What’s the worse fate? Remembering or not?
My fingers clutched Jasmine’s harder. “Please, tell me he’ll come back.”
Jaz sat higher in her chair, pecking my cheek with a kiss. “He’ll come back. And when he does, it will be over.
“For all of us.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Jethro
“YOU HONESTLY EXPECT me to believe you’re going to be able to do this?” Cut spat at my feet the moment I removed his gag. His tongue worked, dispelling the taste of being silenced. “Come on, Jethro. We both know you don’t have it in you.”
I didn’t answer.
Leaving him tied up, I moved toward the main attraction in the room.
Just like the guillotine had rested in the ballroom pride of place, the torturous device sat in this one. Dirty grey sheets covered the apparatus, looking part phantom, part ancient relic.
Cut shifted on the spot, his jeans rustling. “Jet, I’m still your father. Still your superior. Stop this fucking nonsense and untie me.”
Once again, I didn’t answer.
The longer I concentrated on what had to be done, the more I remembered my childhood lessons.
Silence is more terrifying than shouts.
Smoothness is more horrifying than sharp motions.
The key to being feared was to remain calm, collected, and most of all, with a finely balanced decorum where the prey believed they had a chance of redemption, only to take their final breath with hope still glowing in their heart.
He’d taught me that.
My father.
It was thanks to him I’d built a shell around myself and portrayed to the outside world I was strong and unflappable. While internally, I combusted with chaos and calamity.
Fisting the material, I yanked it off. The billow of moth-eaten fabric floated like wings as it settled elegantly on the floor. Dust shot into my lungs, dried leaves flurried in a vortex, and grit stung my eyes. But I didn’t cough or blink.
I couldn’t take my eyes off the implement of my childhood.
The rack.
My fingers shook as I stroked the well-worn wood. The leather buckles stained with my blood. The grooves of my heels as I kicked and kicked andkicked.
“No!”
“Stop your fucking bitching, Jethro.”
“Dad, stop. I didn’t do anything wrong.”
Cut didn’t listen. “You did do something wrong.” His fingers bruised my ankles as he tightened the buckles. I kicked, doing my best to prevent the thick leather imprisoning me, but it was no use. Just like it’d been no use trying to stop him tying my hands above my head.
This wasn’t the first time I’d been here, nor would it be the last.
But I wished so much I could finally be better so he didn’t have to hurt me.
My ten-year-old heart punched against my ribcage. “I didn’t. I can’t help it. You know I can’t help it.”
