Seducing Virtue (Wicked Trinity Book 3)

by Courtney Lane

  “I really don’t know what to do.” As I said the words, my uncertainty knifed through every vowel. I knew what to do, and it was so far from the soul of my being I couldn’t make sense of it. My heart was anchored in vengeance, my head was battling with what was right when it didn’t know where the line stood.

  “Listen, Keaton.” Nadine snapped her fingers in the air to wake me out of my daze. “Shiloh has lost his shit. The things he’s done to us?” She held up her bandaged hand. “He’s not the man I trained him to be. He’s fucking psychotic. Men like him can’t be trusted. He’s going to turn on you like he turned on us.”

  “For you to say that, it makes me think he put you here for more than revenge,” I surmised. “That means you three were all contributors in making him become Reven and in destroying him when he became what you wanted him to be.”

  “He’s something worse.” Her lips trembled, and I couldn’t believe it was due to fear. “He isn’t someone you can handle on your own. He’ll break you before you get a chance to free us. Let Noah handle this. Find him. I have a number. If you can reach him, tell him what’s going on, and he’ll fix this.”

  “Don’t listen to her,” Mrs. Sherman said to me, urgency speeding her steps forward. “She’s trying to trap you.”

  Nadine sucked her teeth and struggled to stand. The look she cast at Mrs. Sherman was full of hatred and disgust. “Do you really want to listen to an old hag who helped Noah with his first kill? Who let Noah fuck her, made him beat her, and demean her?” She slid her eyes up and down my body. “If you want to blame anyone for the fucked-up sadist he is, blame that bitch. She taught him how to hurt to feel and she also taught him how to kill.”

  “Nadine, you know less than you pretend to know about him,” Mrs. Sherman contested.

  “Are you going to admit to Keaton you are the reason he is the way he is?” Nadine taunted her with a sneer.

  “I will not admit to something that isn’t true.” Mrs. Sherman shook her head with finality. “I only tried to help Noah. I made him feel comfortable in who and what he was. Believe me, I only brought light to what was already within him.” She turned to me, her eyes as warm as the day I thought I could trust her to help me. “Play Shiloh’s game and see where it leads. You’ll know when to act. Acting rashly and listening to Nadine will get all of us nowhere.”

  I looked down at my hands, no longer questioning Mrs. Sherman’s role in Noah’s life.

  “Your big mouth just lost an adversary,” Nadine snickered. “Fuck her. I know Noah, and I know Shiloh a fuck of a lot more than she does. He’s going to kill us.” She caught the spark in my eyes and subdued her smirk. “Hey, I know you hate us and think we deserve prison, right? Death is too easy. It’s always too easy. You’re a good girl. Play the good girl game and get Noah. You know he’s the only one who can handle this.” Her eyes scattered around her cell. “I just need something to write with.” She held out her finger. “Go get something. I’ll give you Noah’s use-in-case-of-an-emergency number.”

  Nodding with a promise I didn’t intend to keep, I turned toward the exit. I paused at the doorframe, leading to the stairwell, and glanced back at Nadine. “When you told me about Shiloh at the police station—after we left Rebirth—were you giving me information based on what Noah told you, or what you knew?”

  “Why the hell does that matter right now?” She snapped at me and dug her fingers into her head like a crazed woman with fleas. “I didn’t really know Shiloh until after we—me and Noah—thought up the idea of Rebirth. What I said was what Noah told me, and some of it was true because of what I saw that little shit do at Rebirth.”

  “What did you see, Nadine? Did he kill anyone?” I asked.

  “No…but so what? There are worse things.”

  “Other than murder?” I turned fully toward her, my fists shaking in anger. “You and your husband having a hand in my friend’s murder? You think there’s something worse than that?”

  She closed her eyes and sunk into her cot. “What I meant was—”

  “You’re done, Nadine,” Mrs. Sherman cut her off. Under the shadow of her cell, I thought I caught a glimpse of Mrs. Sherman’s teeth.

  Unable to make sense of it, I headed back upstairs. I attempted to close the door to the antechamber, but the keycard panel and locks intimidated me.

