Текст книги "Six Brothers"

Автор книги: Lili St. Germain

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Seven

The wake goes on for hours before Dornan finds me. He is drunk out of his mind, so I drive us back to the clubhouse in his wife’s car.

The place is deserted as I lead him to his room, the aura of death surrounding the place obviously too much for most. I drop the set of car keys onto the nightstand and watch as Dornan takes a seat on the black vinyl occasional chair in the corner of the room, the moonlight from the window creating long slashes of light across his face. Like scars, I think as I walk over to him.

“You can go,” he says, staring into space.

Part of me wants to go. To get back into the car, find Jase, and tell him everything. But the other part of me, the vengeful bitch—she wants to stay and soak up every last bit of pain and hurt coming from this grieving devil.

“Let me try and take your mind off things,” I whisper, putting my hands on his shoulders.

I swing my leg over the chair, straddling him. His eyes are glassy and threaten to spill over.

“Close your eyes,” I whisper, trailing hot, wet kisses down his neck. He is drunk, and obeys me, much to my disbelief.

I smirk as his action has the desired effect. By closing his eyes, two teardrops are squeezed from his eyes, falling onto his stubbled cheeks.

I lean down, touching my lips to his right cheek. My tastebuds spring to life, assuaged by the sudden taste of salt water.

The taste of victory.

He took my father, my life, and now I have taken his oldest son from him. The taste of his sorrow beckons me, and I repeat my actions on his left cheek, this time darting my tongue out to catch his despair and drink it up, every last drop.

I rock on his lap, his erection already growing just from me straddling him. With my black funeral dress hitched up around my thighs, there is only a thin scrap of black lace and Dornan’s black pants separating us. He opens his eyes, and I sense he is surprised at the tender way I am touching him. In a way, so am I. But his sorrow, his devastation…it’s better than if I had tied him up and made him bleed for me.

Bleeding tears instead of blood, but it is all the same in the end. I will take every tear he has, every son, and then I will start letting blood.

“Sammi…” he breathes, digging his fingers into the soft flesh at my hips. I break out in goose bumps, wary once more. He never calls me Sammi.

Only baby girl.

“So hard for you it fucking hurts,” he says, staring me down with blazing intensity.

I suppress a smile as I fumble with his zipper, the material stretched to breaking point. As I tug the zipper carefully, his erection springs forth, a bead of pre-cum glistening on the tip. I grip him firmly with one hand, swiping my finger over the tip of his cock with my free hand. I don’t break our gaze as I bring my finger to my mouth and suck the salty fluid from it.

Sorrow. Devastation. Loss.

He digs his fingers deeper, the pain intensifying but still pleasant. It’s as if he is holding onto me for dear life, and slipping away.

I smile, and his gaze snaps, just like that, from sorrow and submission, to hunger and domination.

“You’re teasing me,” he says, lifting my hips forcefully. He leaves one hand on my hip and used the other to wrench my panties aside and guide his cock to my entrance.

I’m so turned on. A sorrow fuck. Never is someone more vulnerable than when they’re underneath you, naked, exposed, and on the brink of coming.

I see it all. I see through his facade, his control, into the blackness of his very soul. I see the scars I have left on his cold, dead heart, on the tiny part that has the capacity to care for his own offspring. A primal, human instinct that lives inside him despite his hatred, despite his abject twistedness. He pulls me down over him, filling me completely and to the point of pain, and I can’t help but moan.

I cry out as he pumps harder, his fingernails threatening to draw blood, he’s holding onto my hips that hard. There is no longer any tenderness from either of us. We are like two animals in heat, bucking wildly, alive with our elation and despair. With every rough stroke he pulls out of me completely, then slams me down so hard I see stars. I ache inside, and it’s a good ache and a painful ache all at once. Every piece of exposed skin is alive with goose bumps, Dornan’s breath on my neck firing little nerve endings, his hungry lips on my mouth seeking comfort and release.

