Page 31

WHAT YOUR TOUCH DOES TO ME

MILA

Alex smirks, circling me at my question. “I was wondering when you would ask me that.”

His expression is surprisingly playful considering what I’m asking.

“Does that mean you’ll tell me?”

“You want to know what happened?” He crosses to sit at the edge of his bed, motioning me to him. “It depends who you ask.”

“I’m asking you .”

When I reach where he’s sitting on the bed, he snags my hand, pulling me onto his lap. He allows me to put my arms around his shoulders without pulling away. I can touch him here, when we are alone and not being overly intimate. But the second it goes farther, he’ll stop me.

I tip my forehead to his and take what I can get.

Absorb what he’ll give, even if he decides to force his fingers down my throat and make me spit him out later.

“Please tell me.” I practically beg .

He blinks his eyes open to look at me. “Do you know how the trials work?”

“For the most part.” I rake my nails over the back of his neck. “Initiates are put through seven trials to become a legacy of the House, but they’re a member after four. Members mark every trial passed on their bodies. Carving tallies or letters. Marco has five X’s under his collarbone.”

Alex’s eyes narrow.

“Sorry.” I probably should have left Marco out of it. “You do know I never had sex with him, right?”

“I’m aware.” His confirmation doesn’t relax his shoulders.

And I guess the fact that I spent time with Marco shirtless wouldn’t make Alex feel better either way.

“Anything else?” Alex asks, skirting the subject of Marco.

“The trials are modeled after the seven deadly sins. Since the House rules say: From sin we are born, and through sin we are revealed .”

According to Violet and Teal, both Kole and Declan are legacies, but there are likely more living here than that.

“That’s correct.” Alex nods.

“What trial were you on when this happened?” I brush my fingers over the scars on his arm, trailing the path all the way to his collar and resting my palm over his heart.

“My third.”

“What sin?”

“Pride.” He rests his hand over mine. “But it was more about loyalty than anything. They were worried the friendship between me, Kole, Declan, and Liam would be a liability to the House.”

“Why would they think that?”

“Because once you’re a member, you don’t serve anyone but your oath to Sigma Sin. Regardless of personal feelings or friendships. It’s been known to cause problems.”

“Like Declan’s recent overturn of the Council, putting the three of you in charge?” I hitch an eyebrow.

“Exactly.” Alex smirks, not the least bit apologetic over the number of men whose reputations were burned in recent months because of what they did.

Some were sent to prison. Others ate a bullet. Some disappeared. Whispers all over town talked about the purge at Sigma Sin.

“What did they do during the trial?” I ask.

“They made us… uncomfortable.” His gaze drifts behind me like he’s traveling back to that day in his mind. “Bright lights. Music that makes your ears bleed. No food, barely any water. It was unpleasant, to say the least.”

“They tortured you.”

He shrugs it off. “It was effective. They needed to test our loyalty to each other, and the only way to do that was to make us vulnerable.”

“That doesn’t give them the right to do those things.” My fingers pause on the worst part of his scars, in the middle of his forearm. “Especially this.”

“They did what they had to do to get the truth out of us. I don’t blame the House for that. Besides, that’s not how my scars happened.” He flexes his fingers. His fist shakes as he holds it tight. “This was an accident where the House is concerned.”

“So they say, I’m sure.”

“That part isn’t a lie.” Alex watches my fingers moving over him.

His hands find my hips, and he just stares. Physically here but mentally somewhere else .

“Alex?” I lift his chin, and he faces me. “What’s the truth then? Please tell me.”

It’s clear he doesn’t want to, but with all the limits he places on his affection, I need something. I need honesty to know what I’m dealing with.

Alex nods, swallowing hard. “The whole point of their tactics during that trial was to make us weak, tired, and exhausted. And once we were, they pulled us each into separate rooms for questioning. They tied us to a chair and strapped us to electrical shock units. Sending through small currents or the occasional pulse if we were being difficult. It wasn’t a big deal. ”

I’m not sure I agree, but I keep my mouth shut because at least he’s talking.

“The electricity was nothing at first. It hurt like hell, but they weren’t going to kill us with it, so I swallowed the pain and dealt with it. I answered their questions, and that was that.”

He dismisses the House’s actions more easily than I could have.

