Page 100 of Royal
Chapter 23
Royal
I wasn’t sure how much time had passed. Without any windows, I couldn’t see if it was even still daylight. Ameinias only left me twice. Once to get me a drink of water, and the second time to get me pain medicine for my head, which he insisted I take.
My phone kept buzzing.
He’d placed my clothes in a pile on the floor, my phone on top of them. Each time it rang, I looked over to see the screen light up and Grayson’s contact photo appear. I knew he was worried out of his mind. Probably pissed, too.
When my phone rang for the sixth time in a row, Ameinias jumped up from the chair and picked it up. He glared at the screen before lifting his chilling gaze to me.
“He won’t stop calling you.” Ameinias chucked the phone at the wall, shattering it into pieces. He scratched at his neck so hard I started to see faint lines of blood trickle down. “When I first brought you here, he called constantly while you were unconscious. It’s been hours. Doesn’t he realize you belong to me now? Arrogant Detective Riley.” He charged toward me and slammed his hands beside my head. “I don’t see how you were ever with him.”
Shit. He was turning on me. I didn’t know what to do.
Up until that point, I’d played along with his game. I’d said nice things to him, said I wasn’t afraid and that I wanted to be with him. I’d hoped he would untie me once he thought I was returning his affection, but he wasn’t stupid. He’d gotten away with the murder of eleven people and evaded both the FBI and law enforcement for over a year because, though he was young, he was intelligent.
“Do you love Detective Riley?” Ameinias asked, grabbing my face and forcing me to look at him. He was inches from me and seething.
“No. I don’t.”
“Then why are you with him?” he screamed, holding my chin so tight that his nails dug into my skin.
“I’mnotwith him,” I responded as calmly as I could, even though I was freaking the fuck out on the inside. “I’m here with you. He means nothing to me.”
Ameinias released my chin and straightened his stance, pinning me with a hard stare. “I heard the way you moaned when he touched you. I saw how he fucked you. How much you liked it.” Tears welled in his eyes and fell down his cheeks. “Do you know how hard it was to see that, Royal? To see the man I loved letting another man take him like that? I watched him put his nasty cock in you. I wanted to slit his throat.”
I nearly threw up.
He’d been in my house the night Grayson had stayed with me and watched us have sex. At any point, he could’ve killed Gray. Could’ve killed us all, Brysen included.
“You’re just like him,” he whispered, as more tears brimmed in his eyes.
“Like who?”
“Robert,” he answered, lifting the bottom of his shirt and wiping his eyes with it. “He was a god in my eyes, Royal. He took me under his wing. Let me join his theater crew. I was a lousy actor, but he let me help with the props. I love classical music, especially Mozart. He was directing Don Giovani. Do you know that one?” He cocked his head at me, and I nodded. “The music is spectacular. He and I would sit together after rehearsal and talk. He told me I’d become great someday, that I’d heal from my abusive past, and I believed him. I fell in love with him…I loved the gleam in his blue eyes when he talked to me, loved the sound of his voice. But he loved someone else. Another man who was tall and muscled and everything I wasn’t.”
Ameinias clawed at his neck again, and a crazy look appeared in his eyes. The scratching intensified.
“When I went to confess my feelings for him,” he continued, scratching his skin so hard I cringed. “I saw him and his fiancé fucking in his office. It was after rehearsal when everyone was supposed to be gone. But that wasourtime together. And the things he told his disgusting fiancé. To fuck him harder. Deeper.” The scratching stopped. “Well, it did something to me. Like a damn being burst open.”
My breath caught in my throat as my fear surfaced. I couldn’t hold it back any longer. A person could only be brave for so long before they cracked. And I was cracking. My body started to shake.
Ameinias looked off into the distance, his mind elsewhere.
“I picked up one of the knives left backstage from the prop building and went into the office,” Ameinias said, unblinking. “As they fucked, I approached from behind and jabbed the knife in his fiancé’s neck. You should’ve heard Robert scream as his lover’s blood spurted on his face. It was poetic, really. With his fiancé dying on the floor, I knocked Robert out and dragged him out of the office. I didn’t want to kill him, you see. Only wanted to make him realize he wasmine.”
The guy growled and tightened his hands into fists.
“But when he came to, he yelled at me. Screamed that I was a monster. Even after I told him I loved him, he still screamed.” Ameinias walked over to the table beside me and grabbed a long, jagged blade. “Robert was silly. No one could hear his screams. I might’ve lost my temper with him.” Dark eyes flashed to me, and he smiled. “Just a little. I stabbed him in the stomach and watched as he died. If I couldn’t have him, no one could.”
My chin trembled, but I tried to remain strong. Brave.
“Once Robert was dead, I cleaned him up. Wiped his lover’s blood from his face and made him look nice. I propped him up against the fountain and kissed him.” Ameinias’ eyes watered. It was unsettling that he could go from angry to sad in the blink of an eye. “I hated that our first kiss was like that. But he was finally mine. He was perfect now, you see. Never aging. Never cheating on me. An eternal love that was…perfect. I carried his fiancé’s body to my car and tossed him in the trunk before going back and cleaning up the blood from the office.”
He touched the knife to my chest, not applying pressure. He lightly grazed it along my collarbone.
“Do you know what I did with the body?” he asked, as a twisted smile stretched his lips. “I chopped him up, sawed off his arms and legs. Even his head. And I spread him all over the state of Washington.”