  “What are you doing awake?” Braedan’s deep voice shook me to my bones, and caused me to jolt back in surprise.

  “I…was looking for water.” I clutched my chest as my heart raced at an erratic rhythm.

  He glanced over his shoulder toward the kitchen on the other side of the house, and crossed his arms over his bare and brawny chest. “We’re past the lies we used to tell one another. It’s no longer necessary. Did you get what you needed from my guests?” Dropping his arms, he stalked toward me.

  “I-I don’t know.”

  His hands clasped either side of my neck as he leaned in, pressing his forehead against mine. “Were you expecting to find their humanity?”

  “I…I kept looking at Nadine, and I couldn’t help what I felt. I saw Sonja, what she was, and what she could’ve been, and I felt this burning need to… It guts me to think of them getting rescued by Noah or receiving prison time where they are still living while my friend and her unborn child will never get the chance to live in this world again.” I pressed my closed fist against my chest. “Sonja was a good person. She was better than anyone I’d ever met and they…and they—” I bit into my trembling lip and shook my head. “I hate them for what they did, and I’m not the kind of person to hate anyone. I can’t…I can’t help this feeling. I see her death all over again every time I look at Nadine or Adam.”

  “Tell me what you want, Keaton. Don’t think. Don’t rationalize. Don’t fight. Tell me what you imagined doing when you spoke to Nadine, the woman who ordered the death of your friend.”

  “I want them to pay.” The words burst forth like daggers slicing my tongue. The confession made me feel like I leveled the field and had sunk to their level. “I don’t know who I’m becoming.”

  “It doesn’t make you evil to want justice outside of the law. You and I both know Noah’s reach is long, and once they are in the system, their recompense is out of my hands. With them here, they will pay our way.” He took my hand from my heart and directed me to hold onto his neck. “And Noah’s punishment will come in time. I swear it.” He scooped me up in his arms, carrying me back upstairs.

  IT WAS A peculiar sensation to be torn between happiness and contentment only to contend with a hollow created by circumstances I hadn’t foreseen. My gaze didn’t land on Keaton, beside me in bed, wrapped around me as I’d imagined in my dreams when I awoke earlier.

  I should’ve remained awake, watching her sleep and recreating our moments together in my mind, combing over every detail: how she felt, tasted, and her scent. It was everything she wanted, and yet, it wasn’t enough to remove her doubts.

  Once more, my guests in the basement served as my diversion.

  “So you got your dick wet, huh?” Nadine roughly snapped me free from my melancholic daydream.

  I lingered by her cell, anticipating her nightly ritual to utilize her bucket. Usually, such provisions wouldn’t have been provided. I’d rather the woman was assaulted by the putrid stink of her own feces. In this circumstance, I had a purpose.

  “You screwed her and now what?” In the shadows, I discerned her chastisement from the dramatic sway of her head. “You have no fucking loyalty for Noah.” Nadine treaded forward, holding her bucket low in front of her legs.

  “We can’t all be inherently blind followers to Noah’s cause, can we?” My words sliced through her false iron exterior with a diamond edge.

  The corner of her thick lips curled upward. “Then why isn’t she still here?”

  “I’m not sure,” I admitted, unwittingly disclosing a hint of weakness.

  “You have to be Reven.” She dropped the bucket before her and gripped her hi
ps.

  She was on the cusp of becoming a clone of Noah. He had given me similar ill advice. “You have to be Magnus—be the Reven I created—or she won’t respect or love you,” he had said. His skewed guidance threw me fully into the character he created, and I saw no escape.

  Shortly before I was betrayed at Rebirth, I discovered who Keaton had given her virginity to and whom she continued to engage in sexual acts while in what they thought was secret. When confronted about my knowledge, Noah, unaware I had fixed the cameras and saw the truth, continuously lied to me. There was no strength to fend off the misery hollowing me out as I witnessed the looks they exchanged with one another. It was easy to teeter on the edge of a man I hated. My rage devoured me until only the vision of Keaton slipping away from me filled my view.

  “That’s the only way you’ll ever be able to keep her,” Nadine continued. “The good dick she thinks she’s getting will get old. She’ll remember you were a sad fucked-up man-child who let horrible things happen and jacked off to the carnage.”

