Page 75 of Beast: Part Two

“I’m serious, Beast. I painted this,” Alicia says with a chuckle.

We’re standing in the dining room looking at the image of the artwork on her phone that she painted.

I shake my head at the picture. “It looks like a severed foot,” I tell her.

She tosses her head back and laughs. “It’s actually the horizon.”

I turn and look at her before going back to the image on the phone. I turn her screen sideways, trying to find the horizon in her artwork.

“No. It’s a foot.”

She giggles before taking her phone from me and sliding it into her pocket.

“It’s safe to say I am not an artist,” she jokes. “But I love artwork. It was all around me when I was a kid. Did your parents have a lot of artwork in the house?”

I rub the back of my head. “No,” I say hoping she leaves it there.

She stares at me expectantly. She has a way of looking at you waiting for you to say more without her ever asking for it.

Sighing, I answer. “I wasn’t raised by my father and my mother didn’t believe in art. She had a few pictures of Jesus on her walls but that was it.”

Alicia nods. “My grandmother was a religious nut. She could recite the bible front and back. It made it hard for me to talk to her. She believed that God and the Devil were behind everything. Was your mom the same?”

Mother was absolutely like that. She believed everything was either of God or the Devil. Unfortunately for me, everything I did seemed to stem from the devil. My entire existence was evil. The things that I couldn’t control like hunger, fear, sadness, anger, she believed were some kind of spirit in me.

“Yes,” I simply say in response to Alicia’s question.

“Would she—” before she can say anything else, Summer walks into the dining room.

She stops at the door. Since the day after the date night fiasco seven days ago, she has refused to speak to me. It doesn’t stop my breath from stalling the moment I see her. It doesn’t make me crave her any less. That night with her has replayed through my mind so much I can describe in detail every moan, every face, and every sound her pussy made as I drove into her.

I crave her more now than I did those five years we were apart. But every time I think I can have her back, the demon in my head reminds me why I should stay away.

“Cut out her heart and watch it slowly stop beating,”the demon growls. I shake him out of my head.

Summer looks between Alicia and me. We are sitting side by side, leaning into one another. It’s how we were able to share her phone.

Before I can say anything to her, Summer spins on her heels so fast she nearly runs Maksim over. She doesn’t stop to speak to him, she just scurries away.

“Little sister, are you alright?” he asks, but she never answers. When Maksim turns back to us, he shakes his head. He walks into the room and takes the open seat on the opposite end of the table.

Moments later, the rest of the gang joins us.

“Alright, have you ladies had any luck with Dominique Katz?”

“He’s a slippery man,” Kyra says. “It isn’t hard to find him, but finding a way to get you guys close to him is the problem. His security is very tight.”

“I told you, Dominique is not an easy man to get to,” Maksim says leaning up in his seat.

“Maybe we can make an appointment?” Zel suggest. “I mean, that’s one way to get face to face with him.”

Priest goes to reply, but his cellphone goes off in his pocket. He pulls it out and answers it then places it on the table.

“This is Priest,” he says out loud.

“Hello Nathaniel. I’ve heard you were looking for me.”

Priest looks to Maksim, his brows bunched together.

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