Page 28 of Painter's Obsession: Volume II

“To fuck you. You want me, and that’s what you hate about yourself. You like every fucking twisted thing I did to you.”

Byron doesn’t react to my words as he begins to eat. “Maybe I did.” He pauses, and through his thick curly lashes, he looks up at me. “All that proves is that I’m sick and liked being fucked.”

His honesty humors me, and I smile, at first. But he doesn’t, and that pisses me off. My smile fades because I see that, like my mother, I will fail. I tell myself I won’t. That I’m in control. That he’s mine.

But I know the truth.

You can’t condition love.

And that’s the one truth I can admit.

Byron is proof of that—his love for his sister is unwavering, willing, and true.

Nothing will touch that.

But I will be the thing that haunts it. When he looks at her, when she looks at him, they will seemebetween them.

Chapter Fifteen

Byron

Icontinue to eat, trying to contain the small tremors in my hands or how crazy my heart is beating inside my chest. Ren couldn’t realize how much saying those words out loud affected me. How much this entire situation is affecting me. Taking a piece of the meat, I begin to chew it slowly, feeling the weight of Ren’s eyes on me from across the table. Looking up, I catch him smiling, beer in hand. “How does she taste?”

I choke on the pieces of chewed up meat, bile roaring like a tsunami up my throat. My eyes move with him as he brings a piece of meat—of her—to his mouth and eats it. Immediately, the contents of my stomach spillto the ground as Ren watches. The humiliation burns hot, but the anger boils brighter, and I don’t think. Grabbing my plate from the table, I hurl it towards Ren. “You sick fuck, what the fuck is wrong with you?”

Ren cocks his head to the side, avoiding the hit, dusting off a piece of meat that fell on his shoulder. “Everything,” he says before he resumes eating. “Sit.”

My anger is uncontrollable, my body is shaking.

“Why?” I demand, smashing my fist on the table, picturing it was his devilish face. How can someone so privileged in life be so cruel? Or is it this privilege that has made him this way, so out of touch? Why the fuck is Ren so fucking twisted? And why the fuck does he affect me the way he does?, What kind of sick fuck am I? Ren stops eating, reaching over the table casually as if he didn’t just force me to eat... eat... I can’t even say it, and he— and I bite back the urge to heave. “WHY?”

“I told you I like to destroy things, rebuild them?” Ren brings the joint to his lips and lights it up, shrugging as he takes a pull from the herby smoke. “Byron, sometimes you have to evolve, or in my case, adapt. I can’timmortalize my creations, so I make them part of me.” He pulls the joint from his lips and passes it to me. My hands move too quickly to process as it smacks Ren’s hand, the joint falling to the ground. Pulling back his hand, Ren pushes his chair back and leans onto it.

“What, it pisses you off that I’m honest? That I’m me and own it?” There’s no emotion in his voice, he’s just reading me to filth. Am I this transparent to him?

“Does it make you mad that I do what I want, or,” pointing his finger to his temple, he presses it hard against it, “does it piss you off that you don’t understand what goes on in here? Byron, there’s no reason. I just want to.” His finger falls from his temple. “Maybe I was never taught to be anything more than just Ren Sato,” he says. His voice shows the smallest hint of emotion, but he recovers quickly and stands, walking over to the discarded joint, and then grabbing a remote. “You see, when you live a life like I did, you learn the ugliness of the world.” He turns on a screen that’s mounted on the beige wall above the small living area across the room. “So you learn to survive, to adapt, to alwaysremain ahead.” The screen cuts on and I stare at the screen. I expected to see my sister—I know Ren has her in his hands. But what I didn’t expect to see was Johnathan.

“You see, I watched... I waited, and I planned. Control is what helps you win,” he says with a smile, and whatever anger I had burning in me is now showered by an icy cold bath of realization of Ren’s fucked game.

“If you—“ I begin to say, but Ren cuts me off, waving his hand to silence me. “Before you finish, let me show you.” With a pep in his step, Ren walks toward a box, his back covers what he’s doing, but then I see my phone in his hand and a burner one.

“You see, I saw you get close to Mr. Tavarez, but I also know he has certain kinks.” He laughs at that like he just said a great joke, but I didn’t understand what I was missing. “But boy, does he have the hots for you and a thing for underground glory holes where he schedules meetups. Perfect place to encounter me. And well, I was inspired.”

My stomach tightens in knots, and I can see it in his face—he’s satisfied with my reaction. There’s no denying the horror I convey through my features.

“Why?” I ask again, because I need to understand what drives this compulsion with me, his obsession. He might fight it, deny it, and pretend, but I’m assuming any other serial killer would have given up by now. Or did we both come to the same conclusion—we gotta finish what was started. Ren doesn’t acknowledge me. With a smile on his face and the joint between his lips, he begins to text, and then my eyes move towards the screen. My chest tightens, dread licking at the edge of my ribs.

Johnathan sat on the corner of his bed, naked with a towel around his waist, when his phone screen lights up, and with a smile, he grabs it. My pulse spikes as my eyes snap to Ren’s hands.

But it’s not Ren’s burner phone that lights up... it’s mine... My breath hitches, and I feel my stomach clench tighter,colder.

Ren holds it triumphantly. “You see? So happy to hear from Byron and his adventures in Montana.” My heart sinks—I’ve been so in my head that I don’t even know where I am. A cold sweat begins to crawl across my neck.

“Are we in Montana?” I ask, hating the small shake in my voice. It betrays me.

Ren shakes his head. “No. I wanted to stay close by.”

“For what?” I ball my hands into a fist as I walk towards Ren, when he places the phones back into the box, and takes a pull of the joint that burned in his lips. My eyes don’t leave his hands, don’t trust what comes next.

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