His expression becomes open, naked, and inside me he goes rock-hard. “Gonna…come,” he manages, his eyes growing heavy.

I grip his chin and bring it up so that our eyes are locked. “Look at me when you do it,” I breathe.

That’s enough to send him off the edge. He moans loudly, pistoning his hips up into me, releasing everything he has into me. It looks intense, this orgasm, and lasts several long thrusts.

“Give it all to me, baby,” I whisper into his mouth, my eyes never leaving his. As I bleed him dry. As I take everything from him, every last drop of sorrow.

Finally, when he is finished, he drops his head to my chest, panting, taking my nipple into his mouth.

When I try to sit back, he tightens his teeth around my nipple, making me jolt at the sudden pinch. I relax back onto him, not daring to move again, waiting for his lead. We sit like that for a long time, maybe fifteen minutes, his cock soft but still inside me.

Eventually, he releases my nipple and sits back in the chair, surveying me with tired, weary eyes.

Jase’s eyes. That thought is devastating, so I push it far, far down with all of my other black secrets.

He traces my eyebrows with his fingers, runs his hands through my loose hair, before settling his grip at my throat. It isn’t tight, but there’s no mistaking what it means—I might be on top, but he is in charge. I am surprised when his gruff voice breaks the silence.

“You look so much like her,” he says, his voice filled with wonder. “How?”

I know exactly who he is talking about, but I shouldn’t. Sammi shouldn’t.

“Who?” I ask innocently.

His grip around my throat tightens. “Mariana,” he says, and inside I smile. Five gold stars to Dr. Lee and his amazing surgical skills.

“Who’s Mariana?” I ask, struggling a little as his grip continues to tighten, his other hand now pulling hard on my hair. His mood has definitely changed, too. The mask is back on and he’s no longer showing any signs of vulnerability. He’s back to being the unpredictable snake, ready to strike at any moment.

I rock my hips slightly as I feel him begin to swell inside me once more. How is he hard again already? The man is a fucking machine, literally. He is clearly torn between wanting me to stop and wanting me to keep going. I rock faster, with more intention, and gasp as he throttles me, cutting off my air supply.

His face contorts into loathing and despair. “Mariana was my mistress. My lover. Ten years she was here with me, until I found out she was ratting me out to the cops.”

My eyes begin to water as he throttles me a little harder, shaking me for effect. I start to see white flecks and my ears hum with the lack of oxygen.

“You know what I did to her?” he asks me. I shake my head minutely, frozen in place, as he begins to lift his hips and thrust into me forcefully, all the while cutting off my windpipe.

“I cut her tongue out for telling tales about me,” he breathes, his thrusts becoming harder, faster.

“I cut her lips off for speaking about my club,” he says, sucking and biting on my hardened nipple.

“I cut her head off for betraying me and express-posted it to her mother,” he finishes, finally releasing his grip on my neck. I immediately begin to choke, my hands at my broken throat, wheezing lungfuls of musky air.

“Uh-uh,” he chides me, taking my wrists and pinning them at my sides as he continues to thrust into me. He smiles darkly, admiring my neck. “I want to see my hand prints on you.”

I continue to wheeze, struggling to take a full breath, still light-headed.

“Wrap your legs around me,” he commands, and I obey, gripping my legs around his waist as he stands. Still inside me, he takes three quick steps, slamming me into the wall, impaling me with his cock as my head connects with concrete and I see stars.

“Look,” he says, pushing my chin so that I am facing his mirror. I see myself, flushed, looking completely out of it, with two angry red handprints on my neck. He smiles, tracing the marks with his fingernail, sending involuntary shudders through me.

“You’d never betray me, would you, Sammi?” he says, planting himself deeper with each shattering stroke, his eyes alight with desire and remembered sins.

“Never,” I lie.

Eight

Afterwards, when Dornan is finally sated, I take a shower. All the soap in the world won’t wash away the feeling of his skin on mine, but I lather up anyway, the water as hot as I can stand it without causing burns, comforting as it bites at my skin.

