Page 105 of By the Orchid and the Owl
But I could feel them as the investigators moved closer to us, heard that whispering presence and imagined the group of them now standing right outside the Mind Manipulator house, staring at the many little windows as if they could see inside.
“Here we go,” Coen hissed.
He clasped my hand, and I clasped Sylvie’s, who clasped Sasha’s.
Usually, I couldn’t feel Coen in my mind until he actually spoke to me, but now a pressure built at the base of my skull and snaked toward my forehead.
I didn’t know what was happening until a foreign voice fractured through my thoughts and spit,did you kill Frank Fenway?
Kitterfol Lexington didn’t wait for me to respond.
He plunged through my most recent memories, and I relived them, too, as he flicked through me like I was nothing more than a textbook.
But when it came to my suspicions of Fergus, there was curiously nothing, as if a sheet of generic terror had been slid carefully over that knowledge.
When Kitterfol dug deeper, rooting around like an invasive worm that had split into several separate heads, I sensed Coen’s presence lurking, handing the Mind Manipulator private memories but folding the most secret ones far, far beneath everything else.
Kitterfol watched with amusement as Coen and I had sex for the first time. I cringed internally, trying to fight my way out of that memory, but Coen grabbed my thigh and gave it a squeeze that would surely end up bruising.
Breathe deeply. Relax your mind.
So I let Kitterfol watch it, the most intimate thing I had ever experienced.
Before Coen and I reached our climax, however, I felt him grow bored—andlungefor a new memory.
The one where I hurled myself into a tank of cockroaches.
No, no, no. Not that one. I couldn’t let him reach the end of that one.
Coen wrenched him back. And changed the scene to hold his attention.
Now he, Coen, was dragging out chains from beneath this very bed and cuffing me to the bedpost—spreading my arms and legs wide until I was completely bared for him. Exposed to the air and his wicked contemplation.
“Where should I start?” Coen’s voice dripped with venom as he swiped a finger between my legs, making me arch my back violently. “Here? Or here?”
He plunged that same finger into my mouth, gagging me.
When the Rayna in this false memory began to sob, Coen chuckled darkly and said, “Here, then.” And stuffed himself into my mouth until I was retching.
It worked. Kitterfol Lexington didn’t try to fish out any other memories.
By the time he ripped himself out of my mind, his little worms weren’t curious anymore. They simply oozed satisfaction and triumph and sick smugness.
Coen released a groan and slumped against me. I hadn’t even realized how rigid he’d become, but now his limbs were trembling.
“He’s gone.”
“Without checking us?” Sasha asked incredulously.
Coen fisted a hand against his forehead. “He had his fun and assumed the memories would be the same for each of you, since you’re all sharing my bed. God, I’m so sorry, Rayna. That should have been easier than it was, but Kitterfol is more powerful than I anticipated.” He was shaking. Coen was actuallyshaking. “I’ve never had to defend any of us from him before—it’s always been one of the others. But he was clever. He would have pierced through my shields and guards if I hadn’t distracted him with what he most wanted to see.”
“What?” I asked, breathless. “Abusing women in bed?”
My heartbeat was drowning in my throat at what I had just witnessed.
“Discipline,” Coen said. “Submission. Power. I’m so sorry,” he repeated.
“Hey.” I began to rub soothing circles along his shoulder. “It’s okay. You just saved me. You don’t have to apologize for doing whatever it took.”
