by E. S. Carter
His leg twitches and I pray he moves. I yearn for him to make himself known. Above me, my husband sees something too. Maybe the man’s eyes betrayed him; maybe his mouth opened to protest. Whatever he did it’s enough for my husband to attack.
I flail backward and fall onto my rump as Cole’s entire body pounces and his chair goes flying back, hitting the wall with such force that the intricately carved legs splinter.
I lift my head just in time to see Cole dive across the table, pulling a large serrated hunting knife from a holster on his lower leg. In a movement so fluid it looks almost unreal, he lunges at the man, whose panicked body struggles to get up in time, and slices smoothly across his jugular with such force that he is almost decapitated. His lifeless head lolls back, blood spraying from the gruesome wound, and the vertebrae of his neck the only thing keeping it attached to his shuddering body.
Panic ensues, guns are drawn, some point at Cole, some at each other, but it does not phase him in the slightest.
He pushes off the table, standing tall and menacingly, and eyeballs every man in the room.
“That is just a taster of what happens to those who disregard my rule. I am not Alec-fucking-Craven, I am Cole Hunter, and you will need more than a few guns pointed at my chest to take me down.”
The men stand with their eyes wide; most are not fighters, and the ones with guns outstretched in their hands have true fear in their eyes as their arms shake under the weight of their weapons.
These are the elite. These are the men that command killers to do their bidding, they do not kill themselves, it is beneath them. Most have probably never fired a gun.
Cole, however, looks dangerous enough to spill the blood of everyone in this room and never take a breath.
Just in case anyone thought otherwise, two men break ranks and slowly stand on either side of my husband.
I recognise both of them.
Grim and Luke.
The other men glance around at each other before landing on the three at the head of the table.
Three men, who I know, would take on all of those around them and win.
Weapons get slowly lowered, and seats are shakily put back into place as they all begin to sit.
When the last man is no longer standing, Cole smiles. He raises an arm around the shoulders of Luke and Grim, patting them once.
“Good. I’m glad we all agree. Now, if you’ll excuse me, gentlemen, I have a hungry wife to feed.”
They nod once at him before he turns to me and takes a step forward.
“Did you enjoy the show, my love?”
His hand grips my upper arm, and he pulls me to my feet.
“I sincerely hope so, for this is just a prelude to tonight’s finale. I’m sure you are going to love it.”
As he guides me from the room I catch Grim in my peripheral vision. His face is one of pure unadulterated pleasure as he leans over the the slain man, and tears his head from his body.
Pretentious fuckers.
Sitting at the table lording over everything, thinking they are all untouchable.
They are a means to an end.
Each one of those cunts thinks I’m a rabid dog under their control.
Slitting Renshaw’s scrawny neck released only a fraction of the pressure I feel building in my gut.
While I carved at his jugular, my men were at his child porn farm.
The stately and noble estate that had been passed down through generations, home of Lords and Ladies, was an elaborate façade for a breeding centre. Women were force bred and their offspring used as extras in snuff films and sickening porn movies. Children, even babies, were used as living toys to be raped, beaten and killed.
Right at this moment my men were there executing every staff member and freeing the women and children.
His perverted wife, the much lauded Lady Emily Renshaw, and the mastermind of the farm would be taken alive.
She was promised to Grim. I had vowed long ago that her head was his and his alone.
I could feel the excited energy pulse from him as he drank in the sight of a near decapitated Renshaw. His quest for revenge and the bloodlust fuelling his veins is more tangible than the collective room full of fear around us.
He deserved this.
He deserves to wear her head as a crown and bathe in her blood.
Henry Renshaw.
Just a young, beaten and abused boy when I met him.
Now a formidable and unforgiving foe.
My brother; not one of shared blood but spilled blood.
Grim.
How I wish I could watch as the life leaves his bitch of a mother’s eyes. Although I’m sure, knowing Grim, he’ll record it as a souvenir.
I leave my brothers to their tasks.
The adrenaline of our win, so close I can taste it, fuels my desire for something else. Something sweeter.
My wife.
I crave her sweet screams.
And scream she will.
Faye Craven.
A Craven whore.
No part of her will be spared.
The air in the car is thick with emotions that overwhelm me.
Being alone with Cole after witnessing him take yet another life should repulse me, but it doesn’t.
We’ve been married less than two days, and already four people have died at his hand.
I will not lie to myself and say he doesn’t petrify me, but, so far, those who’ve been slain have all deserved their brutal end.
Killers, rapists, paedophiles; all evil, all sent to their maker justly.
That doesn’t make me naïve enough to believe my husband is a good man. I can see the darkness in him. It is so potent that I am bracing for it to swallow me whole, and I’m not sure I am strong enough to survive.
“Will your eyes mourn your father as they do your mother?”
My head turns to Cole, who isn’t looking at me but is intently watching the blurring world outside the car window.
His question confuses me. My condition has nothing to do with choice, and everything to do with the head trauma I endured in the crash. Still, I answer, giving him yet more of my honesty. “I will not grieve for that man. My eyes are part of me; they will not mourn him either.”
