King's Men

by Lana Sky

  “Tell me what they said.”

  “It doesn’t matter. He’s gone.” My gaze returns to my reflection, tracing the hollow features. I need that lipstick after all, and I clumsily fish it from a drawer and swipe at my lower lip. Light pink only makes me resemble a ghost more.

  “Get dressed.”

  I hear him march into the bedroom, and the door slams a second later. When I gather the nerve to follow in his wake, I find a new dress waiting for me on my bed. It’s black, cut scandalously with a plunging V-neckline and two waist-high slits on either side. The tag claims that it’s in my size, and I nearly collapse with relief when it fits.

  He left shoes for me as well—a pair of my own black heels. Does this mean he’s kept my wardrobe somewhere in the house? I don’t dare hope. Instead, I enter the hallway and find him waiting for me at the foot of the stairs.

  Only now do I let myself wonder where a man like Blake Lorenz would travel with me on his arm. An arm he doesn’t look eager to extend. He scowls as I descend the staircase, his gaze flitting over my waist. Is he disappointed that I met his challenge? I expect a frown to prove as much, but he only cocks his head slightly to the side, and I can’t shake the feeling that he’s intrigued for a reason other than shock.

  “He talked about you rarely,” he says, and my steps falter.

  God, tonight, he seems more willing than usual to use Brandt’s name as a knife, cutting deep where he knows it will sting the most. My fingers flutter over my stomach, pinching fat through the satin. Brandt spoke of me rarely, but I can imagine what he might have said. Hell, Blake’s already given me a cruel taste.

  Fat Snowy.

  Ugly Snowy.

  Stupid, spoiled, evil Snowy.

  “He was always a poetic fucking sap. The way he talked about you, someone might have thought you were an angel.”

  My breath catches in my throat. I can’t move. Having Brandt’s memory tossed in my face hurts, but this…

  Only a monster would lie so coldly.

  “He did,” Blake insists as if sensing my doubt. He advances a step, reaching out a hand to finger the skirt of my gown. I shiver at the contact, feeling his heat bite through the satin. “He talked about your eyes, so blue. Your hair. He loved your hair—”

  “Please stop.”

  He doesn’t. “Little, lovely Snow.” He’s closer. His palm captures my chin, tilting my face for his inspection. His eyes smolder as they meet mine, a wealth of disgust. “You were the one damn person in the whole world he thought he could trust. And he died knowing you were a fucking liar, but if he could see you now…” He digs his fingers into the base of my throat, keeping me from turning away. I gasp, but he merely blinks, unconcerned. “He’d probably lose his fucking mind to see you now, still lying.”

  Our last conversation rings in my ears. The letters?

  “I-I didn’t lie,” I say, forcing the words out as he drags me closer, drawing our faces within mere inches of each other’s.

  “Oh? Tell me. How did you mail these so-called letters? Did you do it the same night he raped you?”

  Heat floods my cheeks. “I gave them to someone I could trust,” I admit.

  “Who?”

  I’ve never seen him like this. Despite all of his apparent hate toward me, he never looked at me with such raw, burning loathing.

  “Who?”

  I cry out as his nails scrape the curve of my jaw, drawing blood. “M-my mother!”

  Suddenly, he lets me go and I fall back, striking my ass off the middle step.

  If anything, he looks more off-balance. His hand grips the banister, his body hunched. For a second, I wonder if he’s hurt himself somehow. A heart attack? Then his eyes meet mine and all I find in them is a grim, chilling resignation.

  “Elizabeth,” he says in a rasping tone. “That bitch.”

  He pushes away from me and races down the hall like a man possessed. I hear a door open from somewhere deep within the house. The kitchen, maybe? He could have gone into the gardens.

  For what?

  My mind shies away from guessing the answer. Something is wrong. I sense it in the air—this foreboding pulsation urging me to run. Intending to do just that, I lurch to my feet and stumble down the remainder of the stairs. I come close to the door. So damn close.

  Before my fingers can connect with the handle, I turn on my heel and return to my room. My thumb engages the lock. No matter how hard logic wars with my building terror, I can’t seem to talk myself out of staying.

