Page 78 of The Burnt Heart

“Look at me,” I whispered, feeble and weak. But enough. My wrists burned with the bite of the zip ties. Another button. Bare skin, a flash of a nipple in the gaping material. Nicole panted.

“You’re insane,” I couldn’t hold back.

“That’s relative.” Alessandro waved me off, his hand still working himself over the material. A succession of popping noises shuddered through the walls. I froze, hope a tender bloom. Alessandro cocked his head, his eyebrows meeting in a slight frown.

“Ah, sweet Briar Rose, wait for me. To be continued.” His secret smile was thick with confidence as he waved an impatient hand. “Don’t leave this room. Unless you want me to put a bullet through her skull.”

Alessandro took his dark, oppressive energy with him and my lungs flooded with sweet oxygen. I choked on it, wishing for freedom instead. Nicole’s gaze raked over Briar’s exposed skin until he shifted uncomfortably. I bit my tongue when he shot me a warning look.

“Let’s not wait.” I stiffened at the cloying warmth in his tone that had Nicole swaying toward him. But the grimace he stifled loosened the tightness in my chest.

“So, Alessandro asked you to watch me at the foster home?” Briar pressed his leg against hers and Nicole flushed, close to combusting. As if this was a first date rather than a twisted situation.

“Yes, but he did it for us,” she justified, leaning in. “He had such a lovely home planned for us, but you left.” Her softly parted lips stretched tight, but she refused to acknowledge me. I clamped my tongue between my teeth. The blunt edges trapping the insults I wanted to fling at her. Briar needed his answers, and I wouldn’t ruin his probing. My limbs had lost feeling, wrenched back like a contortionist. Briar’s face flittered with shadows as he tried to give her the reaction she wanted. His eyes defrosted intoa tepid warmth. Nicole wouldn’t know what true heat looked like from Briar, how it scalded with delicious power. Her breath hitched, mesmerized by his closeness.

“You told him everything I confessed to you?” He squeezed the answers out of her, balancing the push of her desire for his body. Nicole’s head bobbed like a doll.

“Did he tell you what he did to me?” Danger flashed in his hazel eyes, shadowed in the low light of the room. Nicole blithely brushed past the warning.

“Since the first time. I told you I knew everything about you.” Her admission was a tender scold, as if sharing a memory with a lover. My stomach revolted, twisting violently. “Alex sought me out, asked me to help him monitor you. He thinks it’s sweet, how many admirers you have, even though he was the first to love you. He’s so proud of the man you’ve become.”

Briar gulped loudly, choking on the insinuation she made. There had been no love in what Alessandro had done. I stared unseeing through the red that smeared my vision. She’d worked with Alessandro. Kept his abuse quiet. Her wide eyes were wide and guileless as she stared at Briar. Still, with that hungry possessiveness.

“What is wrong with you?” I breathed, seeing the madness glinting in her eyes. She scowled, still intent on ignoring my presence. But my gaze rankled her enough that she snapped.

“Don’t look at me like that. As if you’re better than me.”

“I don’t help monsters abuse children. He thought of you as his shield from Alessandro, but you’ve always been a trap, haven’t you? A sweet, innocent little monster yourself.”

My breath echoed ragged in the room. I was beyond thinking clearly now. I wanted revenge, craved it like the blood through my veins. Briar was blank, but I knew he was sinking into years of memories, seeing them through a new lens.

“Where is your golden crown you boasted to me about?” Nicole’s face twisted. “Bloody and broken, just like I warned you.”

Her words stole the oxygen from my lungs. Her hands tightened into fists at her side.

“So, what will you do with me now?” Briar twined a finger through Nicole’s dark hair and revulsion skittered through me.

“Now that she’s been dealt with, he can take you home. Like he always intended to. Just do as he asks, and everything will be perfect. But I’ll be there, and what he doesn’t know won’t hurt him.” Her fingers snuck beneath the gaping material of his shirt. Coasting over his rippling skin. Briar’s congenial expression fell like a stack of cards. Revealing someone I had never seen before. Forged in agony, shaped in pain, a broken, dark, twisted shadow. Briar’s hand snapped out and collared Nicole’s bobbing neck. Her squeak of surprise smothered by his clawed grip. Briar wrenched her to the bed, looming over her with a silent snarl. Nicole’s nails left unwanted streaks on his skin. She bucked her narrow hips, unable to displace him. Rage consumed Briar, a storming, slapping ocean, biting at a crumbling cliff. Nicole’s eyes bulged, garish popping like a skinned grape. Trembling, watery and losing focus. Briar’s chest heaved as he poured his rage into her body.

“Don’t do it. It’s not worth it,” I croaked, the ties strangled my wrists, making them swell with sharp impotence. Briar didn’t seem to hear my words, face twisted in a terrible mask. What he’d endured leached to the surface, grotesque after years of being hidden. Even in his madness he was beautiful, curls like a woodland sprite. But no fairytale creature gnashed their teeth like he did now, thirsting for vengeance. Nicole had stilled, eyelids fluttering as though still fighting.

“You would do it,” he gritted out, tossing me a tormented look. His shoulders trembled under the terrible weight of his choice. One I had never wanted him to have to make.

“Let me be the dark one.”

“I want to. I want to so much it hurts.”

“That’s because you’re good, you feel the desire, but you can’t.” Briar made a low noise, and it bounced off the pastel pink of my walls. His whitened fingers softened, but I didn’t relax. Not until they peeled away an unhinged gleam shimmering in the dark pools of his gaze. He brushed away the mussed strands of Nicole’s hair. Not with regret. There was still too much anger for that. He trudged to me, shaking, a mottled tear balanced on his jaw. Reflecting the shadows in the room with us. We weren’t the only dark things here.

“Check in my desk, for scissors, something to—” I shifted my ineffectual body with a frustrated noise. Briar rifled through the forgotten mess, pulling out a silver pair. He flashed me a smile, one that looked so like Briar, before it melted away. Marred by the reaching grasp of Alessandro and his eager assistant. The scissors kissed cold against my skin, like ice. I hissed as feeling flooded into my contorted limbs, whimpering under the pressure of it. Briar took my hands in his, feeling running into the numbed skin. It reminded me of the day we met. For a moment our breaths mingled, soft, ragged things. We hoarded our words, needing the silence. Craving touch which we used to build, rather than destroy.

“We should go before he returns.”

My body groaned as I stood. But even I couldn’t continue, not before pulling Briar into my arms. He shuddered in my fierce hold.

“What should we do with her?” He gulped, flicking a remorseful look at Nicole. This was why I was the killer. I yanked off a silk pillowcase and tore the ivory material into strips. Inmoments, Nicole was a macabre present, trussed tightly into an immovable lump. I stuffed the remaining silk in her mouth and wedged her between the floor and the bed. She didn’t argue, her slack body unable to.

“Don’t worry.” I brushed my hand down Briar’s damp back. He’d sweat through his shirt. “I’m not finished with her.”

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