Page 83 of Skin Trade

“Maybe we should let Payton be the judge of that, what do you say, Sethy?”

Seth moved closer, a predatory step, strong, powerful, but Payton put her hand up to stop him. “Don’t.”

“I would never hurt you,” he said. “Whatever he tells you, remember that. You are more than that to me.”

Those words again, something he wasn’t saying with them. But unless he explained properly, there would always be this thing in her head that was unsure.

Alexander gave a nod to his men, and an instant later, they all rushed towards Seth, grabbing him, holding him like he was a wild animal and they all feared his bite.

“Hey,” Payton said. “Leave him alone.”

“It’s okay,” he said to her. He couldn’t do anything to stop her if she came close, she knew that much, but the look he gave her along with his words made her stop.

It didn’t matter either that Alexander had grabbed her arm. “Not so fast. We have something to show you first.” He looked at Payton and then Seth. “I wonder if she knows why she feels the way she does about you? Shall we see what she thinks of you after this?” He gave another nod and the men holding Seth—five men, because clearly Alexander couldn’t contain him on his own, hauled him out. One of the men, a tall fat man with a round bulbus head, a mouth full of brown teeth, who’d been immortalised as ugly, put his pudgy hand at Seth’s nape and pushed.

Surely, if Seth had the mind to, he could break out of that hold easily enough. The question to her was, why didn’t he. He had to have been making a choice to let them lead him out of the room in such a way. She had felt his power, seen it. A man like Seth didn’t rise to the top and then get taken down so easily by lesser vampires, even if there were many of them. There had to be only Alexander in this room who was stronger than Seth, and he had hold of her.

“Where are we going?” Payton asked as Alexander led her by the arm the same way Seth had been taken, to the lift.

“We’re going on a little history trip. Take you for a nice jog down memory lane. See what you do remember.”

“I’ve never been here before.”

“Oh, but you have. That’s the bit I need you to see.”

Seth was already in the lift, the five vampires flanking him. His face was stoic, his body stiff as if he was prepared for a battle. Today he didn’t have his tie on, just a shirt open at the collar and his black trousers. She had never really seen him outside of the club without his formal attire.

Alexander pressed zero to take them to the ground floor. Payton watched the numbers tick by and when they reached the bottom, Alexander stopped the doors from opening, pulled down the front of the control panel, and opened another smaller panel. “What’s the code?” he said to Seth.

“Why would Seth know the code?” Payton asked. “This place--”

“He does. Tell me the code. You still remember it don’t you, Sethy?”

A long pause, eyes on Payton, power in the air. “5-5-6-2-7,” he said in the end, forcing the words out. But he never looked away from her.

“Forgive me,” he said to her, through her mind. It made her blood run cold.

Chapter Forty-Six

Alexander put the numbers into the new control box and the moment he pressed enter, the lift started to work again and defy what her brain was telling her. In her head, they were on the ground floor with nowhere else left to go, but this went down. It made no sense. She counted the floors, the display above them not giving any readout. As the lift went down, Seth didn’t take his eyes off her, not once.

One, she said in her head, trying to keep herself calm. With him so close, it was hard to do just that, hard to focus on anything. Fear was a tight knot in her stomach.

Two.

Three.

Six floors down and the lift stopped.

“You ready?” Alexander said. Though she knew if she told him no, that would have just delighted him even more. The sick bastard wanted this. He wanted whatever reaction he was going to get from her. But mostly, she’d figured, he wanted to make Seth pay for something.

“Ready,” she said, putting as much confidence into that one word as she could manage.

She’d not seen it that first time at Lush, the way he was with Seth, the calm, cool way he controlled everything about him. Vampires were good like that. They could mask any emotion they wanted, put on another in place of it. He’d not been angry at Josie for what had happened in the bathroom. No. This was all a game to him. He’d used Josie, just like he was using her now.

When the lift doors opened and gave way to a cool, pristine corridor made of metal and white walls, Payton froze and the poker face she was trying to hold in place dropped.

Alexander’s gaze was on her, waiting.

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