“You never acted like this before. I don’t know what they taught you in the Under, but no Mavestelli heir is going to be insubordinate to their bloodline. Do you understand me?” He grips my chin and forces me to nod. “Good. Now take her to the cell and wait for further instruction, Reed.”
“Yes, sir.” Reed’s face is expressionless. My hopes die out as I watch my father grab his gilded black cane and leave without so much as a glance back at me.He truly was only after the death pills.I gave them exactly what they wanted. It stings to be rejected by him, even now after I expected nothing.
It will always hurt.
“If you expect me to continue being the executioner after this, you’re fucking insane,” I grumble, tugging against Reed’s hold, but he’s already cuffing my hands behind my back.
Reed says mundanely, “You’d be horrified what people do for certain things, Emery. Especially men like me.”
21
CAMERON
Two days have passedsince Emery broke the door down and promised to return. She stole what little hope I had left.
After the first hour, I began to worry, but after the sun began to rise, my despair became unbearable. Each day that’s passed has added a weight to my chest that numbs my brain from thewhat-ifsthat sift through. What did her dad do to her? I haven’t heard her walk to her room since that night.
Something terrible has happened to her.I grit my teeth and shake my head.
Greg Mavestelli has been outraged at my increased unresponsiveness. His tactics aren’t working to get me to talk, and he knows his time is ticking. He hasn’t once said anything about the death pills so I’m guessing Emery at least got away with slipping me those. Or maybe Reed is giving us mercy and hasn’t shown the extent of the footage to him.
The pain was startling when they first reversed the effects of the death pills, but after the initial shock, I accepted it. I thought of it asmy punishment for all of my misdeeds. Everything I did to Emery and everything before.
But now having to pretend I’m hurting only makes me recede further into my mind.
What have they done with her? Greg, her own father, wouldn’t harm her, would he?
My head hangs limply as blood streams from my lips. My shoulders don’t hurt anymore, but I know they’re on fire from being pulled up with the chains, wrists raw from the metal tugging against my skin. There is no image of strength I could even begin to uphold.
I am broken, more than I thought I could be, if I’m being honest. And I hate that she had to see me this way.
“You are one stubborn man,” the guard striking me across the back with a baton mutters under his breath. I’m not sure Greg hears it because he’d probably put him in a cell if he had.
He’s in a particularly foul mood today. I can only assume it has something to do with his daughter.
Another strike claps over my ribs. I gasp for breath as the cracking of my bones causes my entire body to convulse. It’s convincing that I feel it because my body reacts so violently to the stimulus.
I’m at my limit though, and the pills are going to wear off soon.
I sputter out more blood and groan as my legs finally give out beneath me, adding pressure on my wrists and shoulders tethered to the ceiling.
Greg raises his hand. The guard behind me stops and places the chair at my back. He carefully guides me until I’m offered a moment’s reprieve.
My jaw trembles freely and my limbs are all but useless with the pure exhaustion.
Being forced to stand for days is a cruel tactic. One to two hour breaks only after I collapse. Beatings. Mental beratement. Only feeding me scraps and dirty water.
The only thing he’s yet to try is?—
“You are the strongest willed man I’ve met, Mori.” He circles behind me, dragging his cane across the ground like he always does. It triggers my body, just as an animal learns to fear certain sounds that are associated with bad stimuli, my muscles tense subconsciously, waiting for his cane to strike my head or ankles.
I don’t reply. I haven’t since this started.
He loops back to the front without striking me. The end of the cane meets my chin as Greg lifts my head and forces my eyes to his. I hope he can’t see the utter emptiness that has grown in my soul, but the darkness that gleams in his tells me that he sees straight through me.
“I hate to waste my beloved executioner, but you aren’t really giving me much of a choice, now are you?” My eyes widen a fraction at his words and he grins, corruption and sinful intentions dance in his gaze.
He lifts his phone to his ear and mutters, “Go ahead and bring her in.”
