Page 110 of Cruel Knots

“Oh, my—” I cry out, jumping to sit up the moment my gaze falls on a dark silhouette of a man seated on a nearby couch.

Damien stirs. “What’s wrong?” he asks in a rough voice.

“There’s...there’s someone watching us,” I blurt, pointing toward the man in the shadows who doesn’t move an inch. For a moment, I wonder whether my sleepy mind is imagining things.

Damien flips on several switches, bathing the room in bright light.

A gasp escapes me the moment I stare at the man before me. He’s completely drenched from head to foot in...blood.

“What the hell are you doing here?” Damien growls.

“I was bored,” Leon says with a shrug.

I stare between them. Neither of them acknowledges Leon’s gruesome appearance.

“Are you hurt?” I ask, trying to understand why Damien isn’t reacting to his brother who’s soaked in blood.

“Relax,” Damien says in a deep, cool tone. “It’s not his blood.”

“Then, whose...?” My question dies on my lips. The memory of those three men in the dungeons, hanging from chains and bleeding out, rises in my mind. Looking toward Leon, I ask, “Are they dead?”

“Yeah,” he replies casually. “Their slow deaths better get the message to the bastards planning to turn against us in the future.”

“You need to take a shower,” Damien says, running his fingers through his dark locks. “That couch is probably ruined.”

The cream-hued leather couch has smears of crimson all over it.

“I didn’t know it was so lightly colored,” Leon mutters. “It was kinda dark in here.”

“Again,” Damien says with an exaggerated sigh. “Why the fuck are you here?”

“I was bored,” he retorts. “I like watching her sleep.”

“Have you ever watched me sleep before?” I ask curiously.

Leon winks. “I’ve lost count by now, Princess.”

“But how...?”

“You’re still questioning my abilities?”

“How could you watch me when I was shut at home most of the time? You had to be there to watch me. There’s way too much security at our home for you to go unnoticed.”

“I watched your brother punish the eunuchs who used to guard you. Why should it be difficult for me to spy on you?”

My lips part from shock. There’s no way he could’ve known that about my brother’s guards.

“How did you—”

“I watched him beat the shit out of those poor bastards,” Leon says in a grim tone. “Seriously...how much did he pay them to part with their balls?”

I shake my head. “I don’t know how he found them or where he recruited them from. Callum just wouldn’t allow me to be alone with another male,” I say in a bitter tone. “Maybe they were already that way when they got hired or maybe he was sick enough to force them into castrating themselves.”

“Your brother is sick,” Damien growls from beside me.

“Is yours any better?” I ask, gesturing at Leon.

Lightning flashes in Damien’s icy-blue eyes. He’s suddenly pouncing on me, his fingers curling painfully around my wrists as he throws me onto the bed and climbs on top of me.

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