Page 9 of Violent Reign (Violent Kingdom)

She doesn’t look good. She looks even worse than when I saw her last. Fuck—that wasn’t when I saw her last, was it? She was at my house that night she tried to steal the pills, and then she was in that house of horrors. I should have recognized her gaunt frame. Rosaline’s getting too thin. Too many drugs. She’s a black hole of greed and want. And all she craves is more.

My stomach revolts. I can see it now. All that blonde hair under the rainbow-colored wig. How fucking stupid was I, not recognizing her? Unbelievable. There’s nowhere to run, now. I can’t have Merc torture her into talking or have her thrown out of my house. I can only stand here, rage struggling to contain itself inside my body.

Rosaline gets close, too close—close enough for me to smell stale sweat and something burnt and bitter, like she’s just smoked a shitload of crystal meth. She takes the broken beaker in one hand and tosses it. It shatters on the concrete floor. Then she takes my hand and lifts it in front of her eyes. God, she’s fucking disgusting. Her pupils are dilated too far. She’s high. She’s always high, isn’t she?

“Poor baby,” she drawls, smiling at me as if we two share a secret.

And then she puts my bleeding finger in her mouth.

Her teeth scrape the skin of my knuckle. My mind flies out of my body. I don’t want to be here in this moment, with Rosaline’s nasty tongue delving into my bloody cut. Sucking on it. Her eyes huge, locked on mine. She keeps sucking while she grins up at me.Jesus, what was I thinking, ever taking her home?

Think of this as an opportunity. Sure. Okay. She’s not Tyler, and she’s got my finger in her mouth. This bitch has to be my ticket out of this place, somehow. Rosaline has always had a blind spot when it comes to me. Question is, does she have the same blind spot when it comes to Tyler? How do I get her to come over to team Rome? All of these thoughts slam into me as I watch her devour my bleeding finger. Gross. Her eyes are closed now. The wet suck of her cupid-bow lips makes me sick, but there’s a glimmer of possibility here.

“If you want to suck my dick, Rosie, all you have to do is say so.” I keep my voice low.

Rosaline’s eyes fly open, my bleeding finger coming out of her mouth with a pop as she smiles just for me. “Oh my god, Rome. Tyler won’t like that you said that.” The bitch is loud, and it gets Tyler’s attention. He’s up out of his chair, glaring. Getting closer. Rosaline licks the edge of her mouth as if she’s just swallowed a load of my cum, and for her, my blood on her tongue turns her on just as much. Maybe even more.

“It’s true.”Don’t let anybody see that you slipped up. That’s the first rule of being me. I did it for months in that fucking basement and I can do it now. I keep my eyes on Rosaline’s face. “You know it is. I know you, Rosie. I’ve known you for a long time.”

“Shut your fucking mouth,” growls Tyler. His shirt moves as he approaches, and the shiny handle of a gun comes into view. Fuck. At least I tried. “What are you saying to her?”

Rosaline grins, backing up into his arms. He slings an arm around her shoulder. So damn possessive. So stupidly hotheaded. He’s a Capulet, and he’s not the sharpest tool in the family shed. I don’t expect anything different. “He said—”

“I said that if she wants to suck my dick, all she has to do is say so.” I shrug at him like he doesn’t have me latched to the wall and like I don’t give a fuck if I get out of here alive. “Rosie has a mean rape kink, but if she wants a nice, rough, consentual fuck, she can always come see me in—”

Tyler, for all his faults, knows how to throw a punch. His fist comes at me from nowhere, no windup to warn me of its approach. Pain explodes along my cheekbone and I fall sideways against the bench. More glass crashes against the floor. So much for that batch of pills. I’m going to have to start all over.

“Get out of here, Rosaline.”

I straighten up, rubbing at my cheek, and look right into Tyler’s eyes with afuck yousmirk. Let him see this. Let him see that he can punch me, he can force me to make drugs, he can do any number of things. But he can’t stop Rosaline from hesitating.

“I don’t know...”

He shoves her back behind him. He could fucking kill me. He could shoot me now, he could choke me to death. He could extend his little wire and wrap it around my neck until the very last breath goes out of me. An undercurrent passes between the two of us. He’s not going to do any of it, even though he really, really wants to.

He needs me for his little enterprise. Capulets don’t tend to destroy their own money-making assets without a lot of consideration.

He lets out a hiss of a breath and turns on his heel, going after Rosaline. It’s cute, in a way, how obsessed he is. He’ll probably fuck her just to show her how much. Poor Tyler, though, can never take away what I know—what I knew as soon as Rosaline’s tongue hit the cut on my finger and her breath started to come fast and shallow.

If Rosaline could choose, she’d choose me.

Chapter Five

AVERY

“Sit down so we can talk.”

What other choice do I have, other than to follow Nathan out into his living room? He has knives and probably guns and he is the sickest motherfucker I have ever met in my life. Literally. I shudder at the thought of Eliza cooing all over him.

“Sit.”

I take a seat across from him, staring straight ahead, my entire body trembling. If I just do what he says, maybe I’ll survive this.

“What do you want to talk about, Nate?” I ask, trying for a casual tone of voice and failing dismally. Not only is my entire body trembling; even my voice shakes. It’s unbearable to look at him. To remember what we had - what I thought we had. Because we didn’t really have anything, did we? It was all a lie. I have to assume that everything he’s ever said to me was a lie.

He lounges back against the sofa and spreads his arms wide over the back, frowning a little. Another long day for him, playing people like chess pieces on a board only he controls. The private Capulet paramedics came to take Jennifer away, a bag of blood transfusing into her veins, her blood-soaked body swathed in blankets and teetering on the verge of death. Whether she survives or not, there will be no police report. They went through a quick list of questions with Nate and that was it. Andthatis the double-edged sword of being a Capulet. It is criminal to be so disgustingly wealthy that you can pay people to do anything for you. Even cover up a murder attempt with a phone call and a fuckton of cash. It makes me want to scream, but I can’t. I have to be a pliant little doll for Nathan, lest I should upset him and make him hurt another person I love.

Jennifer. Please, don’t die on me. In Nathan’s case, he doesn’t even have to operate within real-world systems. No nurse at a public hospital will get worried and call the police. No doctor will discreetly enquire as to whether Jennifer is a victim of domestic violence. There will be no secret hand signal she can flash to get someone to ferry her to safety. She will not be protected at all. She could scream at the people holding her, tell them what’s been done to her, and the most they will do is sedate her to make her easier to deal with. She will simply be a prisoner of Nathan’s, even while receiving medical care. And when Jennifer gets out - if she gets out - she’ll be delivered back into the loving, brutal arms of her boyfriend Nathaniel Capulet, in just as much danger as before.

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