His head slowly turns to regard me. His face is so strikingly handsome that it almost takes my breath away when he allows me to stare at it openly.
“Did he refuse to spoil you with gifts or withhold your trust fund? Are you pissed at him for denying you designer clothes or a fancy car? Tell me, Princess, how does a father lose his daughter’s love?”
Where do I start?
With what wrong shall I begin my tale?
The greatest wrong of all.
Far greater than any punishments meted out by my father’s hand, or the hours of isolation I endured. Far greater than being despised by your own flesh and blood.
“He murdered my mother.”
My truth. Pure and simple.
Something flashes in his eyes and his aura changes subtly, going from his typical solid black to a smoky grey with pulses of pale green.
Sympathy.
He empathises with my reason.
It lasts mere seconds before the black absorbs all other colours and his stare turns hard.
“Maybe she deserved it.”
His words pour fury through my veins, and I again speak without thinking.
“Maybe I deserved to die too. I was just a child when our car was run off the road the night she tried to leave him. The night she tried to save me from this life.” Enraged I continue, “Maybe I also deserved the years of punishments, the isolation, and the starvation. The perverse ways he tried to break me to pay for the sins of my mother. Maybe forcing a small child into a cage no bigger than her body and lowering it into a bath full of ice water, then watching as she fought for air was something else I deserved. Or maybe it was the cruelness of my warden that was the most fitting punishment. The way she would dangle affection in front of me like a
carrot, only to tear it away. Or the ways she would watch, getting herself off with her fingers, while Grant forced me to pose for him, forced me to touch him, forced me to spread his cum all over my young skin. Maybe that was what the daughter of a traitorous whore deserved.”
My voice cracks on the final words, a sob trapped in my throat wanting to break free. But he does not deserve my tears; Cole will never get my tears.
His icy gaze remains locked on mine for what seems like an eternity. When he breaks eye contact and resumes his stare out of the window, I feel the loss instantly and wrap my arms around myself to ward off the chill that emanates from my bones.
Lost in my own head, I do not notice that we have arrived back at Cole’s estate until we pull up outside the front doors. The car stops and Cole exits, then he does something unexpected, and moments later my door opens.
He doesn’t issue his favoured command, but his extended palm lets me know what’s expected of me.
A little shocked by the courteous display, I slowly place my hand in his, shivering at the warmth of his touch and the way his large hand feels against my much smaller one.
He doesn’t pull me from the car; he waits for me to disembark and I can feel his stare even though I haven’t looked up at his face.
“I have things to attend. I will escort you to our room and tell the staff to bring you food. We leave at eight. I expect you to be ready; I think you will enjoy this evening’s entertainment.”
I can only nod.
There is no reason to incur his wrath, plus I could do with some time alone to collect my thoughts and gather my bearings.
When he leaves me alone in our room, I sit on the edge of the bed and try to get my racing mind to calm. I sit for so long that the sun rises high in the sky before beginning its slow descent. Hours pass, and I do not move until a low buzz indicates someone disengaging the locks and entering the room.
I lift my head and watch as Luke enters the room holding a tray full of food which he proceeds to carry to the French doors, setting it down on the small table situated between two chairs. He pops a grape into his mouth before turning to face me, his mouth crunching down on the fruit as his lips tip up into a grin.
“You must be hungry, Pet. Come and eat with me, I promise not to bite.”
I observe his relaxed stance and the casual way he leans down to take another piece of fruit, while his eyes never leave mine.
Luke, as always, is never easy to read. He is one of the few that my gift does not give a clear impression. It is both intriguing and frustrating. Having lived with my ability for more years than not, it is when I am around those like Luke, that I realise how heavily I rely on it. Just as most people make decisions based on their five senses, I make mine using my Feyness, or second-sight.
Without this ability, I fall back on my intuition, something I seriously lack.
Is Luke being friendly? Doubtful.
Does he have an ulterior motive? Definitely.
Can I use him to my advantage? We shall see.
Slowly rising, I walk towards him and take a seat on one of the high-backed chairs. He smiles to himself and takes a seat in the other. We are far enough away from each other that I don’t feel stifled, yet close enough for him to touch me, should he so wish.
“Did Cole send you?”
I ask my question but drop my eyes to the food on the table. Reaching out to grab some cheese, which I don’t actually want but I need to keep my hands busy. Fidgeting is one of my tells.
My eyes flick to his face in time to see him bite into a polished red apple. He chews his food before casually glancing at me and answering, “No, I saw the maid bringing you your tray and thought you might like some company. Was I wrong? Would you prefer to sit in isolation?”
I take a cracker from the plate and bring it to my lips, the food covering the movement of my mouth, “Not at all. This is your home; you are free to do as you wish.”
He raises the apple to his lips once more, then lowers it without taking a bite. His eyes tracking from my face, down to my chest and ending on my legs before he raises his gaze to meet mine once again.
