“Ezra isnotmy brother. It’s not blood that determines the relationship. He will never be what Conall was.” Gedeon came to stand beside me, his palm skimming down to rest on my hip. “But I’m done with him for tonight. What I want is to enjoy my evening.” Gripping my jeans waistband, heyanked, spinning me around?—
I swayed on my heels, the moldy basement walls swimming?—
He caught me by my throat once more. “Let’s go.”
My pulse rushed straight down, right to my groin. “What about Ezra’s feet? His toes are still intact.”
“I don’t give a shit.” Gedeon leaned into my face, his voice so dangerous it carried notes of a dark promise. “I’m fucking you, Zion.Now.” The dim light drowned his face in the shadows. “So either you go willingly, or I will bend you over Ezra and have my way. Your choice.”
It was happening. Finally.
Wired beyond control, I cursed the zipper in my jeans. If not for the durability denim offered, I would’ve already incinerated the three pairs I owned and worn sweatpants instead.
“See you tomorrow, little rattie.” I snatched my knife off the table. Returning the weapon to its sheath on my bicep, I stared Ezra down. “Get it? Because you’re a rodent gnawing on your own tail. Only, so insignificant, your father won’t do anything to help you.”
“You have no clue who you’re talking to,” the viper-like man snarled. His cuffs clanged against the metal surface he was lying on. “My father will serve your balls on a platter to?—”
I poked one of the five vertical slices turning his cheek into bars of a cage. His head whipped aside, the movement dragging my digit across the severed nerves, and his scream echoed in the vast space like a thrum of drums.
“Bleh. Your mouth is nasty.” To clean his blood and saliva off my finger, I dragged it across his lips, making sure my nail ripped the healing cuts. “Anyway, I’ll send Eislyn to say hello to you in the morning. I might be late for our next session if Gedeon rearranges my insides.”
“Zion,” Gedeon called out from the bottom of the concrete stairs. “You have ten seconds to finish up.”
Excitement surged through me. Unhooking the button in my pants, I studied the damage Eislyn and I had inflicted on who used to be part of our inner circle yet turned out to be Ilasall’s puppet. My new plaything for the next few days. Perhaps even weeks.
“Why don’t you use the time to say goodbye to your toes? I’ve never peeled a person’s feet before, so we may need to sacrifice your left foot for a test drive.” Three of Ezra’s toes seemed to be of a similar size, and it gave me an idea. “We can flay your toes and then use the bits as hats for your missing fingertips.”Flicking the meat where his nails had once been, I relished his cry. “If we cover your wounds, I’m sure you’ll feel better.”
“Four,” Gedeon counted, his drawl sinking into my pores and luring me away from my doll. “Three.”
“Sweet dreams.” I patted Ezra’s carved stomach, a laceration in each dip of his torso. His flesh squelched, and scarlet drizzled down his sides in tandem with his wail.
Gedeon leaned against a wall. “Two.”
Two and a half seconds. That was how long it took me to cross the space between us and crash into him.
But his grunt didn’t satisfy my appetite. Itfedit. Stoked it until I ceased thinking, until my hunger chewed up my thoughts and transformed them into a heady rush.
Our mouths collided, violent and brutal,bruising,as I scrambled to unbuckle Gedeon’s belt.
He shoved me away. “Upstairs.”
Staggering backward, my chest heaving as fast as his, I ruffled my hair to invite my focus to return.
“Ezra doesn’t deserve to hear you choke on my cock before I rip you apart,” he rasped.
I squeezed myself over my jeans to push the tension away, to placate it long enough for the climb out of the basement.
In a flash, Gedeon snatched my wrist. “Did I say you could play with what’s mine?”
His growl almost brought me to my knees.
“If you need another lesson that badly, I can oblige.” He wrenched me out of my spot, his clasp a claw around my joint.
As I stumbled behind Gedeon, the cement stairs scraped my leather boots, leaving scratches and dents. He pushed the door to the first floor open, the hinges screeching in protest?—
We grew motionless.
At the far end of the hallway, Kali did too.
