Page 4 of Beast of Blood and Roses
Vengeance would be mine. If I ever escaped from here, I would kill every single witch within a hundred miles of my home. I’d hunt them down one by one, methodically, relentlessly. My breath quickened at the thought, a rumbling growl vibrating deep in my chest. I clenched my fist so hard my own claws pierced my palm, dark blood welling to the surface, the pain barely registering through my rage.
As I suffered, so would they.
The rocking chair creaked rhythmically beneath me as I stared out at my beautiful prison, plotting my revenge as darkness swallowed the last light of day.
Chapter Three
Rosalie
I washed the filthy dishes that had piled up in the sink, my raw hands stinging as hot water mixed with cheap soap that smelled faintly of artificial lemon. Bits of dried pasta and crusted sauce clung stubbornly to the plates, evidence of last night’s hastily prepared meal. Dad had another late-night poker game, and his friends had practically used every plate in the house. The house still reeked of stale cigar smoke and spilled bourbon, the lingering ghosts of their revelry.
A dull ache spread across my lower back as I leaned over the sink, scrubbing at a particularly stubborn stain. I blew a strand of hair away from my face with an exasperated breath.
He’d been the big loser again. I’d heard their voices rising and falling through the thin walls of my bedroom as I tried to sleep, followed by the familiar sound of my father’s defeated sigh as chairs scraped across our worn linoleum floor. I don’t know whyhe persisted in playing the game. He wasn’t a successful gambler.
I set a clean plate on the drying rack with perhaps more force than necessary, the ceramic clattering against the metal. Our funds were depleting slowly, like sand through an hourglass we couldn’t flip over. I glanced at the stack of bills on the counter, their red “FINAL NOTICE” stamps visible even from where I stood. My job as a waitress at Crimson Stakes barely scraped together enough to cover them, my tip money disappearing into envelopes before I’d even had the chance to count it properly.
The afternoon sunlight filtered through our grimy kitchen window, casting everything in a bright, unforgiving light. I flexed my pruned fingers, noticing the chipped nail polish—once a bright, hopeful red, now just sad, peeling flecks clinging to my bitten nails. In an hour, I had to be at work at Crimson Stakes Casino as a cocktail waitress. Hopefully, the tips would be good tonight. I caught my reflection in the window above the sink: dark circles under my eyes, dark hair hastily pulled back, shoulders slumped with exhaustion. I barely recognized myself anymore.
Outside, thunder rumbled hard enough to rattle our windows, making me jump and splash soapy water everywhere. Perfect. Just perfect. As if I needed another mess to clean up before my shift.
The door slammed with a force that rattled the dishes in the sink, making me flinch. Dad staggered in, his hazel eyes wide with a haunted look that sent ice crawling down my spine. He had on a stained white shirt that looked like it had blood splattered across the front, and his dark black jeans had mysteriousstains that made my stomach clench with dread. The sour scent of fear sweat—and something worse—rolled off him in waves.
I frowned, my heart hammering against my ribs. “What happened to you?” My voice came out higher than I intended, betraying my rising panic.
He dragged his trembling fingers through his rumpled hair, a nervous gesture he must have done a million times today, leaving it standing in wild tufts. “I’m in trouble.” The words darkened the space between us, heavy and threatening as storm clouds.
I cocked my eyebrow, my jaw tightening as familiar anger bubbled up like acid in my throat. Translation: he owed people money, money we didn’t have. My cheeks flushed hot with frustration. “You took all my tip money. There’s none left. Tonight?—”
He lurched forward suddenly, clasping my arms with fingers that dug painfully into my flesh. His breath reeked of whiskey and desperation. His pupils were dilated with fear, making his eyes look almost black. “You’re not going tonight.”
I pulled away from his desperate grasp, my skin crawling, and tossed the dish rag onto the counter with a wet slap. My hands were shaking now too. “We don’t have any money. If you want to pay this debt?—”
“I owe ten thousand dollars,” he interrupted, his voice cracking. “Will you make that tonight?”
The room seemed to tilt beneath my feet as the number crashed into me like a runaway Mack truck. I wanted to burst into tears, could feel them burning behind my eyes, my throat constricting painfully. Ten thousand dollars? It might as well have been a million. My knees weakened, and I gripped the edgeof the counter to steady myself, the worn Formica cool beneath my white-knuckled fingers.
His tongue darted across his cracked lips with a desperate hunger, leaving a glistening trail that caught the harsh light. His bloodshot eyes shifted rapidly from side to side, never quite meeting mine, calculating something behind their glassy surface. The bitter smell of panic rolled off him in waves, mingling with the rusty smell of dried blood.
“I need you to come with me to try to negotiate with him,” he whispered, his voice cracking like autumn leaves underfoot.
“Who?” My stomach knotted as the word escaped my dry throat.
“Some new crime boss. I don’t know his name or where he came from.” The threat dropped between us like a death sentence. “His servant found me and—” his hands trembled violently as he clutched at his collar “—threatened to kill me if I didn’t pay up.”
He yanked down his shirt collar with trembling fingers, revealing angry crimson spatters that had dried into rusty constellations against his pale skin. The wound looked raw, painful—a warning written in blood.
“He did this to me.” The words tumbled out between shallow, panicked breaths. “If I don’t pay today, he’ll kill me.” His bloodshot eyes, wide and pleading, finally locked with mine. A bead of sweat traced the hollow of his cheek. “Is that what you want?”
The severity of his question pressed down on my chest, making it hard to breathe. My shoulders slumped under the familiar burden of guilt and obligation.
“No,” I said miserably, the word tasting bitter on my tongue.
He was the only parent I had left. My mother had abandoned us when I was three, leaving nothing but the lingering scent of her perfume in empty drawers and the phantom sound of her laughter that sometimes woke me at night. Dad said she didn’t want to be a mother and didn’t love me. According to him, I had ruined her life. A truth he reminded me of whenever the bourbon flowed freely through his veins and loosened his tongue.
He gave me a sly smile, the corner of his mouth curling upward like a cat that had cornered a mouse. His eyes, normally dull with disappointment, now glittered with something that made my skin prickle with unease.
“Good,” he purred, the word stretching between us like taffy. “Now go change.”