When I’m done, I re-enter the bedroom to see Dornan dressing. I sit on the edge of the bed, naked save for a towel around me, and watch.

As he pulls his jeans on and closes his belt, he eyes me thoughtfully.

“Damn,” he says, as if the thought has only just occurred to him. “I’ve been pumping you full of juice for weeks, baby girl. You gonna get pregnant on me?”

I smile, propped on my elbows, the thin towel hiding nothing about my naked body. “I’ve taken care of it,” I say, smiling.

“Well, good,” he says. “But then again, damn, you’re so good-looking I might need to knock you up to keep you here.”

The thought of carrying another child related to this family fills me with cold dread, a feeling that seeps into my bones and takes up residence.

“You don’t need to do that,” I say, giggling. “I’ll always be your girl.”

He is apparently thinking about impregnating me quite seriously. “You could use a little extra meat on your bones,” he says, caressing my upper thighs under the towel. He pulls it away, exposing me to the damp night air, and slides one finger along my slit, cupping my pussy with his hand. I writhe a little underneath his touch.

“The boobs,” I say, taking his other hand and cupping it to my breast. “A baby would ruin them.”

He withdraws his hand from between my legs and squeezes both of my breasts in his hands. “I could just buy you some more,” he says.

“Dornan!” I say sharply, breaking him out of his funk. He cannot seriously be thinking of getting me pregnant a mere few weeks after he’s met me.

“Sammi,” he mimics, setting his jaw squarely and grabbing my elbow. Before I can fight him off, he has flipped me onto my stomach, his knee pressed into my back, pinning me in place.

“What?” I ask, before I hear a whack and feel a sharp sting at my ear.

“Be quiet,” he instructs, laying on top of me, crushing me with his weight. “Listen to me. You keep taking your little pills for now, and when I decide I’m ready for another son, you’ll give me those pills and we’ll make a baby. I decide what happens. Understood?”

I nod minutely, pinned and useless. I’d kill him before I ever let him do that to me again. I’d rather die.

Seemingly satisfied with my answer, he releases me, and I sit up, gathering the sheets around me. My next question escapes my lips before I can think.

“What if it was a girl?” I ask him. Oh my God. Why did I just say that?

He smiles a wide grin that beams so bright, it threatens to break his face.

“I’ve always wanted a little girl,” he says. “A daughter to call my own.”

I smile, swallowing thickly, because if I don’t, I will scream.

He pulls a T-shirt over his head and dons his leather cut. “I’m going back to see my wife,” he says dismissively. “Poor woman loved Chad like he was her own son. She’s devastated.”

She’s probably fucking glad, I think.

“I’ll miss you,” I say, because this is my role and this is what I’m supposed to say.

“I’ll tell Jase to keep an eye on you,” he says.

“You don’t need to do that,” I say evenly. “I’m fine. I’ll be here, waiting for you.”

He cocks his head to the side, surveying me with cold calculation. Grief has left him exposed, blunt, even more fucked-up than before. I need to start being more careful when I speak back to him, because he is like a loose cannon ready to explode at any moment.

“Lay down,” he says, stalking over to his discarded funeral clothes. I watch him as he extracts his tie from the pile, the same tie he wore to his son’s funeral only hours ago. My smile vanishes as I realize what he is going to do.

He approaches me with the grace of a tiger stalking its prey, and suddenly, I am very afraid. I fear that his sudden realization about who I look like—Mariana, the beautiful bitch who fucked him over—has ignited some old feud within him, some desire for vengeance. And, although I don’t believe for one second that his vendetta against the dead woman is warranted, I can understand that burning, crippling desire to get an eye for an eye that must be coursing through his veins.