  “Do you enjoy having the inability to wipe your ass with your dominant hand?” I questioned her with a grin. “Because if you continue on this path, you’ll lose the use of all your limbs.”

  “She won’t forgive you for this.” She gestured around her cell. “She thinks in stark colors when it comes to everything but Noah. With Noah, she’ll see the rainbow if she needs to. You saying you’re the perfect tragic boy who was hurt by the big, mean world while keeping us locked down here doesn’t make sense to her. Shit, it doesn’t make sense to me, either. But she’s not going to give you what you want when you are keeping the people who were once her friends locked up in the basement.”

  “Friends?” My chortle bounced around the walls, awakening my other two guests. “You’ve managed to become worse than Noah to her. Adam tried to thwart her mother’s career by skewering Keaton, and as though he needed to paint himself with a darker brush, he murdered a woman and her unborn child on what I know to be your orders.”

  “It doesn’t change anything.” Spittle flew from Nadine’s mouth. She radiated with anger, proving my selection of topics and truths was more than she could endure. “When Noah comes back—when Noah realizes that we’re gone—you’ll lose her again.”

  She inadvertently provided me with a key piece of knowledge. Nadine was close to breaking. It would only take a moderate shove to place her where I planned for her to be. “There are two options Keaton may choose. She will either remain with me, or she won’t choose either of us.”

  “Stupid,” she muttered and curled her lip at me.

  My smile had faded, and the tension returned. I advanced toward her, prepared to break her in a blaze of agony. “Mind repeating yourself, Nadine?”

  “I called you stupid.” She clung to the cage as though she could easily escape her prison and damage me. “You’re living in a fucking fantasy. Noah will kill you, or your crazy ass will get locked in an asylum where you deserve to be. You’ll get all the shit you deserve. Trust me.”

  “And what about you, Nadine? Do you assume you’ll achieve a little slice of heaven after all you’ve done?” I paced to Adam’s cell and banged on the metal. He stirred in the dark corner and huddled into a ball. If Nadine was the female version of Noah, then Adam was the more fragile version of Keaton. Nadine continuously drugged him and fucked him. Sometimes with a steel cock, other times with what she was born with between her legs. Nadine had a formula for breaking the minds and hearts of the men at Rebirth; she’d beat the skin off their backs when they disobeyed, and fuck them when they obeyed.

  I’d admit, at times the power fueled me with an unrivaled euphoria. In the moment a member at Rebirth experienced fear and relented to insanity, my power reached its heights.

  Now, I found myself with my heels stuck in concrete, encased in a powerless vortex that siphoned my energy and ticked away at my sanity. Keaton had me at her mercy, waiting and playing by her rules until she forgave me for my crimes.

  It was difficult to consolidate my world with hers, but I was attempting to adhere to the rules. I’d do anything I could to gain what I desired most.

  “If you’d prefer to remain in a cell, smelling your own excrement all night, who am I to deny you?” With a wink, I treaded toward the exit.

  “Wait!” she called out.

  I turned and watched her inject the needle into her arm. I waited a tick before the muscle relaxant took effect. She slid to the floor and crawled toward her cot like a well behaved dog. “Why do you do this anyway?” Her words slurred and her eyelids drooped over her azure orbs. “You could hire someone to do this. That’s why you could never be a real leader but the face and image of one.” She struggled to lift her arm and point a slender finger in my direction. “Leaders are born, pussies are made. A leader would’ve hired someone to clean shit buckets. A pussy does it himself.”

  “Remind me to up your dose next time to tire you out faster,” I muttered, unlocking her cell to obtain the bucket.

  I stepped inside, and a blur of black blindsided me, impacting the back of my head. The cling of metal hinted it might’ve been something she found from her cot.

  A haze blanketed my vision in white spots, delaying my speed. My shattered equilibrium was swift to clear.

  Nadine was only able to salivate at her failed plan to escape. The key panel wouldn’t engage for her, leaving her stuck in her prison.

