King's Men

by Lana Sky

  “Say it. Say it or you won’t get a fucking dime—”

  “I need you.”

  “That’s right.” He withdraws with a sigh. “You’re damn right you fucking do. Now, clean up this fucking mess.”

  I hear him leave. Somewhere deeper within the house, a door slams. Silence descends, lasting only a second before my sobs shatter it. They rip from me, wordless and howling.

  I don’t know how long I lie here, gasping for air. All I’m sure of is darkness and unrelenting cold as I return to my bedroom.

  Ice greets me beneath the sheets, a fitting sensation to match the chill encasing my heart. Nothing seems to ease it. No number of blankets pulled over my frame or any position over the mattress.

  For the first time in my life, I wish that Brandt Lloyd really is dead and gone, any doppelganger be damned. I pray for as much.

  Because the alternative is too terrifying to fathom. Could my beautiful boy have become a monster? My brain shies away from deciding on an answer. Instead, I squeeze my eyes shut, desperate to ignore my shorn hair. Cool air tickles my ears in a way it hasn’t in years. My shoulders chafe, assaulted by the sheets.

  But the worst discomfort dwells in my head, where Blake Lorenz waits, eager to terrorize me, even in sleep.

  Thirteen

  “Get up.”

  The harsh tone jolts me awake. Blake Lorenz is standing in my doorway, radiating a cold, subversive hate. It transcends mere disgust. Maybe this is his way of giving me an answer.

  He may not be Brandt Lloyd, but his hate is more than directed at my family. It’s me. A fact bolstered by the object he tosses onto my bed before storming out.

  I scramble for the item, hunting through twisted sheets. When my hand finally brushes the cool surface, I survey it dejectedly: a small box of hair dye. The woman on the package is a grinning brunette.

  And the depth of his newest command slices through me.

  He can’t be serious. I wait for a harsh order to come from the doorway. Something to cement his malice—but no. He leaves it up to me to interpret his meaning.

  And like he told me once before, I could easily walk away. It’s not like red hair is what makes me a Hollings—Papa was an icy blond, a trait shared by Ronan and Hunter. Mama was fair-haired as well, but it’s not her who I remember running his fingers through his hair as he remarked on the shade. Fiery Princess Snow.

  God, I can hear him. You can do anything if you stop letting the world get inside your head.

  But I did. I let the world get inside our lives and rip them apart. I let the world destroy him.

  Ten years later, I’m finally being punished for it.

  My heart aches as I carry the dye into the bathroom. Tears prick my eyes before I even get it open and spread out the materials over the counter. I work quickly, slathering every inch of coppery red in brown dye, though I don’t look at myself in the mirror once.

  After I shower and rinse, however, there’s no escaping my reflection.

  Blake Lorenz didn’t simply cut my hair. He mutilated the perfect image of Snowy Hollings and left a stranger in her place. Dark hair makes her blue eyes wider, her features painfully young. Jagged bits stick out from a blunt, shoulder-length bob. More tears fall before I can hold them back, but I chase down every one and smear them over the back of my hand.

  No. I won’t let him see me like this.

  I towel off, gritting my teeth against any sobs. Then I remember his rule against clothing and I’m left without a stitch of cotton to hide behind. Just my shorn, tangled hair. Drying it doesn’t help any. Neither does brushing it. My curls transform into an unruly heap springing in every which direction, a million different lengths. It’s dark. Ugly.

  This is how he wants me.

  But then why pay for me?

  The question haunts me as I pace, circling around my room. Soon, walking turns to jogging. Then running. My lungs burn and my heart pounds as I imagine bits of fat burning away. More. More. More. Sweat drips down my spine, slicking my limbs, and I use my bed as a post to count how many laps I take.

  Ten.

  Fifty.

  A hundred.

  Three hundred.

  I’ve lost count by the time I finally see him from the corner of my eye. He’s near the doorway, his arms crossed, far enough away that I can’t see him unless I turn directly to look.

  “Brandt Lloyd,” he says coldly.

