Page 39 of Blood and Thorns (Twisted Ever After #1)

Sebastian

I was hyperaware of Arabella walking towards the lift, my body coiled so tightly as she was escorted by Miles. I should’ve lost interest by now, but there I was, watching until she disappeared before I could return my attention to anything else.

I’d been in the middle of one of my episodes, my demons howling so loud I’d almost knocked out my own cousin just to purge some of the fucking tension, and then I turned to her, and the roar of violence quietened. Just like that.

Langdon shouldn’t have brought her, not when I was so close to the fucking abyss.

And yet rather than run, she’d tilted her head back, a flash of disobedience in those fucking eyes that had me wanting to bury my face between her legs just to hear her scream.

“So, is anyone going to tell me why I’m here?” Alexander snarled, one of few men to ever speak to me like that and survive. The only reason I hadn’t killed him yet was because he was blood, and Caden had stopped me. “Caden, you were supposed to keep him under control! ”

Purposely ignoring my uncle for the moment, just to calm down, I moved towards Langdon, realising his eyes were vacant.

“Lang,” I whispered, nudging him slightly. There was a moment his eyes weren’t so empty but instead widened and panicked as he relived the past, and then his usual, malicious spark returned.

“Let’s get this party started,” he signed, looking around. “Wait, where’s Ara?”

I pinned him with a glare, and he simply smirked in return. Bastard knew what he was doing.

“See, this is why you need to go back to the therapist, Sebastian.” Alexander touched Caden’s nose, who was ignoring the fact that it was still bleeding. “Acting like animals isn’t going to help your CPTSD. I’ll ring him in the morning and get you a new prescription.”

I wanted to laugh at the comment, Alexander yet again pushing therapy and drugs on me, believing I was like this because of my trauma.

When in reality I was trained to be this bloodthirsty.

First by my father, who’d been grooming me from five years old to take over his position within the Le Milieu.

And then by Alexander himself, who encouraged me to carve my name amongst the powerful men of the underworld just so he didn’t have to get his own hands dirty.

Caden grabbed his dad’s wrist. “You want to tell us what happened to Margot?”

“Margot?” Alexander’s eyes narrowed, his upper lip curling into a snarl. “She’s dead.”

“You sound confident in that,” I said, flexing my hand to relieve some of the ache across my knuckles.

“Of course I’m confident.” He turned to face me. “Do you really think I’d leave the woman who’d murdered my sister alive? ”

Langdon began to sign, his hands frantic in his anger.

“He called you a lying cunt,” I translated, and Caden simply dragged a hand down his face in exasperation.

Alexander’s face turned red, his eyes almost bulging. “You little bastard.” He pointed a finger towards Langdon, taking a step closer. “I should’ve left you to die in that house. You’re not even my–”

His words ended with a screech when I broke the finger pointed towards Lang. My uncle grunted in pain, and rather than stop me, Caden simply snarled, “Speak to him like that again, and I’ll kill you myself.”

Alexander snapped his mouth closed, his anger paling against that of his son’s.

“Now, let’s start this again, shall we?” I continued, enjoying the way his pupils dilated. He may act like he was the big man, but in reality, he was nothing compared to me.

Caden handed his father the photograph, which showed an older woman smiling. Her hair was still a copper red, with strands of grey that showed her age. There were lines on her face that weren’t there twenty years ago, but it was definitely my father’s mistress.

“Impossible,” Alexander whispered, curling his broken finger protectively to his chest. “She looks just like Margot Laurent.”

I barely stopped myself from reacting to the name, the edges of my peripheral darkening as I fought the memories that threatened to consume me.

“She’s supposed to be dead,” I snapped, my voice so cold it was arctic.

“She is dead, I made sure of it.” Alexander’s head whipped up, and I believed the anger that burned his eyes. “How do you know it’s even real? We all know how easy you like to make enemies, Sebastian.”

“He didn’t even fucking do it himself,” Langdon signed, but rather than comment at the lack of translation, Alexander simply clenched his jaw. “He lied to us.”

Caden reached for his discarded shirt, using the fabric to wipe the blood and sweat from his face. “Let him speak,” he signed back, his movements rigid.

“I thought this was an open conversation?” Alexander growled, a vein popping in his head. He’d had the opportunity to learn sign when the doctors first told us of the damage to Langdon’s vocal cords, but he decided it was beneath him.

I saw him make Lang feel less than because he wasn’t blood, which was why we left as soon as I turned eighteen, taking Caden with us.

My uncle added, “I don’t know what to tell you. I was assured she was dead.”

“You told us you dealt with it personally,” Caden growled. “Which is it, Dad?”

He didn’t answer, and a fresh wave of rage swept over me. I took a step forward, and Alexander instinctively stepped back, much to his annoyance.

“Sebastian, she murdered my sister. My nephews. If I knew she was still alive, I would’ve dealt with it. The fact she’s still out there while my sister’s…” He cleared his throat, an uncharacteristic bit of emotion shadowing his words. “I hired only the best, but clearly I failed.”

