Page 56 of Blood and Thorns
Taking her wrist, I pulled her further inside the room. My nightmares were howling, the demons snapping at my sanity.
“Stay,” I demanded, setting up a fresh canvas and picking up my brush, only for it to be all wrong. The shape. The colour. The fucking texture.
A tightness coiled beneath my ribs, the panic trying to swallow me whole. I felt the first phantom slash of that whip across my back, my cries falling on deaf ears.
It wasn’t the pain of being sliced open, it was watchingthe same thing happen to my mum and brothers. I was made to watch as my mum was raped, and then her throat slit while my dad wailed in despair.
S’il vous plait!
S’il vous plait!
My brothers were next, not even in double digits as they were beaten so badly I barely recognised them, all because of my father.
S’il vous plaît, ne faites pas cela!
Please don’t do this!They’d begged for their lives, even as I cried. Even as I screamed to take me instead. Then I was forced to face him, the man I blamed for it all.
I tore my thoughts away, punching at the canvas until my fist split through. Paint splattered, but I didn’t care.This rage inside me couldn’t be cleansed, my memories and nightmares threatening to choke me.
“It didn’t have to be this way, you know,” she said, stroking through my mother’s hair like a lover. Mum let out a gargled whimper, the last one before death finally took her.
“Fucking bitch!” Dad screeched, fighting against the restraints. “I’ll fucking kill you for this.”
She tutted, her red painted lips curving into a vicious slash of a smile. “You shouldn’t have chosen her, and now look at what you’ve made me do.”
My sobs rattled, my wrists bleeding from where I tried to free myself and reach my brothers. But it was no good; the first whoosh of the whip against my back made me scream. The pain was sharp before dulling into an ache, all before another strike parted my flesh.
“I’m sorry, Sebastian,” she said, kneeling in my growing pool of blood while my dad roared. “This is all your father’s fault. He left me no choice.”
Soft fingers touched my shoulder, and I flinched before there was a gasp. I blinked away the image of the woman that had tried to destroy me, only to find Arabella, her lips parted and my hand tightening around her slim throat.
A little more pressure, and I could watch her light and that infuriating defiance disappear from her eyes. Forever going dark.
“Sebastian,” she mouthed, drawing me back to the present.
I hadn’t even known I’d moved, lost against the fight of my past.
Fuck.I relaxed my fingers so she could take in a breath, my thumb reaching out to stroke the tear glistening from the corner of her eye. I accidentally smudged her with paint, the dark red like blood across her fair skin.
It was fucking beautiful. So I did it again, smearing it straight on her cheekbone in a splash of gore that anchored me to the moment.
She was still beneath my touch, not moving even when I stepped back to grab more paint. She watched me with those fucking eyes, and I expected fear when I reached for the bottom of her pyjama vest, attempting to rip the fabric over her head. But there was nothing as she lifted her arms to help me, a doe caught in the path of a wolf.
The fabric pulled until her breasts were free, and then I was painting them too, tracing around the luscious curves that had invaded my thoughts on more than one occasion.
My thumb brushed over her nipple, and she shivered beneath the touch. So I did it again, lost against the paint on her skin.
If I’d known better, I’d say she’d been sent to me as a Trojan horse to make me fall. But clearly, I didn’t care, notwhen her presence was bringing me back from the void of my mind.
Her breasts moved with every inhale, my paint contouring her top half until I reached the waistband of her shorts. I tugged them off her legs even as she protested, until she stood there in nothing but black lace.
Fucking beautiful.
I stalked around her like she was a living piece of art, reaching out to paint across her shoulders, and then the arch of her back. My fingers moved down, over the slope of her arse to brush between her thighs. Her breathing hitched, the softest moan escaping her lips.
A warmth spread inside my chest, replacing the panic that was slowly receding until I could think. Until those nightmares no longer threatened to destroy me.
Her delicate throat swallowed as my fingers moved closer to her centre, only to find her underwear slick. My eyes flashed up to hers in cruel pleasure.
