Page 113 of Riot

Last night, she rode me like she owned me.

And maybe she did. Maybe I let her.

Allure had this way of making me feel brand new, like all the blood on my hands didn’t matter when she was looking at me like I was salvation instead of sin. I went to sleep with her on my chest and woke up hard and horny, her scent still on my skin. Everything about her felt like a reset. A clean slate.

But the second I stepped into this house, that peace evaporated.

The air hit different here. Heavy. Sour with memories.

I shut the front door behind me and stood in the foyer, jaw tight, letting my eyes adjust to the dim lighting and darker energy. My sneakers thudded against the marble as I moved, each step dragging old ghosts to the surface.

This was where it started. Where I learned how to hate. How to hurt.

The house was too fucking quiet. Not peaceful—funeral quiet. The kind of silence that crept into your skin and remindedyou that no matter how far you ran, your past still had your address.

“You're early,” a tired voice muttered behind me.

I turned to see the nurse—Maria or Mona or some shit. She had bags under her eyes. She looked like she was two seconds from a breakdown.

“She’s upstairs,” she added. “Didn’t sleep last night. Didn’t eat this morning. Threw her meds across the room and cursed out the cleaning lady.”

I raised a brow. “She call her a dirty bitch and a lazy whore?”

The nurse blinked. “Yes.”

“Yeah,” I muttered, rubbing the back of my neck. “She’s still in there.”

She frowned. “Mr. King, respectfully, I think you need to consider bringing someone new in. Maybe someone trained in memory care. This job’s too much for one person.”

“No,” I said flat. “This job’s too much for the wrong person. You tired? Quit. I’ll get somebody who can handle her.”

She didn’t say another word as I walked off, deeper into the house.

Every hallway felt like a scar. Every wall held something I didn’t wanna remember. The den still smelled like cigars and cruelty. I stared at the leather chair my father used to sit in, that smug grin of his burned into my memory like a bad tattoo.

I killed him already.

And I’d do it again. Twice.

But even with that bullet to the head, he still lived here. In the corners. In my mother’s fading eyes. In the weight I carried every damn day.

I sat on the edge of the chair and let my head fall back. My knuckles cracked as I flexed my hands. Allure didn’t know this version of me—the version that grew up afraid of footsteps in the hall, of belts folded twice, of silence that lasted too long.

She saw me as a man. A protector. Not a broken boy turned monster.

And for her, I wanted to keep it that way.

But this house? It remembered everything. And today, I had to face it.

I stood and headed for the stairs, ready to check on my mother, even if she didn’t know who I was when I got there.

Because no matter how far I’d come…

This house still knew my name.

I made my way upstairs slow, hand dragging along the banister, feeling every notch in the wood like it was carved into my own spine. The closer I got to her door, the thicker the air got. Not just heavy with memory, but with dread.

She’d been slipping lately. Some days she called me by name. Other days she thought I was Silas. I hated when she did that.

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