  I flinch and stagger to a stop. The next second, I’m on my knees, hunched over as if the position can protect my heart from any further damage. Pain claws through me regardless.

  “You mentioned him,” Blake adds as if to drill the fact in: I brought him up first. I asked for it. “Why?”

  “You look like him.” There’s no point in lying now. With my gaze trained on the floor before me, it’s easier to admit it out loud. This man looks so much like Brandt.

  He scoffs. “As if you even remember him—”

  “Of course I do.” My head jerks upright. “I never forgot him.”

  “Oh?” he wonders, his head cocked dangerously to the side. My vision blurs around the edges, but his expression is clearer than ever. He is raw, twisted anger in human form. “Tell me, then. What do you remember, Snow?”

  Memories tumble loose from the maze of my thoughts, a million things I spent years tucking away. His laugh. His smile. The twinkle in his eye as he teased me. His scent. His touch. The only time he ever looked at me as anything other than a nuisance.

  God, I remember every inch of him.

  And it hurts.

  “Stop.” I turn on my heel, aching to keep moving. Run. When I lurch onto the tip of my toes, he steps forward as if sensing my need to flee, and his nearness alone traps me in place.

  “Tell me,” he goads in a whisper-soft tone. “Do you remember what a sap he was? How easy for you to manipulate?”

  “Stop—”

  “Or do you remember the lying?” He took a step closer without my realizing it. Each word strikes my bare shoulder in a burst of searing heat. “Do you remember sitting in the courtroom and looking him in the eye as you told the entire world that he—”

  “I didn’t lie.” The truth spills from my lips, bitter and tainted. I’m not lying. But neither are those three words the whole picture…

  “Bullshit.” A heavy hand latches onto the back of my skull, wrenching my head around to face him. I blink and his features blur into a mocking blend of light and shadow. “Say it,” he demands. “Fucking say it. Tell me he raped you.”

  On command, my lips part. It’s like I’m transported back ten years ago, forced to take the witness stand. I only had to utter three solemn words.

  “He raped me.”

  He shakes his head as a roar rips from his throat. In an instant, the callous businessman melds into a monster, twisted and snarling.

  “Say it again,” he commands.

  I recite my line on cue, sick with self-loathing. “He raped me.”

  Seconds pass in silence, with only the harsh sound of his breathing to add context to the tension. He’s more curious than angry. His gaze hunts my own, scouring over every blink and twitching pupil.

  “Fuck you,” he says, spitting each word against my skin. “Fuck you, you lying little cunt.”

  His free hand comes to trace the line of my jaw with surprising tenderness in comparison to the guttural cadence of his voice.

  “Tell me how he did it.”

  My lips spring apart at his command. “With his fingers…”

  “Digital penetration” they called it in the court filings, just as invasive as any other sexual abuse. I had the internal bruises to prove it, but my hymen was still intact, a fact made public to the world.

  “His fingers?” A dangerous cloud falls over Blake’s face, sucking the remaining humanity from his features. He tilts his grip, drawing my face closer to his as he muscles his body against mine.

  A sharp breath catches in my throat. He’s far too close. Heat radiates off his fo
rm, searing my flesh. Naked, I have no protection from his presence. No salvation. With one chilling caress down my cheek, he strips away any semblance of composure I had left. Tears fall, and he laughs at the sight of them.

  “Manipulative Little Snow. That won’t work on me.” His tongue flies out, grazing my jaw, crushing a bead of moisture in its path. He exhales raggedly, savoring the taste as his grip tightens. “I could fuck you here and now and you couldn’t cry rape, could you?”

  A cold sense of dread unfurls in my belly, sparking a single pathetic thought. He wouldn’t.

  “Answer me.”

  “N-no.”

  “You couldn’t.” He hisses through his teeth at my answer. “Now tell me why.”

  Fire crawls through my scalp as his grip tightens further, ripping stray strands from their follicle beds.

  “You’re hurting me—”

  “Answer the fucking question.”

  Numb with shame, I have no choice. “Because I sold myself to you,” I croak.

  “Damn right, you did.” He lets me go.

