Ruin & Rule

Fear skittered quickly.

So why, if you came from this world, do you fear it so much?

My fingers ached to grab my hair and shake. The questions were piling up and I had no answers to tame them.

Calmly Lighter Boy stood up, wiped his mouth, swigged the rest of his beer, and made his way around the table to leave. His brothers didn’t look up, transfixed on waiting for any gossip from me. But I couldn’t look anywhere else.

Opening the door he looked back, brown eyes locking with mine. His lips spread over his teeth, sending a shiver over my scalp. His eyes shouted that he wasn’t finished with me. Whatever he’d stolen me for had yet to come to pass.

Waggling his fingers condescendingly, he left the room, closing the door behind him.

My heart charged around my chest.

You need to remember. And fast.

My time had screeched to an end. I’d been sold. I would soon leave and never get a second chance. I had to fight.

Mo nudged my ankle under the table. “Tell us. It’s cruel to make a man wait.”

“Yeah, it’s called blue balls,” the prospect joked.

Masculine laughter rippled around the room.

Taking a deep breath, I asked, “You want details…”

“Hell yeah!”

Grasshopper grinned. “One tiny juicy detail. Come on, give it up.”

My mind raced with everything Kill had done—the way he’d made me feel, the vulnerability and brokenness he kept hidden below surly curtness. “Okay, one detail. When he took me shopping, he pushed me against the changing room wall and kissed me so hard his teeth punctured my bottom lip.”

My tummy fluttered recalling the passion, the confusion, and most of all the need.

The laughter died; men looked at each other with strange expressions on their faces.

Mo finally muttered, “As fucking if. Tell the story but don’t lie about it.”

Grasshopper threw me a look, stuffing his face full of pizza. I couldn’t read the message in his eyes.

A lie because he kissed me? Was that so hard to believe?

Yes, if what Grasshopper said is right. Bound, blindfolded, no touching—the only way Kill would sleep with a woman.

I lost the spark to interact with them, letting my soul sink down and down into the forgetful darkness inside. It wasn’t their business what their president did with me. Especially seeing as my answers unsettled them. And I wanted to hoard those precious memories—they were my only illumination in the dark.

“Try again, pumpkin. Something believable this time,” the guy with the belly said, swiping his mouth free of pizza crumbs.

Balling my hands under the table, I said, “What happened at Kill’s place—”

“Is none of your goddamn business.” That voice. Smooth but gravelly. Deep and powerful. An earthquake invoker—his words aftershocking around the room with force.

Awareness electrified the fine hairs on the back of my neck. Every inch of my body hummed.

The room went quiet. Achingly quiet.

I spun in my chair. My heart erupted into sparks and comets.

Kill’s face was closed off and angry, his hands fisted by his sides. His eyes were bloodshot and fresh bruising marked his face. Gone was the collected angry president, replaced with an exposed man searching for violence. “I trust you to do one thing and this is what I fucking come back to?”

Everything about him seethed with rage, his hair was tussled, and the scent of winds, salt, and leather threaded with the sharpness of alcohol.

Where had he been? He’s been fighting.

Kill never looked at me. Instead, he directed his anger at Grasshopper. “I see you’re disobeying me again and feeding the damn girl?”

My back bristled. I wanted to yell at him to talk to me, but my lips stayed firmly glued.

Grasshopper stood, wiping his hands on his faded jeans. “Hey, Prez. My bad. She’s been cooped up in that room for a couple of days—felt it important to give her some fresh air, you know?”

Mo’s eyes bored into the back of my head, but I never took my attention off Kill. I drank him in from his bloody knuckles to the grass stain on his jeans. My mind raced with all sorts of fabrications of what he’d been doing the last two days.

I’d missed him.

I wanted to tend to his new injuries just like I’d done the first night I’d arrived. I wanted to heal him—fix whatever drove him to such destructive behavior.

Maybe he wasn’t fighting? Maybe it was self-defense?

My mind skipped into all new horrors thinking of him being hurt maliciously by others.

Unconsciously, I leaned forward, drawn to him as surely as a tide to the moon. “You’re hurt.”

His nostrils flared and the cognizant awareness between us sprang up as if we’d never touched or kissed or fucked. It was thick and rampant and bogged down with issues—but there. And strong. So damn strong.

My skin prickled with heat and my core melted beneath his scrutiny.

“Why the fuck did you call me, Hopper? You knew the plan. You knew why I wanted it this way.” Kill ran a hand through his tangled hair, still refusing to look at me.

“Got something to check. To make sure once and for all—before your chance is gone—that what you believe is true.”

“Fuck you, man. I told you.” Kill stepped forward, the room glittering with violence. The other men stood up, the soft scrape of chairs and rush of mixed breathing setting everyone on edge.

“You can curse at me all your want, Kill, but hear her out. Last time. I fucking swear it. And then she’s leaving. Gone.”