Page 108 of Liars and Liaisons

Willow snags her ankle on a narrow table, yanking it as we bolt past so the glass figurines and sculptures fall to the floor, shattering in Ezekiel’s path. It’s only a second of a deterrent, but it’s enough for us to pick up the pace and launch into the door leading to the southern wing.

We slam it shut, locking it just as he rolls into it; a muffled grunt can be heard on the other side, and he begins banging while our hands stay on the locked knob. Keeping it shut.

“Don’t look in any of these mirrors,” I tell her, noting the deep purple skin around her eye and the blood we’re covered in.

I grab her shoulder, prying us away from the door in the direction of Sydney Scott’s old room.

Once inside, we use whatever bits of strength remain to barricade the door with the dresser. Its legs scrape against the floor, leaving deep grooves in the wood. The banging echoes down the hall, rattling the windows, Ezekiel’s angry shouts barely audible with all the space between us.

“What the hell is going on?” Willow asks, though the question hardly seems directed at me or anyone in particular. It’s as if her brain is just struggling to cope, trying to make sense with any pieces of information that it can.

I shake my head, aiming for the exit across the room. “I don’t fucking know.”

“This family isinsane.”

One of my brows rises in agreement, and I unlock the glass door, sliding the curtain aside with a heavy sigh.

Willow’s scream scrapes along my insides.

Nate stands on the other side of the glass, embers raining down in the night sky around him. A sadistic grin curves at the corners of his mouth, and he lifts Micah’s decapitated head in his hand, gripping her red-tinged hair and turning it so we can see that he’s removed her eyes.

Her beautiful blue eyes.

Now, just endless voids remain.

With his free hand, he reaches down and grabs the opposite side of the doorknob. Twists it slowly so I feel each painstaking notch like a gaping wound in my chest.

The door opens, and he drops Micah like she’s a sack of fucking potatoes. Anger burns in my chest, a hurricane of fury. I clench my fists and back away as he slowly enters the room.

“Where is she?” he demands, and I assume he means Willow. That he wants to finish her off before taking me out.

I move to try and block her from his view. “Get fucked.”

“Wow, Vi, a couple of weeks spent with my baby brother, and you’re as foul-mouthed as he is. Didn’t take much for him to soil the sweet, innocent little girl I met months ago, did it?” He rakes his gaze over me, wiping his thumb across his mouth and smearing Micah’s blood there. “Can’t wait to give the new and improved version a test ride.”

Bile teases my throat. “You touch any part of me, and it’ll be the last thing you do.”

“Yeah? You gonna stop me?” He steps closer, his hand lashing out and grabbing the hair at the base of my skull in a punishing grip. “Gonna thrash and beg, like your little friend did? Every time she called out for her sister, her ass got tighter. Wonder who you’ll cry for. God or Grayson?”

He shoves me toward the bed, and I see Willow trip over herself, giving him a wide berth. Paralyzed by her fear.

I swallow. “Let her go. You have me, let Willow out.”

Nate clicks his tongue, shaking his head. “No can do, Violet. See, I might be a piece of shit, but the man on the other side of this hall? He’s the real monster. If I let her go, he’ll just take her for himself. I’m trying tohelp youhere. He won’t want my spoils.”

As his hands start groping, sliding my sweatshirt up and squeezing my breast, I see Willow stand up behind him. She grips Elena’s knife, her eyes on Nate’s back, wrist twisted outward.

Seeming to somehow sense her presence, Nate chuckles, pausing. He reaches behind him, under his shirt, and pulls out a pistol.

“I didn’t want to use this,” he says, shifting to fit the gun’s cold, smooth mouth beneath my chin. “But if you insist on being a hero, Willow, I’ll just kill Violet before we’ve gotten to the fun part. Do you really want to be the one to deprive your boss of seeing the woman he loves die?”

Willow freezes. A tremor shoots through her arm.

“Drop the knife.”

Her hand opens, fingers uncurling, and the blade falls with a thud to the floor.

“Now,” he says, leaning down to drag his nose across my chin, down my neck. The sweatshirt’s all twisted, exposing my breasts, and he swoops down, latching on to one with his teeth.

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