  Rudderless, I stagger toward my bed, forced to throw a hand out to catch myself against the side of the mattress.

  “I tell you to fuck me, you’ll fuck me,” he says, and I tremble beneath the implied threat. “I tell you to go to Bolles and fuck every bastard there—”

  “I’ll refuse.” How I found the strength to counter him, I’ll never know. It could be the glimpse of emotion I catch flitting across his gaze, even now. Something so faint but so undeniable that it challenges his assurances of the opposite.

  “Will you now?” he wonders, leaving an awkward silence demanding to be filled.

  “Why buy me if you don’t want me?”

  He throws his head back and laughs, glowering at the ceiling. “Little Snow, always so fucking conceited—”

  “Then say it,” I whisper. God, I almost sound like I’m begging him to prove me wrong. Deny what I feel in the most primal reaches of my being. “Tell me you don’t want me.”

  His gaze refocuses, honed like a blade plunging deep. “I’d rather fuck Charles than stick my cock in you.”

  Which isn’t an outright denial. In fact… The word usage terrifies me more.

  His gaze rakes over me, observing my bare breasts and quivering thighs. Contrary to his insistence, I catch him lingering over the space between my legs as a muscle in his jaw lurches against the taut skin.

  “Say it,” I request. A part of me won’t rest until he does. Perhaps it’s vanity? Or sheer desperation. I don’t want you, Snow.

  “I’ll take what I’m fucking owed, Snow,” he tells me, inching a dangerous step forward. “I’ll fuck you raw to prove my point if I have to: I own you.”

  He does. There’s no denying it; even if I wanted to be brave, I couldn’t. His possession is my only saving grace. But he won’t prove it any time soon, I suspect. He’ll make me wait. He’ll make me suffer.

  He’ll make me wonder just how he’ll break me open.

  “Why…why buy me if you don’t want me?” I repeat in the pathetic hope of a different answer. Something concrete. Anything but another lie.

  “Are you that eager to feel me inside you?”

  Alarm crashes down my spine, and instinct drives me away from him. Danger. Mayday. I’ve gone too far.

  He advances steadily, watching with hollow eyes as my calves strike the edge of my bedframe. “Lie down.”

  Ice solidifies in my throat. I can’t breathe. Suffocation begins in excruciating slowness as he waits for me to obey the command.

  Because I must. Or run. The latter has never seemed so fucking tempting. I’d race miles to put distance between myself and the man before me.

  Anything but stay and wait for him to deliver on the malice promised in his eyes.

  “I fucking told you to lie down.”

  My limbs contort on command. Bending knees lower me onto the mattress as my spine extends, guiding my back toward the rumpled sheets. He’s over me in an instant. A harsh shove on my chest pushes me down.

  “Spread your legs.”

  “Not like this.” I don’t know where the plea comes from—ripped from my soul, it feels like. I know he’ll fuck me eventually. I know he’ll make it hurt.

  But not like this—staring into my eyes, snarling with hate. I can tolerate his violation, but not when he looks like Brandt.

  “Is that so?” He sneers, his upper lip pulling back from his teeth, but he withdraws from me, lifting his hand from my chest. “Then how? Tell me, Snow? How do you want to be violated?”

  I cringe at the raw hatred in his tone, unable to escape giving him an answer. How? In darkness, with my face pressed against a pillow and my pores forced to absorb his shame. The imagery triggers a memory I don’t want to relive. My eyes shut against it. Too late. Creeping, searching fingers…

  “Look at me.”

  I snap my eyes open, a slave to his whims. Hovering above me, he’s a stranger again. Blake Lorenz, determined to push me over the edge.

  “Say it,” he hisses through clenched teeth.

  “Not like this.”

  I can’t explain the expression transforming his face. Such a creature can’t be remotely human. But he is. His humanity is proven in the way his fingers flex at his sides as if grappling with the very air for control. A beast wouldn’t fear his nature.

  “How, then?” Two harsh syllables betray his crumbling resolve. Against what? I can’t tell. I don’t want to even decipher the dark motives lurking behind those blue irises. “Say it.”

