Page 12 of Sick Bargain

“Okay,” I gasp. “I’ll tell you.”

I choke and scream together when he buries my face in the crotch of his pants. He holds me there, and I’m completelyhelpless to move. Suffocating against his erection, my regrets become clear.

“Speak.” He frees me.

I cough. “Having no fucking idea who I am. Following the path of my family. Never being good enough.”

“So boring. Most people have those regrets.” His zipper is loud, intensifying my panic.

My hand braces on the dead girl’s thigh when he parts my lips a second time. This time, the hard flesh of his cock is forced inside, ramming into the roof of my mouth. I cough again, trying to scream. But he doesn’t contain the remorse required to let up. A sadist, I remember. Not that it matters anymore.

“Give me something real.” He fucks my face, making me drip drool and tears all over the corpse.

My throat burns and my eyes bulge. I sputter and gag, almost vomiting as the tendons in my neck strain, when he finally pulls out. My lungs rattle almost as loudly as Ophelia’s when I force them to inhale. The assault of oxygen brings a moment of clarity. As if he’s summoned my biggest regret by choking the lies from my vocal cords, I shout, “Not stopping my brother from killing himself! My own death by suicide because it should have been me!”

“There we go,” he purrs darkly. “Weren’t such a hero then either, eh, Remiel?”

I get no chance to answer, even though I don’t have one. His dick jams between my lips, and even the brutal scrape of my teeth doesn’t deter him. He fucks my throat with no remorse, no gentleness, and no enthusiasm. A motion. A domination. A fear tactic. It hurts, but the terror is worse.

“You bought your life,” he says to me, but I barely hear it over my blood rushing in my ears and my sobs around his dick. “You will swallow. If a single drop of cum lands on her body, I’ll do worse than kill you.”

All I can think about is getting through it, surviving it.

My eyes squeeze shut and my fingers dig into Ophelia’s thigh. This nameless monster takes no mercy on my inexperience, instead feeding on my fear. His hips don’t change tempo, his breath barely quickens, and the only sign I get that he’s about to come is the increased firming of his cock in my mouth.

My gag at the first spurt almost ends my life. His release coats my lips as I cough, and some part of me must want to live because my hands come to my face, ensuring that it all stays in my mouth. He doesn’t moan or groan, fucking me through his orgasm, and when he finally slows, I swallow what I can without choking it back up. My raw throat stings, but I force my lips shut around him, sucking him clean all on my own because I’m afraid of what is worse than death. I’m afraid to let a single drop spill.

I’m realizing that the verbiage of our bargain isn’t clear. Until he frees me could mean anything. Freedom could be death, and I stipulated nothing within my deal to protect myself. I’ve never felt like more of a failure.

When he pulls out, I use my fingers to slide the dripping cum up my chin and against my tongue, swallowing it down with another gag. I’m panting, falling forward, trying not to land on the dead girl.

“Your life is in my hands now, Remiel. You aren’t the hero.”

Something slams into the back of my head, and the last thing I see is Ophelia’s dead-eyed stare as I fall.

6

TRIGGER WORDS

KRYPT

I watchedhim wake up from the nap I forced on him. After calling Ransom, Seven, Menace, and Riot to help me clean up the crime scene, I left Remiel there to wake up in her grave. He cried a lot. Looked under his nails, wiped at his mouth, threw up in the foliage and then tried to bury it. He looked confused when he couldn’t find any trace of her body, but he must have had some sense to survive because he left the forest and walked all the way to his shop. It still isn’t open. His friend Cain went in a few hours ago, but I haven’t seen either of them since.

Now we’re back at Vile House, and I’m about to get ripped apart ten ways to Sunday for what I did. We might be a ruthless society with a violent history, but we don’t kill at random. After I came down Remiel’s throat, I was so jarred by it that I knocked him out because I couldn’t stand for him to look at me while I felt so confused. Slumped over the girl’s body, he looked calm, almost comfortable in her grave. It pissed me off because I was so rattled by my reaction to him, and he had the fucking nerve to sleep so soundly after.

Director storms into the room, glaring at me. “The fuck were you thinking, Krypt?” he snarls. “Line up!”

We’re the farthest thing from an army, but we run on rank. Not because it matters, but because competition is the best way to get us to participate the way he wants us to. I stand in the middle of the lineup, between Menace and Riot, waiting for the shit-talking that will accomplish nothing but make me itch and waste my time.

“Someone wanna tell me why there’s a dead blond in my morgue?” he asks, staring at me. None of us say anything. “And does anyone else want to comment on the van full of religious fanatics that blew up on the highway? Huh? How’d that happen?”

“Sometimes shit goes our way,” Kyd mumbles, drawing a grin from the rest of us.

“They weren’t the fucking job!” Director shouts. “Neither was the girl! We have enough shit to handle with this billionaire asshole and initiation coming up next weekend, and now you fucks wanna throw this at me?”

“Sorry, Daddy,” Monster says.

“End of the line!” Director snaps at Monster.

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