  That ominous energy in the air drives me to the farthest corner of my room anyway. There, I sink to my knees and wait for the storm that I know is brewing.

  What feels like hours later, thunder finally ripples through the silence. No. Footsteps. They resonate through the very floorboards, shaking the foundation of the manor itself. Slow. Deliberate. The closer they come to my door, the faster my breaths trickle into the air until I stop breathing altogether. I wait for the slow knock and his command to open.

  Neither comes. Just a few paces from my door, his steps change direction, and I sense him enter a different room. One he has yet to taint.

  I’m on my feet without thinking, throwing myself at the door. I manage to get it open and race down the hall, just in time to catch him lingering in the doorway of Mama’s study. He’s holding something, letting it dangle from one hand. Something long. Wooden, but with a sharp, gleaming, triangular top.

  My lungs deflate, and I nearly collapse, but he doesn’t seem to notice me—and when he finally raises the ax, I’m not his target.

  The blade cuts into the nearest bookshelf with a monstrous sound, sending splinters of wood up in its aftermath. After yanking the blade from the severed shelf, he hefts it against his shoulder and swings it again. Mama’s prized landscape painting, hanging above the fireplace, meets its doom next.

  Then another bookshelf. The mantel itself. The wall.

  I watch in horror as he methodically destroys my mother’s sanctuary. It’s only when he aims the blade at the floorboards that I realize his intent. He’s looking for something.

  “What are you doing?”

  His eyes cut in my direction, but he doesn’t stop his assault. One blow. Another. Again. He rips a hole in the panels beneath the study and peers into the dusty spaces. Frowning, he turns to another bookshelf, the one beside her chair.

  “Stop!”

  Torn wood tears at the soles of my feet as I lunge, grabbing his arm. Violently, he shrugs me off and continues his assault, striking through books and wood alike. Panting, he comes up empty-handed, glaring at the untouched corners of the room.

  Then we both spot the only remaining structure at the same time, and I can’t stop myself from racing toward it.

  “No! Please!”

  His hand slams into my stomach, knocking me to my knees. Wheezing for air, I’m forced to watch helplessly as he raises the ax and brings it down, cleaving the armchair in two. A sound rips from me, melding with the violent tearing of wood and bite of metal.

  Then shock renders me silent.

  Grunting with the effort, he tosses the ax aside and strolls toward the remains of the chair. With both hands, he rips the seat cushion out, further revealing the small object tucked underneath. A box, I see as he holds it up to the light. It’s thin enough to have gone undetected all these years, made of polished wood. Why Mama would hide it here, of all places, I don’t know.

  But Blake Lorenz seems to have an idea. He inhales raggedly, practically shaking with whatever dark suspicion he has as he rips the lid off and throws it to the floor. He blinks at whatever the box contains before grasping it in a single fist.

  My stomach drops as I recognize the stack of at least ten envelopes wrapped together in a strip of ribbon. Letters.

  My letters…

  He lets them fall, and I lunge for them. I only manage to brush the surface of the topmost envelope before he slams his foot against the floor in warning.

  “No.” Slowly, he sto
ops and lifts them off the ground. His fingers hold them so gently that they barely ruffle the fragile surfaces.

  Even from here, I can see my handwriting and smell the scent of my old perfume. They’re mine, hidden in this room. But why?

  Blake laughs, terrifyingly broken. He shakes his head and then crushes the letters to his chest before marching past me, leaving the room in shambles and the ax behind. His voice is a gruff whisper I’m sure I imagine.

  “She always hid her fucking letters.”

  She? My mother? I swallow hard, fighting to make sense of it all. But all I really know is this: Mama never sent my letters all those years ago.

  And Brandt never received them.

  Seventeen

  This nightmare grows realer by the day, and I want to wake up. But when my eyes finally open, I am trapped in a ruined world of twisted wood and scattered chunks of an antique chair. Mama’s presence is so real that I can see her smuggling my letters into this room and tucking them beneath the chair’s cushion. Later that night, she probably brought me into this very room and cradled me on her lap as I cried about the state of my life.