  “I don’t want you to hurt me.”

  He laughs, a grim chuckle that invades my pores like poison, burning. Searing. I writhe in silent agony. God, I need to run. Get away. Move.

  “And why shouldn’t I?” he wonders, creeping closer once again. His hand falls on my thigh, flexing as I flinch.

  “B-because you’re not Brandt Lloyd.” The words take everything I have to choke out, and he jerks back as though slapped.

  “And he hurt you, did he?”

  Such a quiet, dangerous tone of voice. Every part of me begs me to heed the warning in it. Stop.

  But I can’t. Words spill over my tongue, impossible to lock away.

  “He hurt me,” I croak. It’s the truth. My boy hurt me worse than anyone ever could. Papa. Blake Lorenz. Hunter or Ronan.

  He killed himself and part of me with him. He took his light away, leaving only darkness. I’ll never find my way out of this hell, and maybe a part of me blames him for it.

  But my words have a different meaning to Blake Lorenz. A broken laugh tears from his throat as he backs away before turning to the door.

  “You believe it, don’t you?” he mutters, almost to himself. “You think he did it. You think he raped you.”

  He doesn’t finish his statement, but I can fill in the blanks. You stupid, spoiled, conceited little bitch. Ten steps carry him to the doorway, where he wavers, his head cocked to deliver one last parting blow.

  “You don’t have to worry about me coming anywhere near you with my cock,” he warns. “I couldn’t fuck you even if I wanted to savor the experience of making you bleed. Why?”

  He pauses, letting the silence linger and anticipation build until I can almost taste it. Just when the dread reaches unbearable heights, he shoots an unsympathetic glance over his shoulder.

  “Because you’re disgusting. Every fucking inch of you is repulsive, inside and out. Fuck, even looking at you disgusts me, so forget my previous offer. You have three days to fit into the clothes or your shares are forfeited.”

  He’s gone before the true impact of his words can sink in. Embarrassment comes first, flooding my veins. Hunched over as I am, I can only shield so much of me from view with trembling fingers. I choose my stomach, feeling chunks of fat and flesh.

  Humpty Dumpty with no king to save her, just broken pieces.

  When I’m sure he’s gone, I roll onto my side and stare at the floor, urging myself to run. My legs refus
e to obey, and I turn my attention to the yawning bathroom doorway instead. My stomach churns, my eternal enemy. I’m disgusting. I’m repulsive.

  I’m a liar.

  The latter is the worst attribute of the three. Ten years can shape an ugly duckling into the semblance of a swan, but time can never heal the old wounds she gouged into innocent lives with fumbling intentions. I stare down at the body in question and frown. Then I scream—silently, of course—smothered against my palm.

  I’m a Hollings. That means something.

  We suffer in silence and take our transgressions to the grave.

  Like father like daughter.

  Fourteen

  This time of year, each day feels brief and dark—they’re getting shorter, after all. Colder. Warmth comes in the form of blood-red sunsets sprawled over the horizon. But not even a second later, it’s gone, smothered beneath the oppressive dark.

  Blake Lorenz dwells in my father’s study, a midnight creature giving context to the shadows. Their whispers resemble the scratching of an ink pen, chasing me into a fitful sleep.

  I emerge from a nightmare, drenched in a cold sweat, gasping on the verge of a scream—but it’s a harrowing few seconds before I understand why. Faint moonlight reveals the horror; the monster from my nightmare crept into my room and is hunched near the foot of my bed. Before I can scream, he lunges, pinning me beneath heavy, solid limbs.

  If only he smelled like a beast should smell. Not like wind, and rain, and all things clean and distilled. Not like Brandt.

  He even feels like Brandt.

  His nearness burns like Brandt.

  With his mouth inches from my ear, this specter demands one thing. “Fucking tell me why,” he growls. “Tell me why you did it, Snow. Just fucking tell me why.”

  His voice… The way it cracks and splinters. No one could fake that sound. No one.

  Heart heavy with dread, I realize I really am in a dream. The truth can be uttered only in my dreams.