“You’re not laying down,” he says, punching me square in the face, making contact with my cheekbone. He doesn’t punch very hard, and thankfully his wedding ring is on his other finger, saving my skin from being cut. It hurts like a bitch though, and as I’m clutching my cheek, Dornan grabs my ankles, dragging me down so that I am laying flat on my back. He straddles me, and as I put my palms forward in a defensive gesture, he grabs them and wraps the tie around them tightly.

“What are you doing?” I ask as I fight against his stronghold, the worry in my voice tangible.

He ignores me, pulling the silk tight and threading it through the metal bedhead. With a sharp tug, I am effectively pinned in place.

The first thing I do is struggle, pulling on the binds that are now around my wrists, only making them tighter, cutting off my circulation.

I am so fucking stupid. I’ve trained for this! I know every self-defense maneuver Elliot taught me off by heart. And I just let him tie me up without even putting up a fight?

I am such an idiot..

I see a flash of metal, and the next thing I know, Dornan has a switchblade in his hand. Fuck.

I keep my mouth shut and my face passive, because if there’s anything I’ve learnt, it’s that words and expressions will sign my death warrant faster than my silence.

I watch him, panting slightly, as he approaches.

“You’re right,” he says, smartass. “I won’t tell Jase to keep an eye on you. I’ll just leave you here until I get back in a few days.”

I don’t respond. Anger burns inside me. How dare he tie me up like an animal. I decide, here and now, that this is exactly how I’ll restrain him when it’s his turn to die.

“You’ll learn, Sammi, that the best way to be is in agreeance with anything I say. You hear me?”

I nod, my arms pulled impossibly tightly above me.

“You’re mine now,” he says, slithering onto the bed. He grabs each of my ankles and rips them apart, six years of nightmares slamming into me like a freight train.

Play the part, I tell myself. Submit to him. Make him believe the lie.

“I’m yours now,” I echo, motionless, as he brings the switchblade up to the light.

What the fuck is he going to do with that?

The question must be written all over my face, because he smiles, dragging the cold metal up my inner thigh.

“You know,” he says, scraping the blade against my clit, making me shudder, “If you don’t want to do what you’re told, maybe I’ll just put this inside you instead.”

My eyes are watering. I’m terrified. The only thing I can think of is that he likes to fuck me so much, surely he won’t be fucking me with the sharp end of the knife.

He seems to read my mind. “There are other girls with tight pussies like yours,” he says, the tip of the knife barely grazing my sensitive nub, but enough to make me quiver in deathly anticipation.

“What do you want?” I ask breathlessly, tears pricking at the corners of my eyes. “Do you want me to beg? I’ll beg. Please untie me. Please put the knife away.”

He smiles at me. “I don’t want you to beg. Begging means I might listen to you. And you’re mine. I decide what happens to you.”

He trails the knife away, back towards my inner thigh, and I relax minutely.

I watch as his head disappears between my legs, but I can’t see anything, and suddenly I am terrified. I feel his hot breath on my clit, and I moan, fighting against the silk that binds me, looking for a futile escape. He’s threatening me with the knife, but I don’t really believe he’s going to hurt me for something as minor as challenging him in a conversation.

I arch my back as his tongue makes contact with my clit, shallow circles at first that become faster and more concentrated. He doesn’t take his tongue anywhere else, just focuses on my clit, making me writhe beneath his mouth. A sob dies in my throat as he stops and raises himself enough to make eye contact with me.

“Feel good?” he asks, his eyes still full of pain and hate.

I nod. “Yes,” I whisper. Don’t cry. Do not cry.

He chuckles, resuming his licking and sucking between my legs. My hips begin to grind against his face involuntarily as I climb towards that shattering peak his tongue is promising me.

It feels so unbelievably good, and at the same time, as Dornan’s open palm rests against my thigh, the flat side of his blade pressed into my flesh, I know he hasn’t finished taunting me with promises of pain. I swallow down my shame, repulsed at myself that I could be aroused at all with this man, let alone when he’s got me tied up with a knife to my skin. It’s all kinds of wrong, and depraved, and I can’t help but wonder what living here with him is doing to my already messed-up head.

