Page 85 of At Your Mercy

“What address?” I asked. “Where are we?”

“Somewhere very, very special.” His verdant eyes crinkled with amusement. It made my stomach twist how easy he looked,how amused. Like this was just another casual chat before dinner.

“Somewhere special, huh?” I asked, forcing the words out through gritted teeth. “Why am I here, Elias?” I practically spat out his name.

His smile widened. “I think I can see why he likes you. Ro. I should’ve taken care of you myself from the start.”

He said Ro’s name with a sort of fondness that turned my skin to ice.

“Fuck you,” I growled.

He laughed like I’d told him a joke, then his face darkened, smile dropping. It was eerie. Like someone had just… turned off the lights behind his eyes.

“How was I to know that he’d actuallylikeyou? He’s never felt anything for any of his targets before. Well, maybe disgust, but never real attraction. No. He’s always been absolutely perfect for me.”

I glared at him, at the way his eyes warmed and his lip tilted up just at the thought of Ro.

“I hate you, you know,” Elias said solemnly.

My brows furrowed with confusion. “Huh?”

“Twenty years, Wesley. Twenty years, and not once has he ever looked at me the way he looks at you. Twenty years, and some stupid taste oflovehas him eager and ready to betray me, the man who took him in, always made sure he had the best clothes, the best food, the best training. Twenty. Fucking. Years,” he thundered.

With a look of disdain, he walked over to me and took my jaw in a painful grip. I bared my teeth at him.

“I gave him everything. And yet here we are,” he spat.

“He could never love you,” I told him, watching his nose crinkle as he sneered down at me.

He let go, only to rear his hand back and throw a punch. His knuckles cracked as they collided with my cheekbone. My head snapped to the side.

Before I was able to get my bearings again, a flash of steel filled my vision, and I shouted. Blood filled my vision, and I bit down on my tongue to stifle a pained cry. He’d slashed my face, cutting my left eye in the process.

Elias took a step back, then another, until he was standing with his back against the concrete wall. He flicked a switchblade in his right hand and had a deranged smile on his face.

“Woo,” he breathed out. “I needed that.”

“Freak,” I muttered.

He laughed under his breath, a wild, delighted sound that made the hair rise on my arms. Then, with a flick of his wrist, he snapped the blade shut and slipped it back into his pocket, every trace of rage evaporating from his face as though it had never been there.

Just like that, he was calm again.

It was whiplash-inducing—the kind of emotional control that only came from being truly fucking deranged.

I spat blood to the side, glaring at him through the sting in my eye. “You get off on this. Hurting people who can’t fight back. That’s why you raped a child. A child that you say you raised. You’re sick.”

“Oh, please. Seventeen is hardly a child. He’d already begun killing years before that.”

“You’re a pedophilic piece of shit,” I yelled, thrashing in the chair, needing to get my hands on his neck so I could fucking snap it.

He looked genuinely offended. “Please, Wesley. Don’t be so dramatic.”

“I saw those fucking photos. He was akid!”

He stepped closer again, lowering his voice as if he were sharing a secret. “He was never a kid, Wesley. Not since the night I found him.”

“You’re a monster.”