Page 4 of Feed Your Fiends

“You were never her baby, Gant,” Bart says, his eyes trailing to the death portrait. “But you werealwaysmy son. You only became hers later.”

He said he hadn’t read the letters, or was it just an observation I hadn’t realised until now? That my mother only became my mother later. It’s not normal to remember your childhood starting at age eight, or so my old therapist said.

Another canine yelp draws me back to the tank, followed by a gluttonous gasp for air, then a gurgling gulp of water. Splash after splash is like a symphony to my eardrums.

“You say it’s endless? An impossible pool?”

“Not unless you show mercy.” He pushes a button on the wall, making me realise it’s not one massive tank but three. The side tanks fill as the central tank empties, and the thing thuds to the black bottom. The light of the living room above shines down like a spotlight.

“Let her get reacclimated. Comfortable. Take the information we need, then get rid of them both.”

I snort. “You think she’s that easy? After everything?”

“It is that easy. Ask the host you crawled out of.”

The corpse portrait catches my peripheral vision. “She hated you too, you know.”

I hate you.

“She loved this more.” He gestures to the penthouse. “There’s always something they love more than they hate you, and you’re Gant Auclair. You can give a girl like her anything. So give her anything. Give hereverything. An offer she can’t refuse because I can assure you that whatever she could possibly want is nothing greater than what we could lose.”

He doesn’t want to need me, but he does. And the fact that it’s solely because of Elle makes it obvious that he’s hit a dead end. It's not a pretence either, so he can pull out a wildcard to throw in my face later. No, he’s…desperate.

I rip my eyes from his reflection and face him head-on. I can’t see the desperation, but I feel it radiating from his pristine suit. If only he’d read the mind-numbing musings of a cunt, he’d find the clues.

“How much of Auclair Enterprises did you gift her to marry you?”

“Twelve per cent.”

Seems small until you realise the company is worth over twenty billion.

“I consented because her will ensured that her firstborn would inherit it. I thought I put her firstborn inside her. If only I’d known she’d let some worthless loser cum in her first, I would’ve never married her.”

You would’ve never had me.But that’s of no consequence. Any able-bodied male heir would’ve done. It’s notmemy father cares about. I just happen to be in the correct package.

“And you think that worthless cumshoooter is Jarett Crewly of all people?”

“That’s what you and your little Cayenne cunt are going to find out. I can admit when I need help. So do what I couldn’t and finish it.”

I turn to the tank, to the heaving form.

I’ll take it a step further than that.

I’ll take it to hell.

Elle

Nothing…

Nothingeases this sort of pain. Not even a drug-induced slumber.

Even with my eyes closed, it’s blinding, excruciating as it stabs at every pore. As it worms deep into my eye sockets, embedding into each tooth down to the pulp. It burrows beneath my nail beds and ignites every nerve fibre while corroding everything in its path.

It electrifies my hair and my erratic heart, which emulates the rhythmic throbbing of my useless, blood-crusted feet. My most prized possessions. Or they used to be.

He was wrong when he said I wasn’t porcelain because I’d shattered. He’d placed me on a pedestal so high that there was no choice once I fell from the tremendous height, the height of my ballet dance career as the lead in Cinderella. He ensured that I was the lead.

He ensuredeverything.

---