How can someone so cruel, so horrifyingly devoid of goodness, make me feel, physically anyway, so goddamn good? My brain might know that what I’m feeling is fear, but my body mistakes it for excitement.

I guess it’s all the same feeling of trembling and frantic heartbeats in the end.

My legs start to shake, even though I’m trying beyond hope to stop what is about to happen.

Don’t come, don’t come…

“Come for me, baby,” Dornan says, lapping at my sensitive clit as my core clenches and I cry out.

I am coming, and it feels divine. And then—pain. Red, crushing pain.

I scream as loud as I’ve ever screamed, my leg on fire, as Dornan stabs his switchblade hard into my thigh, sinking it to the hilt. He looks at me, clearly aroused, with that darkness still dancing in his eyes.

“Stop screaming,” he instructs. I can’t. The pain is overwhelming, breaking me into bloodied pieces.

I feel a weight shift as he leaves my line of vision, then returns with my balled-up panties.

I am still screaming when I try to clamp my mouth shut, but he is faster than me. Suddenly I am screaming but no noise is coming out, a wad of black lace stuffed into my mouth, effectively gagging me.

There is nothing worse than being in pain and not being able to scream or yell. The sound of a scream, its very vibration in your chest, is a small distraction. The silence only makes the agony worse.

“If I wasn’t running late already, I’d stay here and fuck you till you were raw,” he says, and I believe him.

“I’ll see you in a few days,” he says coldly as he glances down at the knife in my leg. “If you manage to get free, clean all this fucking blood up.”

Nine

The pain is shattering, and I can feel each pulse of my heart as my leg bleeds onto the bed. I lie there for a few minutes; every thought consumed by the red pain that’s tearing my leg apart.

There’s a major artery in my leg—did he get it? Am I going to bleed out here, on these stiff sheets, alone and tied up?

I test the binds around my wrists, trying to see if I could possibly tug my hands free, but it is useless. He has me tied up tight. I squeeze my numb hands into fists, trying to keep some blood circulating in them.

How long will I be here? What if someone finds me, naked and bleeding. Oh, fuck. What if Jase finds me? It’s almost too horrible to comprehend. Because then there is the alternative—what if he doesn’t find me? What if one of the other brothers do? They’ve done it to me once, and that’s when I could put up a fight. Now, lying here, nude, silenced, and completely vulnerable—I just can’t let my mind go there.

I look around me, trying to ignore the horrific pain in my leg, when I realize that’s the answer I’m looking for.

The knife.

I take a deep breath through my nose and set my teeth in anticipation, using my abdominal muscles to curl my legs down to my face. Thank fuck he didn’t tie me at the ankles as well, or I’d be truly out of options.

The pain in my leg intensifies since I’m moving it, and I gasp silently around my makeshift gag as I see my blood pouring from the stab wound, the knife still sunk in to the hilt. Now that my leg is raised, blood starts to slip down my thigh and pools on my bare belly, making me shiver.

Come on. You’ve got a single bind on your hands and a knife in your thigh. This is easy.

It’s not easy, even for someone who was a gymnast in her grade school years. I might be limber but there’s only so far you can twist and contort your body when you’ve been stabbed and tied up with impossibly tight binds. I continue to try various ways of kicking my leg up and toward my face and hands, hoping I might be able to reach my fingers out to grip the knife and pull it out. I quickly tire, needing a break in between each attempt since I’m getting more and more lightheaded and nauseous.

Finally, I realize that I might need to change the way I’m laying so that I’m parallel to the bedhead instead of right in the middle of the bed. I shuffle my body slowly and awkwardly and frown when I see the patch of dark red blood I’ve left behind.

Fucker’ll be buying a new mattress, I think to myself.