  Matted black hair was gripped tightly in my fist. A punch to her chest forced her to collapse and weaken. She slid to the floor, choking on her own blood. I led her by her hair into her cell, throwing her against the wall once she was there, and shortly thereafter, engaged the lock.

  I fingered the back of my head. Crimson liquid dotted my hands. Anger and hatred fueled my energy, returning it to me in full. “If that’s how you’d like to end the night, who am I to argue?” Methodic in my actions, I retrieved a red canister and a vintage broom made of wood and straw from the secured storage closet.

  “What are you doing?” Panic riddled Nadine’s voice.

  I followed through, without explanation, placing the items beside the entry to Adam’s cage and turned back to the wall to push the sawhorse across the floor and rested it beside my selection of devices. At a lazy rate, I dialed the passcode on the keypad to open Adam’s cell.

  On my approach, Adam attempted to make his nude body smaller. He cowered in the corner, whispering pleas to salvage his life. His hair served as a leash to force him into position. I situated the sawhorse perfectly underneath the main sprocket to the fire-containment system. I secured his limbs to the legs of the wood device.

  “He can’t fight, because you drugged him, you asshole. Leave him alone.” Nadine slurred her ill words toward me and slid across the ground, reaching out to touch the side of her prison, facing Adam’s cell. “If you have a problem, take that shit out on me.”

  I kept my eye on her and rounded Adam to stand at his rear. I lifted the end of the broom, observing where it would be injected and easily slid it inside. Nadine must’ve broken him in quite a bit, his anus barely gave me trouble.

  Nadine’s eyes widened upon the discovery of where I decided to stick the broom into her husband. She threw a stream of curses and insults in my direction.

  “Nadine. Nadine.” I reached for the canister of kerosene and bathed Adam in it. “Instead of wisely pleading for your husband’s life, you’re disrespecting me…again.” The last of the kerosene was used to coat the broom.

  Adam moaned and groaned his discontent. The sedative had taken its effect, leaving him helpless to my punishment.

  I reached in my pocket, retrieving a lighter and a cigarette. I lit it as it remained clenched between my lips. Arching my neck, I blew smoke rings into the air. Slanting my head downward, I threw the lit cigarette at the broom, and removed myself from Adam’s cell, locking it behind my exit. Plucking up the tablet from my chair, I pressed a series of digits. The large slabs of fire-rated glass panels retracted fr
om the ceiling, locking together when it became vertical with the floor and encaged Adam. The next series of numbers ventilated Nadine and Abigail’s cells. The last thing I wanted was for my two other guests to die of smoke inhalation.

  Abigail stirred, coming to the front of her cage. “It’s not too late to stop it. Put out the fire. You don’t have to do this, Shiloh. Don’t let him die this way.”

  “My name is not Shiloh.” My cadence held to a throaty and low undertone, warning her to stay off her path of resistance. “Nadine hasn’t learned her lesson, and she’s proven to me that her husband is very expendable to her. He’s useless because Nadine has rendered him as such. Why have him here when I have no use for him? Nadine’s actions have set Adam’s death sentence.” I lifted my eyes at her. “You have an interesting little feature in your cell. Did you look down at your feet? Did you think the designs were for show? If you call me Shiloh again, I’ll fill the divots with acid.”

  I turned my attention back to the beautiful show. The fire in Adam’s cell had ignited, sending a rush of amber flames up his body at a rapid pace. The beautiful white, black, and orange fire burned brighter, feeding off the accelerant in the kerosene, engulfing his body in an array of flames.

  Limp movement indicated he was still alive and fighting to remain that way. His gurgled screams and cries were an engaging symphony to my other guests’ sobs. He danced around, tipping over to the floor along with the sawhorse. Amazingly, the broom remained inside him. His skin turned from white to bright orange to a darker hue, blackened and burning past skin to bone.

  I closed my eyes to focus on Nadine, begging and pleading for Adam’s life. The moment couldn’t be enjoyed for too much longer. I pressed another passcode, engaging the sprinkler system. A flush of water snuffed out the fire within seconds. The glass retracted from Adam’s cage, and the ventilation duct was opened, syphoning the toxic smoke from the air.