I believed him, but that didn’t ease any of the tension that crawled and buzzed beneath my skin like a thousand wasps. “Being blood doesn’t exonerate you.”

“That’s where you’re wrong,” Alexander said, jaw tightened, shame creeping in just enough to sour his anger. “Blood is everything. Otherwise, I wouldn’t have gone through hell to get you back.”

“That’s called guilt,” Langdon signed, but neither I nor Caden bothered to translate .

“You’re going to find her,” Alexander demanded rather than asked, his gaze direct. “Make sure it fucking hurts. Make Margot pay for what she did to our family.”

“I’ll drive you back.” Caden pulled on his shirt, leaving the buttons open. He nodded his goodbye, but I’d already turned to Langdon.

“Go home,” I snapped. “And don’t think I’ve forgotten you’ve brought Ara into this. Stay away from her.”

Langdon smirked, purposely pushing me to try and play the situation for his entertainment. It was how he held control of his reality.

I didn’t wait for him to respond, not when I was already storming towards the lift.

Miles should not be in my office, and his eyes widened when I walked in to find him scowling down at Arabella, and her glaring at him in return.

I gestured my head to the door, dismissing him before I settled my attention back on her.

She was curled up in my chair, watching the monitor with my reading pen clenched in her hand like a weapon.

“Miles giving you trouble?”

She released the pen, slipping from the seat slowly as if not to set me off. “He’s just opinionated.” She carefully moved around the desk while I circled it, her back rigid.

My eyes fell to the screen to find she’d been watching the security camera. “You been spying on me, belle?”

She didn’t bother to deny it. “Why did you break his finger?”

“Because he said something I didn’t like.” Her voice washed over me like a drug, calming the fury that vibrated my soul.

“You’re angry,” she commented, pressing herself into the corner.

I placed my palms flat to the wall, caging her in. Rather than recoil, she lifted her chin, never looking away.

“Read to me,” I demanded, needing to hear her voice calm the demons that still howled for me to destroy. To become the man my father had trained me to be.

I’d never needed anyone before, and I hated this vulnerability with a fury I couldn’t name. But I still craved her voice, her soft words and delicate laughs. She quieted the noise.

Arabella frowned, seeming confused by my demand. “You want me to read to you?”

There was a rush at having her pressed against the wall, my cock immediately waking up as I pressed my lower half against hers. A flush darkened her cheeks as she felt my reaction.

“There’s… there’s nothing to read,” she stammered.

I gently cupped her throat, wanting to feel it move. “Make it up.”

She laughed, and I was ready to drown in the sound. “I don’t know what to say.”

Closing my eyes, I allowed her voice to wash over me, even as phantom slices split the skin of my back.

Il ne m'a pas laissé le choix.

He left me no choice.

“Sebastian,” she whispered. Fear, and something else darkening her tone. “You’re okay.”

I blinked, finding Arabella pressed further against the wall, pinned almost painfully with my weight. She gripped my wrist, nails digging in.

“You’re okay,” she repeated, her fingers moving to brush along my arm, and I stilled beneath the touch. Fire thrummed in my blood, the anticipation of what she could possibly do to fight for her life tightening my muscles.

I didn’t usually feel this alive unless I was in the ring or expressing my darker side when it came to sex. Deviant tastes that I’d since grown bored with. Nothing other than violence seemed to quench my demons these days, feeding their bloodlust just so I could fucking sleep.

Until her. I needed to mark her. Own her.

Discover why the fuck I was so infatuated with a woman not made for my world.

Arabella’s fingers were light, tracing over my skin and brushing over my scars like she had the right to. Her lips pursed, so full and yet defiant in the face of my monster.

She seemed to have forgotten that I controlled her life in my hand, literally. Her pulse was violent against my palm, a little beat that revealed her sheer terror at the situation she’d found herself in.

She should be scared.

Using her throat, I pulled her against me, my lips sliding against hers until I could swallow her gasp. I bit and sucked, devouring her like I should’ve the first night.

I rarely kissed, finding the act unstimulating, but with her it was everything. The way she moaned and gripped me tighter. The way she tried to take control, fighting my dominance with little nips along my lips that had my cock aching.

My free hand slipped beneath her dress, rubbing between her legs to find the fabric already soaked.

Pulling the underwear to the side, I thrusted two fingers into her roughly, her moan so delicious I caught it on my tongue.

She was soaking wet, the slickness coating her thighs and dripping down my hand .

“Look how wet you get for me,” I growled, nipping along her jaw.

She groaned, and her cunt clenched at my words. Smirking against her skin, I used the heel of my palm to add pressure to her clit.

I could feel how close I could get her, knowing it could be almost painful when it was forced so quickly. But this was a punishment for making me crave her. To show her how little control she had over her body and how easily she gave herself to me.

Arabella’s hips rocked against my fingers, chasing a release to the very edge.

What a shame I wasn’t going to give it to her, not yet.