XV: (Fifteen) (War of Roses Book 1)

by Lana Sky

  Her visits had become less frequent by then. Sometimes days would pass without one. I’d only catch glimpses of her on my way through the halls as I assisted Martha, one of the servants. Always with Briar, her face turned away from me as though I didn’t exist.

  “Wait.” A whine tugged at my voice, making her frown. “Please…can you sing it to me again? Just one more time?”

  Her lips twitched, but with a wary glance over her shoulder, she returned to my side, placing her mouth near my ear. “Happy birthday to you. Happy birthday to you.” Her fingers returned to stroking my hair, and I curled into her side, relishing the few extra moments of her attention. “Happy birthday, dear Elena. Happy birthday to you, my precious Rose…”

  “Eat.” His voice shatters the memory. The remnants of it cut into me—all of those questions I never asked. Like why she called me Elena only then, once a year, hidden away in a song.

  Or why a monster would ever think to call me by it years after she’s been gone.

  “I said eat.”

  Something clatters onto the floor by my side. A tray, I see once I peel my eyes open. It contains a sandwich and a bottle of water. I ignore them both by turning my face into the space between my raised knees.

  As he has for what feels like an eternity, Mischa lingers for only a second before retreating from the room, slamming the door in his wake. I’m on a lower level. A basement, I think? Somewhere he dragged me after I attacked him. Newer memories meld with older ones, distorting the past few hours. Twenty…thirty?

  Three days. I’ve been in this room for three days. It’s starting to smell. I’m starting to smell. I’m starting to die.

  My muscles ache, wasting away as my stomach protests days of hunger. My throat is so dry that each breath irritates my tender esophagus, but at least there’s no moisture left in me to waste on tears. Without the fear of triggering any sobbing, I delve into those dark, deep memories I’ve left untouched for over sixteen years.

  I chase my mother.

  And she avoids me, even now, lurking in the depths of my psyche that hurt to reach.

  I was her biggest secret, hidden away in a room at the very back of the servant’s wing. I was her greatest treasure. Only now do I realize just what she left behind for me, as her legacy. The real reason why Robert Sr. reclaimed her, even after she’d been tainted by his enemy. Why Robert wanted me.

  We look alike, after all. Our eyes were the same, well beyond any resemblance we shared with Briar. Our expressions were fragile, sporting tiny, hairline cracks. To monstrous men, those flaws glowed like tempting signs proclaiming, I am weak. Break me. Destroy me.

  In the end, my mother destroyed herself in silence, with the aid of a razor blade and a running bath. By doing so, she passed her curse onto me. She revealed the only way out for someone like us: A doe can only survive at the mercy of a wolf for so long.

  “Damn you. Eat!”

  Another monstrous clang rouses me from my thoughts, but it’s harder to leave my head for the real world. My eyes refuse to focus. It’s bright. Someone turned a light on, illuminating my sparse surroundings and the concrete floor.

  Four days. It’s been four days since he brought me here when I refused to move from the pathetic puddle he’d left on the ground of the upstairs drawing room.

  Four days since I stopped eating or drinking.

  Four days since I first utilized the only gift my mother ever gave me: silence. She used it as a weapon, breaking it only on the rarest occasions, like my meager birthdays, honored once a year for just a few minutes at a time. Briar had parties. She had gifts beyond anything I could ever dream of receiving.

  I had Marnie’s love, the cruelest present of them all.

  “Eat.” Once again, Mischa’s voice yanks me from the past. Or does he? Is he even here, or have I imagined him? My mother’s face morphs into his, invading my one and only sanctuary. “Fuck—eat!”

  Someone grabs my chin and pries my lips apart to shove a warm object between them. Something metal containing a liquid I let roll off my tongue, even as my stomach lurches in desperation. I taste nothing. Feel nothing.

  Just…rage, so palpable that it stings like a physical blow.

  “Damn you.”

  More wetness. Cold. When I don’t swallow, a torrent of fluid drips down my nose and rolls down my chin.

  Again, I’m left alone with Marnie. She doesn’t acknowledge me, even now. She merely lurks around the edges of my consciousness, always out of reach. Four days.

