Yet not the same finger on each side—the mutilation by design.
Pointer finger on the right. Ring finger on the left.
Why?
The stumps were pink on the ends, healing. And he was thinner, his fancy clothing hanging from his frame.
Beautiful face untouched. Why?
Why take the fingers and not the face?
Jacques had not been able to properly braid his flowing blonde hair short two digits, the plait messy, her fingers twitching to reach out and fix it as she had been trained.
Even so, ecstatic blue eyes glowed as he looked her over, as he pressed his whole self to the barrier and put his nose to the holes to suck in another breath of her, lip curling at the scent of fear, of dried slick, and of vast quantities of Beta cum.
“He raped you!” A snarl, matching the way the Alpha swung his head up toward the Beta standing at Brenya’s back.
“No.” One small word. That same word… again. Her new litany. “No. He didn’t.”
The play of rage, of disgust, over Jacques’s face. The hunger. It made her take a step back.
“You cut off his fingers…”
A warm pet down her spine from her husband, Brenya arching away from Jacques and into Jules’s touch as the Beta softly said, “He didn’t feel a thing, I assure you.”
But… “Why?”
A steadying grip came to her elbow, directing her toward the table she’d ignored. One set up flush against Jacques’s cell. “Breakfast. You need to eat. That’s why we are here, remember?”
No. That was not why they were there. They were there so she could smell her Alpha and be near him… so she could notice that one of his eyes was wrong, that it didn’t quite match.
Because it was glass.
Jules had taken Jacques’s left eye and replaced it with a false one.
And tears were falling down her cheeks to see it, the beauty of the man distorted just enough to confuse.
Jacques followed where Jules led her, pressing to the bars and glass so his Omega could see him. “Brenya, let me touch you. Tell him you need me now. We have an agreement, he and I. All you have to do is ask for me. Just ask.” Said with a growing, desperate smile, the Alpha trying so hard to fit his fingers through the too-small holes to reach out for her. To make contact.
An impossible feat.
Jules ushered her to the table—one set with crystal goblets, with golden silverware, with china. A smaller table set up in Jacques’s cell, butted up together. A setup that gave the appearance of one long family table. The glass and the bars bisecting the white tablecloths.
A mirror.
Though Jacques had no crystal, no golden cutlery. He had no food. He had no cup.
No utensils.
Strange.
The lack of symmetry was very disturbing.
And it made her feet catch as Brenya was shuffled into a comfortable chair, one leg tripping over the other. But Jules was careful, guiding the staggered female anyway, Jacques scrambling, lightly limping to the vacant chair in his cell, so they could be seated together as if this were some state dinner.
He didn’t even growl, snarl, or take his eyes off of her for a moment when Jules took the seat across from him.
If it were not for the glass, Jacques would be able to hold her hand, to feed her. They were that close.
