Page 137 of Stutter

Something I can feel – the leather straps on my wrists and ankles.

Something I can hear – I strain my ears, trying to hear anything but it’s obsolete, deafening silence. Okay. Nothing there. That’s okay.

Something I can smell – myself. Ugh. Okay, I won’t think about that. This isn’t like before. I’m not at Lorne Wood and I’m not in that goddamn locker. That was a hallucination.Thisis real.

Iam real.

Something I can taste – my bile from earlier.

Okay, Raven. Think. Think. How did I get here? What was my last memory?

Walking back into the house. I was… letting Kronos back in. There was growling and grunting. And then…darkness.

So where am I?

It’s freezing in here. My fingertips are numb, and I can’t feel my toes. The flimsy mattress I’m on doesn’t offer my spine much comfort from the steel underneath it.

There’s a creaking on the stairs and then a slam of a door that makes me flinch. One… two… seventeen steps. The stairs have seventeen steps.

A large man comes through my blurry vision. I tense when I can smell him. Loud hints of patchouli, cedar wood, and citrus. It’s a delicious smell. A smell I’ve smelled for months dancing at Inferno. There’s a squeak as he sits beside me.

“Oh, Raven, good you’re awake. Or should I say,Chloe.” He says my dancing alias with disgust as he looms over me, twin blue icicles piercing straight through me. He holds something out and it lands on my chest. The familiar black and gold trim of my moth mask glitters in the faint light, the eye holes ruined, staring back at me in shame, judging me.

This isn’t real. I shake my head. But it is. It is real. I can’t afford to hide in the recesses of my mind anymore. I have to push through. I have to stay here. I have to-

“I should have known. All those months of you sitting in my lap, leaning into the conversations, clinging to me… it was smart, Raven. Very smart. Truly I thought you were just the worst dancer ever.” He chuckles. “I knew you would have been great for my Tyler that’s why I negotiated with John for you. From the moment I saw you in that little red string bikini and you flipped your brother off… I wanted you for myself, at first. Granted, I wanted you once all of you developed. I’m not attracted to children. Plus, the age difference..." I can feel his breath so close to my lips. “I knew you were going to besensational… capable of great, beautiful things when I saw but a fraction of your spitfire. Although,murderwasn’t one of the things when I imagined you for myself or my son.”

Chills. Chills everywhere send shivers running through every inch of my fiber. I tremble, uncontrollably, breathing out to see little puffs of fog. It’s so fucking cold.

“You know, Raven… Chase… his death I could have forgiven. I would have welcomed you with open arms. Riordan… well, the boy had been set up for failure since birth. But my son… my only, as much as the twink liked getting his asshole reamed, he was still my son. Still able to produce an heir… a legacy. Riordan as well but it’s better when the blood comes directly from your line.” He lifts a finger, delicately tracing the scar on my temple, over my cheekbone down to my chin, and up to my bottom lip, pressing down on it harshly as though he’s testing it out for himself. “A beautiful creature… so…broken.”

I blink back the tears that are burning behind my lids. He’s wrong. I’m not broken.

“So you turned seventeen I made the proper arrangements and purchased you for my son. Your mother was a bit hesitant, of course. Pleading with me to at least let you graduate from Rayne-Moore.” He sighs. “Which was fine and well. An educated woman can be intriguing at times. So I agreed. I mean, what good is a dinner party without a little banter and debating, eh? Imagine my surprise when my son tells me you’ve been applying to other schools. Music schools. Did you know I was the one who made sure Rayne-Moore offered a greater program so you wouldn’t be tempted to leave?”

I shake my head.

“Hmm. I thought so. As soon as the contract between your parents and I was signed, I poured so much money as an anonymous donor so that you would love it there… But then you had that littleincidentand you became a defective mute."

I inwardly cringe at the worddefective. His callousness towards my ‘little incident’ makes my blood boil. I struggle in my binds, needing to claw his eyes out.

I’m going to kill this motherfucker.

“Shh… Raven,” he soothes but all it does is make me feel sicker.“That too, I could have bargained with, used you as a sort ofprop. The agreement was only made to further tie the Prescott’s and the Monroe’s. After all. It was your voice that was gone, yourpussy and your womb still worked. I mean, the actual word they used to describe you was, ‘intact.’ A virgin. And you being tycoon money on your mother’s side well, that was just a bonus… but Tyler said no. He didn't want a mute, brain-dead wife. So I called it off. Made negotiations across the pond. Cost your parents a pretty little penny but all was well. Until photos of my son were blasted to the media… See, Butterfly,”

I hold in my flinch when his hand goes to my hair, gingerly petting me as though I’m the most fragile thing in the world.

If I could, I would projectile vomit in his face.

“I already knew of my son’s tendencies. But for the world to see a Prescott, my son, this large, six-foot-four, two hundred and fifty-pound quarterback bent over with his ass getting rutted into and crying out for more like a cock-throating slut… you’d understand why it turned into such a scandal. Then the royals we had negotiated with pulled out of their contract which in turn costmea pretty little penny. Do you see where I’m going with this?I’mnot the villain in your story, not really, and yet… I’m the one that’s lost the most.” He says those last words slowly as if softly singing them, his hand stops petting me, fingers curling to pull, and my scalp prickles from the burn. I silently yelp. “What I don’t understand, ishowit came to be."

He chuckles and resumes petting me, his fingers stopping at the tangles only to start over from my roots, over and over again. “I will say, Butterfly, once I had Arlo following you, and he saw you signing to the Anderson boy, I had high hopes. But to find out you wereChloe?” the chuckle in his throat is low and I can hear it in his chest. “To find out you were my butterfly perched on my knee, getting all the details, killing us off one by one with no leads just broken bones and flesh wounds? Do you know what I saw?”

He stays quiet, waiting for my answer.

I shake my head.

“Aqueen. Finally, a woman so clever, she could be a legacy herself. My late wife, Elise, didn’t have the heart for it, didn’t have the heart for a lot of things- which is why we only had Tyler. I mean, Ashleigh Whitmore was there the night of your incident, but she didn’t go through with it all. She didn’t deliver a final blow. But you?Sixbodies in a matter ofweeks. Chase. Tyler. Thadd. Ashleigh. Simon. Thaddeus I…” He trails off, his eyes light with a childlike wonder like he’s in awe of me and that somehow makes him look ten years younger. Fuck me, he’d be beautiful if he wasn’t so fucking deranged.

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