I manage to twist my arms enough to get to a sitting position, and immediately pull my panties out of my mouth. I stretch my jaw painfully and take a deep, gulping breath of air. Fucking asshole. I can’t believe he just fucking stabbed me while he was eating me out. It makes me want to find him and put six bullets between his dead black eyes and a seventh in his heart for good measure.

I wiggle my fingers to get some feeling back in them and turn sharply so that I can grip the knife handle sticking out of my bloodied leg. I grimace as I contemplate pulling the knife out.

There’s going to be a lot more blood once I do that.

I grit my teeth, count to three, and yank the knife upward as hard as I can. It comes out with a meaty squelch that turns my stomach and makes the pain throbbing in my thigh about ten times worse than it was.

Blood bubbles up from my leg as I take the knife and maneuver it in my clumsy fingers, sawing at the thin, but incredibly strong silk holding my hands hostage.

I saw for what feels like a lifetime before the knife makes a solid break in the fabric and my arms fall to my lap loosely, free and numbed. I immediately ball a corner of the bed sheet up in my hand and press it to my stab wound to staunch the bleeding.

Of course, it’s my exact luck that Jase chooses that exact moment to knock on the door.

“Go away,” I call out, my breath catching.

“Are you okay?” Jase yells back. “I heard screaming, and it didn’t sound like good screaming. Ohhhhh.”

He opens the door as he’s saying it, peeking his head around the corner, and when his eyes land on me, or more specifically, my blood littering the sheets, he baulks, rushing me.

“What the fuck?” he says. I tug the sheets around my naked body, suddenly embarrassed by how I must look.

“It’s like the red wedding in here,” he breathes. “What the fuck happened? Are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” I say bleakly, tossing the knife on the bed beside me. I’m not fine. My leg hurts like a motherfucker. And I don’t want to look at him.

He just continues to stare, mouth agape.

“Can you pass me my dress?” I ask tiredly, pointing to the black material on the ground by his feet.

“Sure.” He picks the material up between two fingers and gingerly hands it to me. It’s going to get blood all over it, but I don’t care. I just want to be somewhat covered.

Jase turns around and I pull the dress over my head, letting it pool around my hips so that it covers me, but doesn’t touch my stab wound. Not that it matters. I’m drenched in bright red blood, which is turning colder and stickier by the minute.

Jase approaches me cautiously, studying my blank face.

“What happened?” he asks quietly.

I swallow thickly. “Apparently, I remind your father of someone he used to know. Someone he beheaded.”

Jase’s eyes go wide and he does this kind of choking thing with his throat. I curse myself silently, remembering how close he and Mariana were. How she was like a mother to him after his own had been killed.

“So he stabbed you and left you in here?” Jase asks, not surprised at all.

I nod, giggling inappropriately. “He tied me up first.”

Worry flashes in his dark eyes. “You should have run when you had the chance,” he says.

I don’t answer. I won’t run. Not now, that I’ve tasted Dornan’s tears and sorrow, not after I’ve watched as Chad took his last breath. I won’t leave until this is over.

I lift the sheet from my thigh to see that the bleeding has slowed. Jase stares in sick fascination at my mangled leg.

“I’ll get a first aid kit,” he says. He looks around. “Let’s get you the hell out of this room.”

I look at my leg, wondering if I can walk on it, and decide to stand and test it. “Fuck,” I mutter under my breath, my leg buckling underneath me, tears biting at the corners of my eyes.

“Here,” Jase says, and in one swift move he has picked me up in his arms like he is about to carry me over the threshold.

“Now it’s like the red wedding,” I say groggily, my head lolling forward and smacking into his chest.

Jase just shakes his head, and I can see the beginnings of a small smile form at the corners of his mouth. “As if you’ve read A Game of Thrones,” he says, easing me through the open door and carrying me down the deserted hallway.

“I watched the show,” I say, hiding my face in his chest. “Does that count?”

He enters another doorway, maybe ten doors down from Dornan’s room, and deposits me on a bed.

