Page 31 of These Monstrous Ties
Nicolas had been entirely mute. Even when he handcuffed my hands behind my back and forced my mouth open, even as my jaw cracked when he pushed soup down my throat.
He hadn’t said a word. I thought he actually was the devil himself, until Jeremiah released me. And I became friendly with Nicolas.
We aren’t friends exactly. I don’t have those. But we’re something. And he had given me more than he had to.
I almost want to thank him. But I know better.
I sigh and stand to my feet, crouching down to lace up my combat boots.
“One more question,” I say without looking up. “When do I start?”
Nicolas laughs. “It’s a one-shot deal. One shot kill. Halloween night only, Sidney. Your brother is a sadomasochist, you know?”
I smile, nod.
I know.
But no way in hell am I going to wait ‘til Halloween.
Chapter Eleven
Present
Finding Lucifer is harderthan I thought it would be.
For one, I don’t have his last name. I hadn’t thought to ask Nicolas what it was during our game, and now it’s too late for that. When I find Nicolas that night in the gym, he zips his lips and throws away an imaginary key. I roll my eyes and get to running on the treadmill. I work better when I get a sweat in.
I don’t listen to music, just the own steady beating of my heart, the inhales and exhales as I run through sprint intervals. I glance in the wall of mirrors in front of me and see the purple and blue bruising on my throat.
I haven’t seen Kristof since the night before. I’m glad. If I had, I might have punctured his lung with the long, curved knife I have in the cup holder of the treadmill. I had left the switchblade in his room in the chaos of my brother’s interruption, but I didn’t need it back. I had more knives in my room than I had clothes.
My eyes flick to Nicolas in the mirror. He’s doing weighted burpees at the far end of the gym, wearing a tank top and basketball shorts. I watch his body move for a long moment, marveling at the muscle tone. He’s breathing hard, and he runs a hand through his short blonde hair, transferring the hand weights to one hand to do so. He catches me looking at him in the mirror and shakes his head, rolling his eyes.
I laugh, bring my gaze back to myself.
I’m wearing a hoodie, letting the extra heat drench me as I power through another stretch of high intervals. My pale complexion is splotchy and red now, and I glance down at the muscles flexing in my thighs as I run, my long runner’s shorts swaying a little with the movement. I take pride in that muscle. It had taken me a long time to build it, half a year after my brother took me from Raven Park. When I’d been an escort, I’d ran, too, but never lifted weights. I didn’t practice fighting either or firing a gun or wielding a knife.
All that changed when I came to the Rain mansion. Even inside these walls, where most of my brother’s staff lives full-time, it’s hard to trust anyone. The only person I did trust was the one at my back, but I know that he would take a bullet for Jeremiah in a heartbeat before he thought to take one for me. I understand that loyalty. Nicolas has been here longer than I have. In truth, he’d known my brother longer, too.
Nicolas hadn’t been an Unsaint because his own family hadn’t been with the Society of 6. But he’d been my brother’s friend even before he started the Order of Rain.
After me and Jeremiah split up, when I was a kid, I had cried for him, even though he’d terrorized me. He was familiar. The devil I knew. The new homes I went to were full of worse monsters, worse devils. When I turned eighteen, found myself with no high school diploma (because I found writing in the library was more fun than writing in class), I had finally tasted freedom.
I’d fell into escorting after looking for easy jobs on the library computer. I’d worked for an older woman for a few months, learning the trade, how not to get caught, how to avoid the cops. And then I got tired of her taking my cut, so I got out from under her and took my clients with me. They brought me more.
I hadn’t been rich.
I should have been. But I undercharged, only wanted enough to pay my bills and buy books and clothes. Then, a year ago, when I decided I didn’t even want that, I’d taken the gun I had at the house for some perceived sense of self-protection and thought I’d retire early. Nineteen and ready to die.
Fucking Lucifer. He took that from me, then put me somewhere worse.
Here.
I walk through the low interval, tugging up my hoodie sleeves, wiping the back of my hand over my forehead. Then I power through the last of the high intervals, thinking only of him. Of how now I could destroy him. He might owe my brother something for burning down Brooklin’s house, but he owed me more. He had taken my death away.
When Jeremiah had thrown me in that cell, it had been fourteen days of constant suicide watch by Nicolas, and a sub when Nicolas had to catch a few hours of sleep. Even then, he didn’t leave my side. Or rather, the other side of my cell. When I’d finally gotten out, I had a woman—the head housekeeper’s daughter—at my side. She even slept in my room. I screamed at her. I threatened her. But she was stocky, tall, and this time,shehad the gun.
I didn’t kill myself.