“I could say something crude, something about the things I wish to do to you once my brother becomes bored, but I’m more of a shower than a teller.” He smirks, and his original façade of nonchalance slips away.
His words betray a jealousy he harbours, possibly towards Cole. His grin is forced and for a brief moment, his aura flashes a faint colour. Orange, burnt orange, the colour of betrayal.
Whether it was his emotions he was emitting or ones he felt towards another, I cannot tell. It was too brief to be sure.
“Cat got your tongue, Pet? Come now, you can converse with your new brother, can you not?”
I clear my throat, pushing all thoughts aside, other than my plan. I need to find a way to use Luke, and this is the opportunity to begin gleaning information from him.
“Why do you both hate the Cravens? Why, when our families have been linked for hundreds of years, do you and your brother want to sever that connection?”
This time, there is no mistaking his emotions when his aura flashes red. Angry, violent and bloodthirsty red that is quickly swallowed up by the blackness that also clings to Cole.
He places his half eaten apple on the table and runs his index finger across his lips in thought.
I take the opportunity to look at him, to study his features and drink in his masculine perfection.
If Cole has an angelic beauty, Luke is the flip side of the coin with his dark and brooding features.
“Cat got your tongue, brother?”
I don’t know why I push him, other than I want to see if he snaps as quickly as his sibling.
He does.
The heavy, wingback chair I sit in is pushed fully over, and all the air leaves my lungs in a whoosh. The impact of landing flat on my back so unexpected that it steals my oxygen.
Within seconds he is on me, his hands pinning mine to the rough upholstered fabric, his torso across my bent legs that dangle uselessly in the air.
Now I see the true Luke and the darkness he hides so well flares to life and pulses from his body.
I raise my chin the best I can in my position and glare up at him, daring him to go further.
“Feisty little bitch, aren’t you? Tell me, sister, will you scream when I have you in my chains? Will begs of mercy fall from your plump lips when I carve my initials into your flesh? Will you cry me a river when I ram your cunt with my cock or will you sob for the lash of my cane instead?”
At last. Luke reveals himself to me. Every rotten corner of his soul is flayed wide open and bare for me to see.
“I belong to Cole. Do you think he would allow you the first taste of his wife, brother?”
The word is left unfinished on my lips as his hand darts out to grip my throat. His fingers bruise my skin and crush my windpipe.
I let my triumph reflect in my eyes even as the black spots begin to creep into the field of my vision which only serves to enrage him further.
“Release her, Luke.”
The deep baritone of my husband commands from the doorway, his body is at his sibling’s back with just a few long strides.
I lift my hands up to claw at his, trying and failing to loosen his relentless grip. Cole’s large hand lands on his shoulder, his threatening tone unmistakable, even to me whose body and senses are shutting down from lack of oxygen.
“Let. Her. Go. You don’t want me to make you, Brother. And I will, have no fear.”
Luke’s angry eyes stare into mine, and are the last thing I see before my world goes completely black.
The last muffled words I hear are, “I warned you, Luke,” before I disappear into nothingness.
Why is Luke in my room with my wife when I forbade him from being near her and what has the Craven whore done to break his normally unshakable composure?
Seeing him with his hands on her throat throttling the life out of her brings out a
rage in me unlike any other.
I see blood.
Lots and lots of blood.
My brother’s blood.
It takes every ounce of my self-restraint not to gut him where he stands.
When he disobeys my order to let her go, and I watch the light leave her mismatched eyes, I completely lose control.
My body moves on autopilot, and my brother is pinned against the far wall with my favourite knife to his throat before he has taken his next breath.
His hands shake with the exertion of his actions. His eyes are burning into me with disbelief and a heavy dose of betrayal.
I am about to bathe in my brother’s blood, my only kin, and for what? The life of a Craven?
This is the second time that that whore has come between us. Still, I cannot drop my weapon from Luke’s throat. I still rage with the need to slice at his flesh.
“I warned you, Brother. I told you not to touch her.” I grit out between clenched teeth, my blade pressing further into his skin, drawing first blood.
“You forget, Cole. You forget who she is, what her family has done to us. Every time I watch you with her I can see you forget a little more. I am saving you from her before she turns you into our father.”
“I am nothing like our father and she is not her mother.” I shake with fury, my brother’s large frame seemingly smaller in my ruthless grasp.
“I have not, nor will I ever forget.”
My eyes leave his face and fall to the woman on the floor by our feet. Her hair is spread around her head like a halo. Her pale skin lifeless, her plump lips blue. This is the first time that when I look at her, I don’t see a Craven whore, I see Faye. A victim of circumstance just like us.
“She is not like them. She is not like us either, but from what I’ve seen she does not deserve our wrath.”
The admission shocks me, and I look to my brother’s furious face, catching the look of disdain aimed wholly at me.
“You have fallen under her spell, Cole. You are blind to it, but I can see. My untouchable brother is bewitched by a freak whore.”
I raise the blade from his throat and strike at his temple. The butt of the handle hitting the perfect spot to knock him out cold.
