.
I turn to leave, but his voice drags me back one more time.
“He’s not doing it for you, you know,” Jason croaks. “Guys like him? They don’t protect. They possess.”
I pause then I look back at him. Really look. “You don’t know a damn thing about him,” I say. He doesn't speak again. Just looks away, jaw clenched. I get up and walk away. Leaving him back there to seethe and fester.
The campus is mostly quiet now. Most students are inside, cramming for midterms or pretending too.
I’m back in my room now, my window is open, and with the evening breeze coming through, the air smells like moss and smoke.
Someone’s probably lit up just beyond the tree line. I don’t care. I need the fresh air.
I’m laying on the bed when I hear movement outside, and then sound of boots on my desk. Eryx.
He doesn’t say anything at first, just stands at the edge of the bed looking at me, hands tucked into the pockets of his hoodie, his face unreadable. The kind of unreadable that’s too careful. I let the silence stretch. See if he’ll break it first, he doesn’t. Of course not. So I do.
“I don’t know if I should thank you, or be angry.” I pause and wait for him to be fully in my room. “For what you did to Jason.”
His brows lift, just a little. “Do what?”
I glance at him, even though he already knows the answer. “Get him back like that.”
Eryx shifts his weight. “He put his hands on you. On what doesn’t belong to him. Had to show him what happens when he does.”
“That doesn’t mean I needed you to play hitman.”
He tilts his head. “You think that was me playing?” A coy smile on his face. "If I was playing hitman, he wouldn't be breathing."
I look away, throat tight. “I’m not saying he didn’t deserve it, I just don't want it to get worse.”
“He made it worse. I just finished it.”
He steps closer taking a seat next me now. Close enough that I can smell the faint trace of cloves. His scent is warm, like a woodsy blanket wrapping you in a hug. The trace of a cigarette clings to his hoodie. That scent that shouldn't comfort me but somehow always does.
I sit up on the bed now.
His voice lowers, almost a whisper now. “Are you okay? Seeing him again after what happened?”
That question again. The one I hate. The one I’m still not sure how to answer. It makes me feel weak.
“I don’t know,” I say honestly. “I feel… stupid. Weak. Like he won or something, just by getting to me.”
“You’re not weak,” he says. “You kept your shit together longer than most people would have.”
I shake my head. “I screamed. I panicked. I begged. You didn’t see that part.”
He places his hand on my cheek, “I see you now. You’re so much stronger than you know.”
I’m quiet for a moment. My voice is soft when I speak again. “It’s not just Jason. It’s what it reminded me of. Sergio used to—” I stop. Swallow it down.
He waits, giving me the space to continue.
“Closets,” I say finally. “He used to lock me in, hours at a time. No lights, no sound, just me and the dark.”
“I wanted to tear that room apart,” he says after a beat. “When I found you in there… fuck.” His jaw ticks and I feel the shift in him. “When did that start?”
“The punishments started when I was little, but it got worse after I turned fifteen. Any argument I started, any disagreement, and lie he thought I told and that was it. When my mom was still alive it was simple things; writing lines or paragraphs about how I would be better, how I wouldn’t lie or be bad.
When I was 13, I got into some stupid argument about when my bedtime should be.
That night he made me stand up all night in the living room, not being allowed to lay down or sleep.
He said, ‘If you want to stay up, then fine stay up,’ Thoren had come home late that night and found me.
I had fallen asleep on the floor and when I heard him come into the room, he scared me so badly I shot straight up.
I found out later, he was watching me through the cameras all night to make sure I followed instructions.
It’s when I turned 15 that he started locking me inside a dark closet for hours on end.
At 18 I finally had enough. He had got into business with some bad people, owed them a lot of money.
Instead of paying them, cheap as he was, he made them a deal instead.
The Rivera family had a son who needed to get married.
He would offer me up to him, and his slate would be wiped clean. ”
I can hear Eryx grinding his teeth.
“That’s why I was leaving that day. The day of my accident. Thoren was helping me get out so I didn’t have to get married. In the end he had to pay them anyway, they didn’t want a runaway bride. I was going to be too much trouble for them.”
He’s holding me now and the silence between us settles again, heavier now but softer somehow. I lean back into his hold, let my head rest against his chest. “You didn’t have to go back for him.”
“I did.”
“Why?”
He grabs and tilts my chin up so that I’m looking at him. His eyes dark. “I told you before,” he says. “I don’t like people fucking with what’s mine.”
My breath catches. I should roll my eyes.
Say something bratty. Laugh it off. But I don’t.
Because part of me likes being his. And that part of me?
It’s louder tonight than the fear. I nod once, as we stare at each other.
My eyes silently begging him to kiss me.
To seal this moment and make it ours. And he must hear my pleas, because he closes the distance between us.
His hands thread through my hair, pulling me closer as if there was no such thing as "close enough." My own hands find his back, exploring the familiar line of his spine beneath his hoodie. The kiss is a collision of desire and relief, a hungry, desperate thing. It’s not gentle, he knows that’s not what I need in this moment.
Every touch, every shift of his body against mine, is an electric shock, a current that starts in my lips and runs straight through me.
I don’t just feel the kiss, I feel the longing. He kisses me like I’m his whole world.
He leans me back, and removes his hoodie and shirt in one go. “Let me take care of you,” he whispers to me and I nod.
He unbuttons my pants and removes them from my body. Throwing them on the floor where they fall in a pile next to his own clothes. My shirt is next, and then I’m laying there in my lace panties.
“Fuck,” he breathes as his eyes rake over my body, landing on my bare breast. This is the first time he’s seeing them since I got them pierced.
“They should be healed in about six months, so no touching yet.” I tell him.
“You’re so fucking beautiful you know that? You’re a god damn goddess.”
My cheeks flush, “You like them?” I ask him.
“I love them baby. You’re perfect. If they weren’t still healing, I’d have them in my mouth already, biting and sucking them, until you beg me to stop.”
And because I’m feeling cheeky, and needy. “Well, lucky for you, I know something else you can put your mouth on.” I tell him as I bit the inside of my lip. I let my knees fall to my side, inviting him in.
His eyes darken as he starts slow kisses up my leg and to my thigh. He bites me gently, enough to feel a sting and leave a mark.
“You don’t know what you do to me, Moya Vorona.”