“When they were almost done, the interrogator got called away for a few minutes, leaving me alone in the room, strapped to the chair while he went to deal with something urgent. I was fine with it because at least that room was quiet and dark. Anything felt like a break from going back to the cell with Liam, Declan, and Kole.”

“The interrogator?”

“He’s someone who used to be in charge of the trials.

A sadistic asshole, but at least he knew the limit.

He was loyal to the House, and he never pushed the boundaries.

” Alex shakes his head. “But when he left, someone else walked in. Someone not part of the trial or the House. And the first thing he did was turn up the voltage. ”

My eyes widen. “Why would someone do that?”

“He and I had unfinished business. He blamed me for something and decided it was time to get his revenge.”

“What did you?—”

“Don’t ask me that question, Mila.” Alex cuts me off, skating a hand up my spine and gripping the back of my neck. “You aren’t ready to hear all the terrible things I’ve done in my life. And it doesn’t matter. He came for vengeance, and he got it.”

“He electrocuted you?” Tears burn behind my eyes.

The air is thick. The room foggy just thinking about the kind of pain Alex must have experienced.

“I fought back.” Alex leans in, planting a kiss on my throat. “It took a minute with how I was tied down, but I finally got at least one hand free to take care of the problem.”

“You killed him.”

Alex doesn’t answer. Doesn’t nod. But his eyes don’t leave mine as his grip tightens on the back of my neck.

“During the struggle ”—he’s careful how he says it—“the machine short-circuited, catching on fire at spots where it was attached to my arm and chest. Between the fire and electrical currents, it was—” Alex swallows, cutting himself off, and I can only imagine the pain he’s remembering.

“Sometimes I can still smell my skin burning. That’s usually what wakes me up at night.

Remembering how it felt to have death eat me alive.

The seizure hit right as the interrogator came back.

Or so I was told. He got there in time to cut off the power before the electricity fried my brain completely, but I don’t remember that part.

Even if I did, it was better than what came after. ”

A tear breaks free, sliding down my cheek.

“The next few months, I was in and out of it. The recovery hurt worse than anything that happened at the trial.” He flexes his fingers.

“The sterilization, the skin grafts. And then there were the lingering effects from the seizure. I couldn’t put thoughts together, much less words.

So it was easier not to even try to talk.

And then once I could, my head had cleared enough to know it was better if I didn’t. ”

“How come?”

Alex’s gaze snaps back into focus. “Because there’s only one reason someone outside of Sigma House could have gotten access to me during a trial, and that’s if someone from the inside let him in.”

“Who would do that?” My eyebrows pinch. “The interrogator?”

“Never.” Alex shakes his head. “He respected the trials and never would have jeopardized them like that. Declan tied it to Teal’s dad at some point.

I was the one who was there the night she tried to kill herself when she was sixteen, and her father was paranoid that maybe she said something to me about it.

She didn’t, but Declan’s best guess is that somehow her dad used that as an excuse to shut me up just in case.

He dug until he found someone who hated me enough to do his dirty work, and then he gave him access. ”

“Is that why you waited to leave Montgomery until Declan flipped the Sigma House Council? Because Teal’s dad used to be on it?”

“Among other reasons.”

Alex brushes a thumb over my jaw, tracing the line of my face and tucking my hair behind my ear. His touch sends a current through my bones.

Alex has survived unspeakable things. But he’s here. He’s out .

“Patience doesn’t know any of this, does she?” I ask. “Maybe she’d understand if you explained it wasn’t really Sigma House’s fault.”

“She won’t.” The hint of a smile he offers is almost sympathetic. “She can’t.”

That’s an interesting way to put it, bubbling a hundred more questions to the surface. Like he senses them brewing, he presses his lips to mine, ending the conversation. He pulls me closer and seals me to him.

My nails scrape the back of his neck. I just want to hold him. Offer comfort when he no longer knows how to accept it. Alex’s arms tighten around my waist, and I’m an anchor in the churning sea for him.

Solid ground.

I trail my hands over his thick shoulders, down his hard chest. Needing to feel him.

To hold him.

To understand him.

To make life worth living for him again after all he’s experienced.

My hands slip under the band of his shirt, and I expect him to stop me as I start to pull it up, but he doesn’t.

Maybe he’s as desperate for a distraction as I am after everything we talked about.