“Is this your room?” I ask, looking around. I fall backward on the bed, dizzy, weak and feeling like I’m drunk. My eyes flutter shut for a moment and Jase shakes me roughly.

“Hey, Samantha?” His tone is one hundred percent serious now.

I crack one eyelid, even though the effort is almost impossible. “I’m tired,” I say, closing my eye again.

“I’m gonna take you to the hospital,” he says, and upon hearing that, my eyes snap open and I sit up. “No. No hospitals. Just a first aid kit.”

He shakes his head. “Samantha, you’re fucking bleeding everywhere! A bandaid is not going to work.”

He goes to scoop me up and I put my hand on his forearm. “No hospitals,” I say adamantly. “Just a needle and thread.” I think about that for a moment. “And a bottle of Jack.”

“Wouldn’t swabbing alcohol be better to disinfect it?” he asks dubiously.

“It’s for me to drink,” I say through gritted teeth.

He disappears, and returns a few minutes later with a small plastic box marked with a white cross over a red square, a fresh, unopened bottle of bourbon, a bottle of cola and a small sewing kit.

I eye the cola as he pushes my dress up my thigh, moving the blood-soaked pillowcase I have been using to staunch the bleeding out of the way. He opens the first aid kit and pulls out a package of sterile wipes, tearing it open with his teeth. That’s probably not sterile, but I’m not complaining.

“Who’s Mariana?” I slur, my head full of cotton wool and my leg a sharp, throbbing pain that won’t dull.

“She was my stepmother, I suppose. She never married my dad, but she was with him for a long time.”

“Jesus!” I swear as he swabs my leg with alcohol. I grab the bottle of bourbon that he tossed on the bed next to me and twist the lid off, taking a long, deep drink that simultaneously burns my throat and soothes my ragged nerves.

“Sorry,” Jase mutters, finishing his wiping. He stands back and surveys my wound. “It really needs stitches.” He prods it gently. “How deep did he put it in there?”

I want to laugh, but I don’t. “Up to the hilt,” I say, swallowing back bile and chasing it with more bourbon.

“We need a doctor,” he says. I grit my teeth and hand him the bourbon, snatching up the calico sewing kit from the bed next to me and unzipping it. I locate a small needle and some black cotton and clumsily try to thread the cotton through the eye.

“Here, let me do that,” he says. He takes the needle and thread from me and produces a lighter out of his back pocket. I lie back on the bed as he busies himself with the needle and thread.

“You ready?” he asks me.

I sit back up, the room spinning. “Not really.”

“On the count of three,” he says, using one hand to push my torn skin together and the other to hold the needle. “One, two…”

On two he presses the needle into my flesh. Pain ricochets through my entire body, every nerve ending alight with sizzling, searing pain.

“Was there a three?” I mutter through my clenched teeth.

He doesn’t answer, just swears and holds the needle up to me. “The thread keeps breaking,” he says.

I roll my eyes. “Fishing line,” I spit. “Fishing line will work.”

“I’ll be right back,” he says, leaving the room and closing the door. He isn’t gone long, maybe five minutes, and when he gets back, he is panting.

“Did you go for a run?” I ask sarcastically.

He holds up a spool of brand new fishing wire in one hand and a small bag of off-white powder in the other.

I immediately look to the bag, intrigued. “Smack?” I ask.

He hands over the bag, nodding. “It’s pretty pure,” he says. “You’ll only need a tiny pinch.”

I take a pinch of the powder from the bag and nestle it in the webbing between my thumb and forefinger. Holding it up to my nose, I close off one nostril and breathe in forcefully.

Almost immediately, a sense of blissful calm settles on my shoulders, even as I swallow the bitter taste of heroin that coats the back of my throat.

“You good?” Jase asks. I nod.

“Yeah. Go for it.”

He digs the needle into my flesh, and though the pain is still apparent, it is now much more bearable.

“I don’t know how to knot this,” he says. I wave my hand dismissively. “Doesn’t matter.”