  And all along, she knew.

  Should I be so surprised? After all, I’m a Hollings. That means something.

  I lie.

  I cheat.

  I steal.

  All at Mommy and Daddy’s behest.

  The longer I stay in the room, the more I feel choked by memories. They wrap themselves around my throat, cinching off my air bit by bit until I have no choice but to scramble to my feet and escape. My first refuge of choice is my bedroom, but I don’t know what makes me turn for the stairs instead. The moment my foot hits the floor of the foyer, the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end.

  “Snow.” His voice comes from down the hall, in the direction of Papa’s study.

  I find him seated at the desk, but there are no loose pages in sight today. Merely a stack of old, crumpled letters. He lifts one and presents it to me without looking back.

  “Read.”

  My hair lashes the air around me as I shake my head. “N-no.” Some things can only be uttered once, either out loud or indirectly. Some truths mean nothing when all is said and buried. Rehashing the past now serves no one. Especially not Brandt. My fingers twitch, aching to reclaim them for myself.

  As if sensing the desire, he lowers the letter back to the rest. “I will make you this offer once.” His voice inspires goosebumps that rise over my arms. I’m suddenly freezing, and this man—this stranger—seems miles away. “Read the fucking letters. Tell me what they say or—” He breaks off as his hands form fists over the desk. Ropey veins pulse against his skin, broadcasting his racing heartbeat. “Or I’ll make you wish you’d gone for the first option.”

  My throat goes dry at the threat. Forming words at all requires that I lick my lips and inhale deeply. “I can’t.”

  He stands, shoving the chair aside. It flies back and nearly strikes me. I only just manage to lurch out of the way—and right into his path. He grabs my shoulders, shoving me into a bookcase next. The ridge of a shelf bites into my spine, but the discomfort is nothing in the face of his expression. Narrowed eyes stare through me, a haunted, stormy blue.

  “You said you told him everything,” he says. “You said you had an explanation. So say it. Say it!”

  My lips refuse to part, sealed shut. Deep down, I know it’s foolish—a childish promise I haven’t broken in ten years. I’m a Hollings. My name means something, but what exactly? Mama and Papa are dead, yet their hold on me is a steel chain, tethering me to this goddamn house. Eyes welling with tears, I shake my head. “I-I can’t.”

  “Oh?” He brings his fingers to my cheek, but they shake, grazing my skin. “Then I’ll treat you like the lying bitch you are. I’ll hurt you, Snow.” There’s no mocking this time.

  I can’t escape the feeling that he’s warning me more than threatening. Pleading for me to give him a reason not to.

  “I-I can’t.”

  His eyes glaze over, his mouth tightening. I almost don’t see the slap coming—it happens that fast. The sting burns through my skull, sharp, but nowhere near the strength I know he’s capable of. I rub the area with trembling fingers as I watch him, my mouth agape.

  “Bend over the table.” He claws at his front, tugging at the buttons of his shirt. The first two break off in the assault but he’s unconcerned. His arm lashes out next, knocking the letters to the floor. “Now.”

  Everything slows down to the frantic breaths we trade between us: mine mere gasps, his steady and harsh. There’s so much malice contained in that single word: now. My gaze flicks to the letters as my fingers ache to grab them. Hide them. Letting a stranger peer over them should be easy, considering everything else.

  But Blake Lorenz is a monster. Something in me won’t let him have that last, final piece of me. Not if I can help it.

  Shuddering with the effort, I manage to wrestle control of my limbs from fear bit by bit. My brain fights to put everything back into perspective. The money. The business shares. The Hollings name.

  I told myself once I’d do anything to preserve them, the only things in life that matter. Even as terror gnaws at that resolve, I remember Hunter and Ronan. Is Ronan awake yet? Is Hunter even further within the bottle?

  My feet flex against the floor, drawing strength from the polished wood. The first step I take is unsteady, but I don’t fall. The next propels me close enough to the desk to cling to the edge of it.

  Blake Lorenz wordlessly comes up behind me, casting a shadow that leaves me in semi-darkness. When his hand lands on my lower back, I wait for the violence. Instead, he roughly tugs my elegant gown up. Gradually, my ass is exposed, and I hear him groan, sounding pained. Then his foot forces its way between mine, nudging them farther apart and opening me up to him.