  The count remains the same when I’m disturbed by a soft hand brushing my cheek—not Mischa’s. The fingers are too small. So is the face staring back at me as I force my eyes to focus.

  No. Not her… Mischa is a cruel, unfeeling bastard. Hatred for him is the first tangible emotion I’ve felt in days. It burns through my sore, wasting limbs, too weak to direct itself toward anything in particular.

  Nicolai’s girl watches me with an unreadable expression. Her brown eyes stare blankly, even as she pats my chin and guides a utensil toward my lips with her free hand. A spoon.

  The urge to refuse is nearly impossible to resist. I’m so close. Marnie feels nearer than ever. A few more days and I’d finally find her again. Touch her. Be near her with no one to come between us.

  But guilt is a terrible, persistent thing. Marnie may have been immune to it at the end of her life, but I’m not. When the girl nudges my lips with the spoon, I part them and swallow the liquid gathered on it. My shriveled taste buds fail to discern a flavor. I just drink each mouthful woodenly, emptying the bowl. Upon setting it aside, the girl reaches for a bottle of water and silently urges me to finish it next.

  Someone’s cleaned her up and brushed her hair, having plaited it into two small braids. They dressed her as well, in a clean pink shirt and jeans. Vanya? Only he would be kind enough.

  Has he sent her to me?

  No. Most men aren’t selfish enough to use a child to do his bidding—but a monster would be. Not even because he cared about my welfare.

  He just wasn’t finished with me yet.

  When I gulp down the last drop of water, the girl gathers up the bowl and the bottle and exits the room, leaving the door open so that a sliver of light can penetrate my prison. It’s a silent gesture that conveys an unmistakable request.

  Four days of filth waft from my skin. What little waste I managed to expel is in a bucket in the corner of the room. Mischa never locked the door himself—my imprisonment had been self-imposed. Leaving now would be a harrowing defeat.

  But if I don’t, he’ll send her again, forcing her to feed my emaciated frame.

  Forcing her to watch me die.

  With a groan, I unfurl my sore limbs. Weak with disuse, my legs refuse to fully support my weight. I have to cling to the wall with both hands just to rise to my feet, and leaving the room is a slow, painful ordeal.

  Somehow, I make it up the stairs to the first floor. I pass no one, not even the girl. Not Mischa. I can’t escape the feeling that he planned it, this silence that chases me through the halls and into the red room beside his.

  I choose it solely for its familiarity. Nothing else.

  After wrestling the door closed, I lock it. Then I stagger into the bathroom and lock that door as well. The sunken tub is a tempting escape. I draw the water scalding hot and collapse in the center of it, letting the warm wetness consume me.

  How pathetic. I always thought I was above such an act: suicide. Marnie took her own life, but even after years of torment, I’ve never done the same. Not even when Robert showed me his worst. Not even when he made me wish for death.

  I’ve never been desperate enough.

  Or brave enough.

  Am I now?

  The answer eludes me as the water level rises. I lie here motionless, letting the moisture seep into my nostrils and lap at my parted lips. Just as my lungs start to burn, I tilt my head toward the ceiling and inhale the humid air.

  Only now do I hear it. Thunder? No. Pou
nding.

  In the end, I don’t know how long it takes him to break the door down. He appears in the room amid a sound like thunder, his chest heaving, his eyes a flashing amber. He deflates when he sees me in the tub, still alive, his hands flexing in and out of fists.

  Meeting his gaze, I force my dry, cracked lips to part and address him for the first time in days. “Mention my mother again and I’ll kill myself.” The falling water adds an ominous backdrop I couldn’t have planned on my own to the threat. “You’ll have to send my body back to Robert, still his. Always.”

  I’m dangling before him an object every monster covets: ownership. Does he want it?

  His expression reveals nothing.

  Robert would laugh at such an ultimatum. Then he’d drag me from the bath and show me just how many ways he fucking owned me.

  Mischa? He meets my gaze and I shiver despite the steaming water basting my limbs. Four days have changed him almost as dramatically as they’ve affected me. Something cut his cheek, leaving three slender red lines slashed into the flesh. My fingers burn as if in guilt. Did I do that to him?

