Total pages in book: 70
Estimated words: 65151 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 326(@200wpm)___ 261(@250wpm)___ 217(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 65151 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 326(@200wpm)___ 261(@250wpm)___ 217(@300wpm)
“And this is where you tell me you enjoy this? The torment, the scalpel?” Glaring at his jailer through the bars, Jacques narrowed his eyes. “Why did you kill Rebecca? It wasn’t because she was happy.”
“Imagine a man who’s felt sunlight on his skin for the first time in fourteen years. And it burns. Imagine how that pain fed the cancerous hope—insurmountable odds overcome. What ego. Imagine what he had done to escape an inescapable prison, to return to his wife—the wife he had cherished, loved, suffered for—and for her to see him and run.
“Not because I’d startled her, or had changed—though I had—but because she was afraid of me.” Darkness entered Jules’s words, poisoned them. Made them ugly. “And had good reason to be.”
“Rebecca’s life with Kantor had not been her choice, yet she’d glittered, as you insinuated. Was beloved by the city. Of course she was; she was wonderful. And she could have spared me so much pain. She could have let hope kill me gently. But in those last moments of Rebecca’s life, she felt the need to confess… to tell me that she had never intended for her lover to kill our boys. My boys. That it was supposed to be fling, nothing more.”
The air went still, only the faint tick of Jules’s thumbnail tapping the water glass punctuating his silence. “A fleeting affair with the powerful man. An Alpha who used his influence to subsequently murder my children, pair-bond my wife, and set in motion something that could never be undone.”
Jacques’s jaw flexed, the Alpha sitting back in his chair, mirroring his host’s posture. “Your point?”
“The confession, Jacques. She could have died without ever telling me. And I’m quizzing you to see how astute you might be. Why did she tell me? Why were her last words an unnecessary admission? Had I not already suffered enough?”
“Because she hated you.”
Another smirk, a little sparkle of something unnamable in Jules’s eyes. “No. Try again.”
“Because she hated herself.”
A minute head shake, Jules cocking a brow. “Maybe. But no. Wrong once more.”
“I don’t know, Beta.” Frustrated with this banality of the conversation, Jacques barked, “I don’t know why your dead wife did any of it! I’ve never met her, and you are insufferable, so I imagine it wasn’t hard to seek pleasures elsewhere.”
“You’re disappointing me, Jacques.” Jules sighed, brushing crumbs from the table with exaggerated patience. “You of all people should know the answer.”
“Because she didn’t believe you’d actually pull the trigger.”
Snapping his fingers like a man applauding the correct answer, Jules’s grin sharpened. “Exactly. She hoped. She didn’t understand who she was dealing with despite having grown up with me, been married to me, having borne my children. She miscalculated when she asked for mercy. Just as you miscalculated when you thought I wouldn’t actually cut out your eye while you were wide awake and screaming.
“And it wasn’t about revenge. If I had wanted Rebecca to suffer, all I needed to do was keep her alive. I knew what was coming for Thólos.” His chuckle dark, Jules added, “With a few truths, she carved out what little heart I had left. Emptied me of delusion. And I set her free from the infection of her guilt. I gave her true mercy.
“When that bullet shattered her face, I felt nothing. When I murdered the citizens of Thólos, I felt nothing. When I cut off your fingers, I felt nothing—sweet Brenya sedated from surgery and blissfully unaware, because she feels everything. And though she had suffered rape and mutilation and your constant attentions to her torn vaginal canal, she is a saint still. The scarring you inflicted on her was extraordinary. One of the worst cases I have seen. You were basically fucking her intestines and forcing her to like it. She would have died eventually; she was already so weak. Yet she still climbed the face of this building to reach me. And not due to hope.
“You were her Undercroft, and I was her Rebecca. And I scared her as she begged for mercy… for her people. Hopeless. As she apologized for what you’d done, that poor girl having no idea how elated I was to be trapped in that box. She wanted me to be free to return to my wife… and had accepted her life was over. Gave it to me freely.”
Savoring the words, Jules shared high praise of their mutual mate. “There is a delicious rage in Brenya you would be wise not to tempt. Underestimate her, and she will push herself too hard. Because she’s not like Rebecca. She’s not like us. I’m not sure she ever had true hope. She won’t be tempted by a fairytale or power. And that is why the greatest gift you could give her is order… and a gentle hand.”