Page 126 of Wreck Me

And there were only three things inside.

A container of wintergreen Tic Tac mints and two flasks.

I snatched one of the silver flasks up, both engraved with JK, formerly belonging to Jameson King.

I screwed off the top and brought it to my nose, scenting the bourbon inside. Not my go-to for liquor back in the day. It had been top-shelf vodka all the way for me. But it would do the job I desperately needed it to do.

My hand was trembling as I brought it to my lips.

Fuck this.

I tipped it back.

I grimaced as the taste hit my tongue, like some foul-tasting medicine.

Unfortunately, that was pretty much what it was functioning as right now.

I pushed aside that thought and all the rest, the voice screaming just beneath the surface for me to spit it out, to purge it from my system before it fully hit.

I drank it down, gulp after gulp.

I’d only meant to take a little, especially so it wouldn’t be noticeable that the flask was emptier than it should be, but the promise of that numbness, of taking all the shit away, in a way that I could no longer accomplish, ever since I’d opened myself up, consumed me. To accomplish that again, I’d have to shut down and that meant shutting her out, shutting out all the good I’d started to feel, how I had started to live again instead of just existing.

No. I wouldn’t do it. I couldn’t go back to that now.

I just needed a brief reprieve and I could get a handle on all these feelings, all this intensity and the bad that was now coming along with the good.

I gulped it down, forcing it down despite it burning my throat like a bitch.

Before I knew it, I’d consumed it all, right down to the last drop.

I fixed the lid back into place, then put the flask back in the exact position that I’d found it in. I snatched up the Tic Tac container, then shoved three into my mouth to hide the smell, and chomped down on them quickly.

Then I closed the drawer and snuck back out of the office.

I walked a good way down the corridor so it didn’t look like I was lingering there.

Thankfully, security was currently disbursed dealing with some business issue Caspian had been intentionally vague about, and Luke was sorting the fallout of tonight. Normally, there’d be no way for me to sneak around King Manor, let alone get anywhere close to that office, not unless Cas had called me in there for a meeting of minds or something.

Once I found a good spot out of the way, I sank against the wall and waited for the alcohol to hit.

To calm me down at long last.

To soothe me.

19

~Caspian~

I was losing them.

Encouraging Caleb and Bastian to move out had been intended to give them a chance at a more normal life, a peaceful life that wasn’t marred by the complications that my role as King of the City brought along with it. I’d wanted to give them their best chance and allow them to get out from underneath my shadow.

Especially for Caleb. He’d put his own life and aspirations on hold when I’d lost my parents to assist me with that tumultuous time when my whole world had come crashing down and I’d had to take the helm of King years before had been intended. I’d needed somebody whose loyalty wasn’t in question, somebody who, unlike all the others who’d surrounded me at the time who’d just wanted a piece of me and the empire, I could count on to have only my best interests at heart. But he’d stayed far beyond what had been necessary. And as he’d become involved in the more illegitimate aspects of the business, he’d begun to not just excel at it, but to need it… too much. It had fed that darkness in him.

I hadn’t wanted that for him.

It was bad enough that I was it.

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