She didn’t elaborate. She didn’t need to. Sebastian’s whole body tensed. Slowly – terrifyingly – he turned to Cade who bolted for the door. He didn’t get far. Sebastian grabbed him by his tunic and hurled him into the opposite wall. The impact was brutal. His spine hit the stone with a sickening crack. He tried to scramble to his feet – to get away – but Sebastian was too fast. He seized Cade by the throat hauled him into the air.
“You touched her?” Sebastian asked, dangerously quiet.
Cade looked petrified. He didn’t answer.
Sebastian sheathed his blade, and seized Cade’s wrist – the hand that had been on Kara’s thigh – with his bare hand instead.
“With this hand? This one?” His voice was ice.
Sebastian twisted it. The sound of breaking bone echoed through the cell.
Cade screamed.
Kara flinched at the sound. But she didn’t look away. Couldn’t stop watching.
“I asked you a question, Sarren. Did you touch her?”
Cade choked, clawing uselessly at Sebastian’s grip. “I–I didn’t–”
Sebastian grabbed Cade’s other wrist without hesitation and did the same thing. The bone snapped. Cade’s face contorted in agony as she stared, not in horror, butrelief.
“Don’t lie to me,” he said, low and lethal.
Sebastian’s magic crackled – searing-hot – casting a red glow against the stone walls. Cade struggled, his own magic flaring, but Sebastian held him easily.
“You call yourself a Thorne soldier. You’re a disgrace,” Sebastian snarled. “You know what we do to filth who hurt women in Thorne, don’t you?”
Cade whimpered.
“We break them.”
“Please,” Cade begged. “Don’t–”
Sebastian’s fist slammed into his face – savage but precise. Cade’s head flew back into the wall with the force of it. Blood sprayed from his nose. Broken.
“Is that what she said? DID YOU STOP WHEN SHE BEGGED YOU?”
Another punch. Cade cried out.
“DID YOU?”
Sebastian hit him again. Cade started sobbing. Choking on blood.
“Sebastian–” His name came out unbidden. Only a whisper. But it stopped him. He looked back at her. His expression was blazing, full of fury. The desire to hurt. To cause pain.
But she saw him visibly rein it in. Restrain it. For her.
He turned back to Cade. “I ought to let you live long enough for her to heal you–” Sebastian’s grip on him tightened. “Then break every bone again.”
“No, please–”
“You’re lucky I don’t have time for that,” Sebastian said coldly.
In one brutal motion, he drew a dagger from his belt and drove it through Cade’s gut. Cade’s eyes went wide, wild with panic as his bloodspurted across the stones. Sebastian pulled the blade out and drove it in again. Higher this time. Twisted it, mercilessly.
Sebastian dropped him. Stood over him.
Just watched – calm and silent – as Cade writhed in agony on the cell floor, trying desperately to clamp his hands over the wound. But blood was pooling beneath him.