  Darker stubble coats his jaw, contrasting with the sun-kissed gold of his hair. Dark shadows taint the skin beneath his eyes. From exhaustion? No… From brooding, smoldering rage. My punishment lurks behind those dangerous eyes. Soon, I’ll feel it. Our dynamic of master and captive will be restored.

  But for now?

  He doesn’t drag me from the tub. He doesn’t say a damn word to me at all. He turns on his heel. He leaves, and he lets me have the one thing even my mother never gave me.

  He lets me have one single round all to myself.

  He lets me win.

  CHAPTER 22

  I lurk inside the red room, in self-imposed exile, while clues as to the goings-on of the rest of the manor’s occupants seep through the door. Mischa’s been busy, it seems. Shouts ring out from below as footsteps rattle the walls. Apart from a stern-faced man coming to replace the doors to the bedroom and bathroom, I’m left alone. The chaos rages around me like a storm, but I’m too tired to stick my head beyond the doorway and gauge its intensity. Instead, I sleep, savoring the precious hours of peace.

  I bide my time.

  Winning matters to men almost as much as their money does. Rarely do they lose their precious little games—and only when a greater prize is worth the forfeit.

  So what is his end goal?

  It terrifies me to admit the obvious: I don’t know, and I can’t even begin to guess.

  Mischa’s punishment lords on my horizon like a cloud, inescapable and building in strength with every passing second. How will he deliver it? With physical blows? With sex? By selling me?

  The logical part of my brain does its best to muster up fear of any one of those scenarios. But it’s no use. What little food I’ve ingested since leaving the basement doesn’t return my itch for survival. I’m far too reckless when it comes to imagining what I can endure now.

  A beating.

  A rape.

  Being whored out to other men.

  None of those prospects inspire the terror they used to.

  I’m too damn tired. I just want him to get it over with, whatever his plan may be.

  But he’s too damn patient.

  When a knock rattles the door, he isn’t the one behind it. Instead, I find Vanya, his expression wary. Balanced on his hands is another tray, this one containing a bowl of soup, a sandwich, and more water.

  “Is…is something wrong?” I croak, alarmed by his serious expression.

  “We will talk when you’re feeling better,” he says, his voice strained. “For now… Eat.”

  I take the tray from him without complaint, but he doesn’t leave. Instead, he watches while I bring the food to the bed and force a few bites down. On behalf of Mischa or himself?

  I can’t tell.

  Satisfied, he faces me directly, folding his hands over his lap. “I suggest you stay out of sight today. Mischa is planning—” He breaks off and seems to rethink his words. “Just stay out of his way.”

  “Why?” I can’t stop myself from questioning him despite the part of me clenching in foreboding. Judging from the look in Vanya’s eyes, whatever Mischa is up to, I don’t want to know. “Is he planning to sell me?”

  “Sell you?”

  I’m caught off guard by how Vanya laughs.

  “Things would be so much easier if he were, believe it or not.”

  I stiffen, but he doesn’t sound malicious. Just…alarmed? “What is that supposed to mean?”

  He meets my gaze. In the dim lighting, he looks so much older. Wizened and worn. “It means that you need to be more careful around him,” he warns. “I won’t pretend to know what you’ve been through before now. But Mischa… He can be a terrifying enemy. Or he can be a ruthless ally. If he sees you as a threat, he will eliminate you quickly.” He frowns, eyeing me as if seeing me for the first time. His hand drifts toward my cheek only for him to lower it without touching me. “But if he sees you as a tool worth having, he will never let you go.”

  My brain mulls his words over, pairing them with the way Mischa cornered me in the bath, constantly weighing my worth to Robert.

  I’m his enemy still. I’m sure of it.

  So then why does Vanya’s silence unnerve me as he leaves, closing the door behind him? Alone, I devour the rest of the food without dwelling on the tempting impulse to throw it away. When I finish, I leave the tray outside the door and climb onto the bed.