  I’ll hurt you, Snow.

  And he does, but without ever having to touch me. His breath nuzzles my throat as he lowers his face to my shoulder, almost crushing me with his weight.

  “I won’t say that I wish you took the first option,” he growls against my ear, scalding the tender flesh with the heat of his confession. “I need you like this. Hating you…”

  Air whistles past me as he draws back. A zipper comes undone, and fabric brushes my exposed back before hitting the floor. His shirt, or so I assume.

  “I need you selfish and so fucking stupid.” A guttural note edges the words and my heart stutters in anticipation. “I need to fucking despise you.”

  The desk creaks beneath his weight as he braces a hand against it, inches away from my head. His shadow flickers and then flesh meets the damp space between my legs, biting deep. Splitting. Invading. My scream echoes, but it isn’t loud enough to drown him out.

  “I need it. It’s all I fucking have left.” He bucks into me, shoving me almost onto the desk entirely.

  His nearness traps me, and I’m forced to accept every burning inch he seeks to bury inside me. Throaty groans betray his satisfaction as his hand fists in my hair, wrenching my head to the side while his lips find mine and devour them, forcing them apart. Like that, he manages to thrust even deeper than before, making me whimper. Muscles spread to conform to his size. The sheer breadth of his invasion leaves me speechless. Senseless.

  I can only feel.

  “I need to hate you,” he says almost reverently against my open mouth. Then he shifts his position, mounting me fully, and begins to move in earnest, slamming my body against the desk with every battering entry. “Fuck, I have to hate you.” He pants, biting the words out in between breaths. “Or I’d kill you.”

  Fear sleepily combats the all-consuming sensation of sex. I blink, grappling against the wood beneath me with trembling fingers.

  “I would,” he says as I struggle in vain to crawl from beneath him.

  With one tug on my hair, he drags me back, using the motion as leverage to sink his cock into me so roughly that my vision goes white and my lips contort in a wordl
ess scream. Everything inside me burns. My toes curl, my lungs gasping for breath.

  “I’d have to,” he murmurs almost soothingly into my hair as his movements quicken. “You’d…beg…me…to…”

  A big hand sweeps along my stomach and eases beneath me. He finds the weeping folds where we’re joined and rubs, grinding what feels like a thumb over the sensitive flesh. My spine contracts with every rough pass, like I’m a wind-up toy at his discretion. A plaything.

  “Because it’s already done. It’s already done.”

  The hand in my hair becomes a vise on my skull, shoving me forward as his thrusts increase. Hard. Harder. It’s like his goal is to bore through me, rip me utterly apart. Destroy me for anyone but him.

  “You’re already mine.” He slams into me, his chest folding over my back.

  This time, he doesn’t bother to anticipate his release. It floods into me, pulse after pulse of burning, unbearable heat. Too much. It seeps through what little space he isn’t occupying, dripping down my inner thighs.

  I expect him to leave, but he lingers, softening inside me while his fingers continue to twist through my hair.

  “Your body foils us both,” he whispers. “We both need the pain…but you can’t even give me that much.”

  He pushes back off his hand, and I can hear him unsteadily fishing his clothing from the floor. Dazed, I watch him, my cheek still pressed against the desk.

  His bare back is turned to me, rippling with muscle and tension, locked within a shell of paper-thin skin. Damaged skin. Old scars define his hulking shape, adding touches of vulnerability where there should be none. A pang shoots through my belly. Pity?

  These injuries aren’t the result of an accident: circles of silvery skin indicate deliberate, precise wounds. Burns? If so, ones created by something small. My brain tries to place the weapon as he replaces his shirt. Then I remember.

  They burned him, Snow. With cigarettes.

  My sharp intake of air draws his attention, but his face doesn’t reveal dread or shame. He merely meets my gaze and holds it for what feels like an eternity, chilling me to the bone. An expression falls over his features, one I’ve come to fear. After adjusting his collar, he snaps his fingers.