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I WAS DRUNK.
Motherfucking obliterated. Off-my-tree intoxicated.
There. I admitted it.
Drunk as a fucking alcoholic.
I’d been clearheaded all night. But the moment Kestrel took my woman into the bedroom and stripped her, I couldn’t do it anymore.
I wanted to delete all knowledge any way possible.
It didn’t work.
I winced, opening my eyes.
Where am I?
Instead of darkness and flickering flames from the fireplace, the windows welcomed pink, tentative dawn.
The room swirled, balancing on a stomach full of liquor.
Dawn.
The blank slate of a new day.
Dawn.
The eraser of yesterday’s mistakes and the pencil of today’s new ones.
I groaned, blocking out the pink light with smarting eyelids. I wished the awakening sun could eliminate the past couple of months. I wished everything could be washed away, granting a fresh start.
What happened last night?
The moment I probed my pounding brain, I wished I hadn’t.
Thanks to Kestrel, I’d done what I didn’t think I would ever be strong enough to do.
Plans I never thought I could put in place. A future I never thought I could earn.
My mind slipped a few hours into the past.
When I left the billiards room, I followed strict orders on where to go and what to prepare.
And I did—just like the fucking pussy I was.
As the Third Debt depicted, one man would rape, the others would wait their turn. An orgy with witnesses. A night of entertainment for devils and a night of horrors for angels.
I stormed into the security room, turned on the feed between the three cameras dotted around the room where the Third Debt would take place and waited for Cut and Daniel.
Only, I added something else to that to-do list.
Opening the liquor cabinet that the Black Diamonds stocked when on security detail, I poured copious amounts of second-rate bourbon down my throat.
The pills were fucking useless. They blocked emotions from tainting me, but they didn’t do anything about taming my own.
When Kestrel appeared with Nila in his arms on screen, I almost smashed the bottle and sliced my wrists open with jagged glass. And when he’d stripped her and climbed into bed, I buckled under heartbreak—my insides cascading with broken blood.
Cut and Daniel arrived.
I drank more disgusting alcohol. Their thoughts and enjoyment splashed around my burning body, cocooning us in a cesspit of nastiness inside the small, windowless room.
The sounds of Kestrel grunting tore at my eardrums. The sights of sheets bunching and bed moving dug daggers into my eyes. Nila’s begs echoed like a never-ending reflection in my soul.
It was all...too...fucking...much.
Cut and Daniel laughed. They peered closer for a better view. They whispered and high-fived and muttered what horrific things they would do during their turns.
I kept drinking.
And drinking.
And motherfucking drinking.
Each swallow only stoked my pain, and if it wasn’t for my trust in my brother, I would’ve slaughtered everyone in the bloody room.
It felt like it went on for decades—who knew how long it truly was. But slowly, my attention turned from the fiasco on the TV screen to my brother and father.
Their evil plans became slurred and unfinished. Their eyes hazy and glazed. Cut saw me watching him and stole the bourbon to swig a healthy dose.
He could have the damn bottle—it didn't matter. I was past legal levels of blood intoxication. I saw double. I heard triple. I felt quadruple pain.
Keep it together.
Kes assured me, they’d be out cold in approximately ten minutes.
Not long...
I grimaced when Cut slapped me on the back. I hid my murderous intentions when Daniel sneered as Nila screamed.
Inch by inch, I died inside.
All my life, I’d been in pain. Emotional pain. Physical pain. Psychological pain.
But this...
This pain—especially the moment when Nila realised what Kes intended and gave in to him—was like nothing I’d ever felt before.
It was physical, emotional, and psychological all at once.
A ransacking of my very marrow. An acid on my soul.
I couldn’t break. I couldn’t cry or scream or yell.
All I could do was crowd around the camera with my condemned family and witness the rape of the woman who held my fucking heart. If Kes and I pulled this off, we stood a chance of ending this. I was done trying to win on my own. Nila was my team. Kes was my team. Together, we would win against wrathful corruption.
Kestrel picked up his pace; the sheets tangled harder around two thrusting bodies.
And that was my limit.
I completely lost my shit.
Daniel cackled. “I’m going to fuck that cunt’s mouth.”
Cut laughed. “Her arse is all mine.” He turned to me. “You haven’t ploughed that yet, have you, Jet?”
Yep.
I lost it.
I fucking punched Cut in the jaw.
He fell.
Hard.
Cut smashed against the door, folding to the floor.
“Hey!” Daniel launched himself on me, but he was too slow. I slammed my fist into his face. With a grunt, he crashed against the keyboard, bouncing off the desk.
Two throws. Two men down.
My knuckles throbbed. I waited to deliver more.
But they never woke up.
I liked to think it was my powerful punch, but...it was all thanks to Kes.
Everything was all thanks to fucking Kes.
I groaned, grabbing my head, willing the memories to stop.
The hardness of the floor and coolness of sleeping with no blankets forced me to haul myself to my knees. My lips pressed together against the backwash of stale bourbon. The pills I’d taken at the start of the night had worn off, but the liquor was well and truly still controlling my blood.
