Page 208 of Claimed By Fangs and Darkness

I lost my mind twice.

Aster was the first to reach me. I grabbed a shard of mirror, and I stabbed his neck.

He gasped, dislodging it and grabbing my wrist before it could go too deep.

His white knight mask dropped for a second time as he lifted me off the ground with his hands around my neck.

I locked eyes with Conrad. “You know, don’t you? You know Juliette is with him!” My words were stifled as darkness crawled over my vision and my airways closed.

Aster slammed me onto the ground, straddling me as I thrashed and coughed. He pinned me there, blood ruining his perfectly tailored clothing. “What are you talking about?” he hissed.

“Juliette is a changeling. She wore a glamour to appear as Conrad right before she stabbed herself, and now she’s wearing a glamour ofme.”

Conrad’s eyes flashed, as if half of that was news to him. It was clear that was how Juliette had known about our murder plot. I suspected she was testing my relationship to Conrad, and she actually hadn’t expected to find a deeper betrayal.

“Why would she pretend to be Conrad?” Aster asked like a fucking idiot, too blinded by ego to connect the dots on his own.

“Do I really need to spell all of this out for you?”

He slapped me.

My cheek stung, tears filling my eyes. So much for never laying hands on a woman. But I supposed he could justify this one with his supreme logic.

“She’s with the turned. She left you,” I said.

Aster’s eyes were cold. His lips curled as he glared down at me. “Looks like someone doesn’t want to be my good girl after all.” His hand closed around my throat, pushing the hot metal of the collar against my skin. “Would you rather be my disobedient slut, Evie?”

I was suddenly hyperaware of his hips against mine. I stopped thrashing, my body going into a freeze response against my conscious protests.

Conrad sighed. “I’m sorry, brother. I fear she needs more work than we originally thought. Perhaps some much-needed alone time.”

Aster undid his belt.

“Don’t you dare rape me!” I screamed, tears brimming my eyes.

Kylo’s lips on Juliette’s neck was behind my eyelids every time I blinked.

“I. Am. Not. Going. To. Rape. You,” Aster spat.

“She needs to be calmed down. Her hysteria isn’t good for morale.”

“Shhh,” Aster said. “I’m guessing Juliette managed to reach you in here with her witchy tricks. But you’re safe. I won’t let her hurt you.”

He manhandled me onto my stomach and hiked up my nightgown as I continued to scream.

The belt came down on my ass, and I was transported back to the rolling hills of Isolde. The tall grass, the children who played quietly, the heads bent in prayer.

Another smack reverberated through the room. I could feel the scorch of several men’s eyes on me.

“I don’t want to punish you, Evie,” Aster said. “It hurts me more than it hurts you.”

He knew. He knew all about the belt and the prayers and the grains of rice.

I closed my eyes, finally going still as my mind floated away. The pain melted my brain and set me free from this corporeal hell.

The world was quiet save for the sound of leather on skin. My breathing slowed. The power that had once been clamoring to break free went cold.

Shame flushed across my skin, but I didn’t move. I kept my eyes shut tight. I stopped thinking about lips where they shouldn’t belong—Aster’s on mine, Juliette’s on Kylo’s.