Page 5 of Fragile Facade
Riot keeps smiling, tying the vine root off to something. When he snugs it up against my throat, tight enough to hurt but not tight enough to cut off all my oxygen, he looks at me. “Oh, this is just a restraint, but we can get kinky if you want.” His ass wiggles on my lap, and my hips buck in an attempt to fight back. “Ever fucked in your grave before?”
“What would my father think?” I gasp. Literally, because his elbow pounds on my solar plexus, knocking the wind out of me while a tree strangles me. I cough, my eyes watering, my hands grasping at my throat.
That’s when I realize my mistake. Both hands at my throat, wrists close together. Close enough for him to slap on a pair of cuffs and tighten them so much tighter than the noose.
“I don’t think he’d be too surprised,” Riot says as I struggle. “He knows his oldest remaining son is an attention whore who will fuck anything darker than he is.”
Still gasping, I spit at him. “You think you’re darker than me?”
“It says something that your mind went to me first.” He pushes my bound wrists above my head, hooking the cuffs to the root sticking out of the soil. Leaning over me, his eyes narrow, his hair falls forward to drip more rain, and his smile stops being charming. “Oh, sweetheart, you have no fucking idea how dark I can be.” He holds up a syringe, andfuck, I start to panic. “Wanna know what it really feels like to be dead down here?”
“Fuck you, Riot! What is that?” I kick my legs and buck my hips, but Riot is strong and muscled, entirely in control of his bodyandmine. He jabs the needle into my hip with a jolting sting and tosses the empty syringe down where my feet are. “You fucking prick.”
“Just a paralytic.”
No. No. No.No!
“Knock me out.” Panic fills me this time because nothing scares me more than being entirely present while unable to do anything about it. Don’t take my body away and leave my brain! Fuck! My mind isn’t a safe space, remember? My body is my only weapon, and he’s taking it from me, leaving me with my weakest part. “Knock me out!”
“Not a chance,” Riot says while my legs go tingly. “Because you need to learn to think without having any of your other vices. I’ll wait.”
He leans against the soil wall, waiting for my body to numb. I feel my heartbeat slow, but I don’t lose all feeling in my upper half.Yet.I don’t like it. I don’t like the feeling of being disconnected from my body, the one and only thing that actually keeps me alive. Because if my mind was in control, I’d have died years ago. The suicide curse lives in my brain, infecting it with its whispers of total oblivion. My body is the part that fights back. It’s my skill as a ghost and my confidence in my strength that’s keeping me alive long enough to tempt death but never actually achieve it.
I don’t want to play the game without my body!
I can hear myself hyperventilating, but I can’t feel it. Titling my head down, the root digs under my chin, and I witness my chest heaving. I tell my legs to kick, to knock Riot out, to stand up and climb out of here, but they don’t do anything. Not even a twitch.
“You know what my favourite part about you is?” Riot asks, making my eyes shift to him. I hate him. I’ve hated him for a long time because his ego challenges mine, and I’m a sore loser. Not that I’ve ever lost to him, but if I ever do, I won’t be able to handle it. “How pathetic you really are. You think no one notices?” He laughs, cruel and powerful. “Oh, I notice. It’s all I notice about you. Poor Soren Sauder, a ghost who gets no recognition.”
I might not be able to feel my body, but I feel the burn inside it. How fucking dare he. He plucked my biggest insecurity straight from my soul, and now he’s wielding it like a weapon in my own grave.
“The narcissist who craves recognition but is forced to thrive in silence. Your talents go unseen, ironically, because you excel at them. The Ghost of Moros. The man who wants to live in the spotlight but thrives in the dark. You’re a mindfuck, yeah?” He smacks my legs, but other than sensing my body jolt, I don’t feel it. “It’s gotta hurt. Does it? To be the only Vile Boy who doesn’t get to be present for every big reveal and all the dramatic moments because you’re off lurking somewhere in the dark to give us the intel we need. You do all the work, and we get all the credit.” He laughs again, getting up onto his knees to lean over me. “Admit it hurts.”
Never. My tongue is partially numb, but I say, “You just admitted I do all the work.”
He's right, though. It fucking kills me, but I’ll never admit it to him. Because I’ve learned to rationalize it within my mind. I tell myself that none of these assholes would be where they are if it weren’t for me. I’m the one who accomplishes the most on our jobs, and without me, they wouldn’t get their credit and their big dramatic moments. I’m the strength of Vile House. I’m the Ghost of Moros. I don’t need the credit because I know I earned it.
But fucking hell, it grates when I don’t get it. When I have to be silent and hidden while they get to be loud and powerful in the public eye. Every time I have to watch them get credit from our locals, be thanked by our citizens or applauded for their efforts, another piece of my well-glued-together puzzle chips away to stab at my pride and infect my already infected mind.
It’s why I taunt Death. She’s my most attentive audience member.
“Does it bruise your sensitive ego, Ghost?”
Despite all the numbness and the insecurities, I can still feel my face, so I morph it into the illusion of confidence. I’m a madman at my very core, and no one brings it to the surface like Riot does. I smile at him, forcing myself to laugh at how patheticheis. He’s the one with the inflated ego. He’s the one who needs recognition without ever earning it.
“The fuck do you even do for Vile House?” I ask through choked laughter. “Cause some chaos? Fuck, that’s easy. You think my ego is bruised? Look at yours, you sociopathic fuck.” The root digs into my jaw, but I keep on laughing.
Harder and louder. Deeper and harsher. I can’t feel my body, but I can feel my broken mind, and it’s a goddamn master at deflection. He wants to hold a mirror in front of me? I’m gonna spin it until he can’t stand to even look at himself. There’s no time for introspection when I can tear someone else down first.
Riot laughs with me. He thinks I’m pathetic, and I think he is, and never, in the history of our feud, have either of us ever given in. It won’t happen tonight, either. Straddling my body again, his toned legs press against my hips, and he brings my arms down and undoes the cuffs, letting my hands uselessly fall to my chest.
“Chaos, yeah,” he agrees with me, dark hair flopping over his forehead. “Ready for a little more?” He lifts on his knees, opening his pants.
“The fuck are you doing?”
“You’re dead, aren’t you? This is what you wanted. A trip to Death’s doorstep, and now I’ve brought you here with a deadened body and an awake mind. My turn to have a little fun with it. It’s not quite necrophilia, but it’s close enough. I’ve always wondered.”
Reaching inside his pants, he brings his hard cock out, palming it above my still body. I watch for a second, transfixed by the bead of precum already on the tip, trying to figure out what his plan is and why I’m anticipatory over the unknown of it. But when I look up at his face, I see his thoughts. He’s going to taunt me physically to fuck with me mentally just because he can. Because he somehow knows how flawed my mind is. Because he sees through the illusions I weave, peering into the mess of who I actually am.