I should’ve headed to bed once it was all over, but I couldn’t.
How could I?
Inching higher on my knees, I peered over the edge of the bed. The remaining shadows painted her in a ghostly collage.
My hands fisted on the bedspread as her eyelids twitched and fingers strummed a nonsense beat on her sheets.
The drugs Kes had given her would wear off in another hour—it never lasted long. Already, her body fought it off—legs jiggling and feet battling imaginary beasts.
I wanted to step into her dreams and slay the figments for her.
I wanted to reassure her that nothing had happened.
“Nila, I’m so fucking sorry.” I stayed vigil, stroking her arm as she whimpered. Silent tears tracked down her cheeks.
She would wake soon to a different kind of nightmare.
She would be told a lie. It would tear her apart, but in order for this deception to work, she had to believe. She had to believe, because my father and Daniel had to believe.
My mind skipped backward again.
I looked up as the door to the security room opened.
My brother stood there fully dressed with a grim line for lips.
The moment I saw him, hatred billowed, and I wanted to kill him with my bare hands. “Did you fuck her?”
His eyes flashed. “What do you think?”
“I think you went above and beyond what we’d discussed.”
He shook his head. “I did exactly what you said.”
“You did more than what I said, Kes.” Rubbing my eyes to stop the fucking tears from prickling, I growled, “You touched her. You made her come. You touched what’s fucking mine!”
Kes swallowed, dropping his eyes. “I told you everything. I told you how I felt about her—how hard that would be for me. Yet you made me do it anyway. I didn’t fuck her.” Holding up his finger and thumb, he pinched air. “I was this close, Jet. This fucking close to taking what I wanted. But... I didn’t. I didn’t because I’m on your side and have your back.”
My hatred turned inward, battering and pouring yet more acid on my already flayed wounds. I asked more of him than any brother should. I ought to thank him and never speak of it again. But my lips formed another question, spewing it forth. “Did you come?”
He looked away.
Gratefulness or not, I couldn’t stop my possessive rage. “Motherfucker.”
I lunged.
I caught him off guard, landing a right hook and a left before he wizened up and punched me in the gut.
“Shit, Kite. Calm the fuck down. I didn’t do anything we didn’t agree.”
“We agreed you wouldn’t come!”
“We agreed on other things, too.” His eyes narrowed. “Or are you forgetting about those?”
I froze.
He’s right.
I hadn’t honoured past promises, no matter how hard I’d tried.
Looking past me, his attention switched. “Shit, that was fast. How long did it take to kick in?”
Shaking out the pain in my knuckles from punching three of my family members, I glanced at Daniel and Cut on the floor. “It didn’t. I helped them along.”
Kes dragged a hand through his silvering hair. “What the fuck did you do? You know they can’t wake up in the morning and think it didn’t happen. Shit—what was the point in all of this if you couldn’t even let it run its course!”
The room tilted and weaved.
I heaved as my stomach tried to revolt against the booze. “Had no choice. Couldn’t do it anymore.”
Suddenly, I couldn’t look at Kes without reliving what he’d done to my woman. It shredded my skin, turned my muscles into quivering agony. “I can’t—I can’t stay in here with you.”
Kes stomped forward and gripped my shoulders. “You have no choice. It’s not over yet.”
I tensed against his thoughts, preparing myself to flounder in his coital bliss from Nila, but like most times, Kestrel protected me. I picked up on faint frequencies, but he kept the majority hidden behind a calm curtain of nothingness.
I sighed, pushing him away. “Sorry.”
He nodded. “I get it.” Pointing at comatose Cut and Daniel, he added, “Let’s finish up. Then we can call it a night, yeah?”
Swaying on my feet, I moved to lock the door. “You’re right.”
Together, we faced the archives of previous debts and extractions. I pulled up old footage of Emma Weaver. “It’s time to get creative.”
With a solidified bond, we each took a keyboard and began.
Goddammit, I was a monster.
Covering my face, I folded over her bed.
I was so tired.
So fucking drained.
It’s all so fucking hard.
All I wanted was to give in. To tell her the truth and end the lies I’d always lived.
Pulling the tiny bottle from my pocket, I deliberated taking another. The drugs helped me stay sane—they were the only thing that had a power over me—but as much as I appreciated the silence, the numbness from overwhelming intensity, I hated the severance between Nila and me.
She deserved so much more than what I’d given her.
And now she would hate me for eternity.
Clutching the bottle, I cursed the swirling room.
Nila was safe and untouched.
She would remain safe and untouched.
I was done being unhappy and selfish. My sacrifice would keep her safe.
I would trade a lifetime in a straitjacket to give her a long, happy existence.
Those were our futures. And her hating me would only make that separation easier on her.
Sighing, I slid back to the floor and curled up beside her bed.
I would guard her for the rest of my days.
It would be the one good thing I’d done before I died.
Falling to my side, the room spun quicker and quicker.
I closed my eyes and succumbed.