  With Mischa’s use for me in question, it’s ironic that I’ve been forced to wear the strange woman’s clothing once again. I chose a simple white dress that might have been a nightgown, yet I feel her in every inch of satin. She mocks me, this faceless predecessor. She taunts me.

  You’ll never know him.

  Whoever she was, Mischa cared enough about her to save these delicate items of clothing. That act alone contrasts with everything there is to hate about him. It brought up an even more dangerous emotion: curiosity.

  And, deep down, I know I’ve already learned far too much about my new monster.

  I know what he feels like aroused.

  I’ve tasted his rage.

  As for his revenge…

  It’s dark when heavy footsteps approach the newly repaired door and give me an inkling of what lies in store for me. Unsteadiness. Each footfall scrapes the floor, slow and reluctant. The figure they belong to casts a wide enough shadow to blot out all light emanating from the hall. I’m bathed in darkness for so long that my eyes begin to adjust as the knob finally turns, revealing the creature lurking over the threshold.

  Any hesitation he might have felt is left at the door. He strides boldly into the bedroom, slamming the door in his wake. The lock clicks and I watch him approach from the bed.

  My stomach lurches as I spot something dangling from his right hand. Long. Thin…

  Before I can name it, his knee extends, nudging me onto my side. My stomach. With me blinded, he mounts me from behind, ruthlessly using his weight to pin me in place. One of his hands cinches mine, wrapping something around my wrist. Rope? It bites into my flesh as he secures the limb beyond my head. To the bed frame? I tug it only to meet resistance.

  With my thoughts still spinning, he does the same to the other.

  And only now do I feel something: fear.

  At his mercy, there is no escape.

  I tense in anticipation as his hand grazes the back of my thigh and draws the hem of my dress up. Cold air kisses the flesh as if in warning: Brace yourself. He feels between my legs next, sliding what I suspect is the pad of a thumb along my entrance. Far too softly, so unlike his usual roughness. As if to spite me, he lingers there, testing me, and I can almost picture the thought circling his mind: hard or slow?

  My punishment comes without delay. He chooses both. Every inch of his length slams inside me with no preamble. Stretching. Taking. Claiming.

  Facedown against the sheets, I smother my moan into the
silk.

  Breathe, Ellen. After four choked gasps, I realize it’s impossible. From this angle, he’s deeper than he’s ever been. Harder. Thicker. Harsher. The second thrust throws me forward, straining my binds and ramming the top of my skull against the headboard. My eyes shut as another gasp escapes my lips to sink into the sheets. Another. Another.

  On the fifth brutal slam of his hips, real panic starts to gnaw away at the numbness. I can handle his hate. Or his lust. Not this.

  Not silence.

  He isn’t frenzied, grunting with each thrust. He’s slow. Careful. Precise. Each strike brutalizes a particular spot deep inside me that aches at the stimulation. It throbs. Heats. Ignites. The building pressure spreads through my belly, swiftly gathering in intensity until I’m moaning with every pass of his hips.

  Robert fucked me only for his pleasure, taking what he wanted. Never giving this deliberate, callous…feeling.

  I thrash, shaking my head, and buck against him desperate to arouse his rage.

  Fuck me.

  Hate me.

  Knowing damn well how to attack, he touches me, sliding his fingers along the ridge of my entrance, above where we’re joined. Too close. Too hard. Not hard enough.

  Then he groans, smothering the sound against my ear. Words, I think. My brain struggles to interpret them.

  “Bea..tiful. Fuck, you’re beautiful—” Sharp teeth scrape the back of my throat and then bite down hard, grinding the flesh between them. Take it.

  There is no reprieve. He rocks his hips, grinding the blunted tip of his cock against my abused walls. My eyelids flutter as my nails clutch at the air for stability.

  I can taste his madness on my tongue. It grows more potent with every unsteady lurch of the bed and jolt through my core. Bit by bit, he loses that careful rhythm and just…punishes.

  Slick flesh and sinful heat churn my thoughts into a senseless mass. Then, all at once, the harsh friction reaches a boiling point and every nerve short-circuits. Pleasure is a neutron bomb going off inside my skin. Muscles clench and tense, pulling him deep, deep, deep. Right when he begins to pulse inside me…