Page 24 of Drag You Down (Bloody Desires #2)

LEVI

T he bus that takes me home costs two dollars and fifteen cents. I had three dollars in my pocket, and I have to deal with the annoyed glare from the bus driver while I stick the bills into the machine.

Everybody else has an electronic fare card. There’s a fare card at home, one we share between all of us for whenever somebody needs to go outside our neighborhood. I haven’t done that often.

I don’t know why I’m thinking about that now.

Maybe it’s because I don’t want to think about the pounding in my chest, or how sweaty I got running away from the devil.

I shuffle toward the back of the bus, and I find a single empty seat next to a young woman wearing large earphones. Her music is audible through the device, a steady thump thump thump that doesn’t resemble any of the music we listen to at home.

Home .

My back already aches in anticipation, though the idea of telling Father Zachariah is far less appealing than the penance I know will follow.

Maybe I don’t need him to dole it out.

Maybe I can pray and seek it on my own.

The bus ride back to the apartment complex seems to both take forever and be over in an instant, and as I exit it, I look quickly around for signs of Gabriel.

Nothing.

I don’t expect him to be here, not after the commotion he’d made by leaving his car parked in the middle of traffic, but part of me almost wishes he was.

Almost.

I’d prayed for him, but when he’d come, I’d panicked.

And what he’d said about Father Zachariah… No. I hadn’t been able to stay.

I let myself into the building, eschewing the elevator and trudging up the stairs. My hands shake as I unlock the door to the apartment, and I call out for Eve. It’s early in the morning, but she doesn’t answer me. The door to her bedroom is open, and her bed has been neatly made.

I frown, but it leaves me open to repent before she gets back and asks questions.

My hands shake as I open the bottom drawer of my dresser, moving my clothes until I find the flogger I keep hidden there.

Its presence is one of the biggest sources of my shame.

I know that I should go straight to Father Zachariah and beg him to hear my sins, but I can’t.

If I told him I’d laid down with another man, he would do more than require me to take penance. He would kick me out, and I would deserve it. But I can’t leave Eve here without me.

What if Gabriel was right? What if Father Zachariah isn’t who I think he is, what I think he is?

I swallow down those thoughts, and I pull the flogger out of the drawer. I toss it onto my bed and remove my shirt, closing the door to my bedroom before I circle back around to grab the handle of the flogger.

The leather is rough, obviously cheap, but my decision to duck into one of New Bristol’s seedy sex shops had been on an impulse. I’d needed punishment then too, but I’d been too ashamed to tell Father Zachariah then, like right now.

I brace myself.

The first lash over my shoulder is far too light to do more than sting. The tails of the flogger caress my skin, but they don’t break it.

It always takes me a few moments to find the courage to swing with real strength.

Two more light lashes. They’re mere taps, nothing like what Father Zachariah metes out.

I close my eyes and strike much harder.

The tails land on my shoulder blade with enough force to make pain blossom. I stifle a groan and swing the flogger again, the leather hitting almost the exact same spot. This time, the stinging pain lingers, radiating out from that spot.

A bead of sweat trickles down my forehead.

I switch arms and hit myself again. The leather curls around my shoulder as it lands, and I open my mouth to breathe. I have to keep my voice down. I can’t let anyone hear.

I swing again, and again, each lash harder than the last. Small groans escape my lips, and my chest grows slick with sweat.

My arms grow tired too, but I keep going, feverish with a need I don’t know how to satisfy.

My cock is hard and throbbing.

I pause to press my hand against it through my trousers.

I remember how Gabriel had cupped me gently.

My little lamb , he’d whispered.

“Daddy,” I say as I swing the flogger once more.

This is wrong.

This isn’t what penance is meant to be.

But my body grows hotter and hotter with arousal as I keep whipping myself, and instead of God or Father Zachariah, I hear Gabriel egging me on, telling me what a good boy I am, what a perfect lamb I am.

I groan as the next lash comes down hard on my shoulder, and I realize that somewhere along the way, I’ve started to bleed. Maybe it’s from opening up other wounds, or maybe it’s from the cheap leather of this flogger cutting into my skin. I don’t know, and I don’t care.

I keep going until my arm hurts too much to continue, then I let the flogger drop to the floor as I sink down to my knees.

I don’t feel purified.

I feel more tainted than ever.

It doesn’t stop me from reaching down into my pants and fondling myself beneath my clothes. I’m about to unfasten my pants when I hear the front door open and close, and I yank my hand back out like I’ve been caught doing something truly terrible.

I haven’t.

I’ve only nearly been caught dealing with the aftermath of something that can’t be forgiven.

I grab the flogger and shove it into the bottom drawer of my dresser, closing it right as the knock sounds on my door.

“Levi?” Eve calls out.

I grab my shirt, my back screaming as I pull it over my head. I know it won’t be long before it becomes wet with my blood, but I have to try to get Eve to leave me alone so I can tend to my wounds in private.

I open the door to my room, wincing, but I paint a smile onto my lips as I look at her. “Hi,” I say feebly, not knowing what else to say to my sister.

Eve looks at me with wide eyes. “Where have you been? What happened to you?”

She gets into my space and wraps her arms around me before I can react. I cry out when her hands land on my open wounds.

“Levi?” Eve recoils from me, looking down at her hands.

There’s a faint smudge of red on her fingers.

“I’m fine,” I say quickly.

I’m not.

I’m so far from fine.

“You’re bleeding,” she says, grabbing my shoulder and forcing me to turn. “Who did this to you? Did somebody attack you?”

I hiss in pain, shaking my head as she pulls my shirt up from the back. “No. No one attacked me.”

She wants an explanation. Maybe she even deserves one.

But I don’t know what to tell her.

Blood trickles down my back, no longer being soaked up by my shirt, and I grimace. She’s going to know that I did this to myself.

She’s going to want to know why.

“Levi!” Eve meets my gaze as I turn back around to face her, and the concern makes the guilt bubble under my skin.

“I’ve been worried sick about you. You were gone for two days, and Father Zachariah said there was an outsider who’d taken you…

I almost went out and walked the streets to find you.

We were going to call the police today!”

I swallow hard. Father Zachariah was going to call the police?

I shouldn’t have gone with Gabriel, not even for an afternoon, not even for a night.

Especially not for a night.

“I got lost,” I tell her. It’s not a lie, but it feels like one. “I spent the night under… Well, that doesn’t matter.” I try to smile. “I’m back now.”

“It doesn’t matter?” Eve repeats. “Of course it matters! You’re filthy and bloody and, and…”

Tainted .

“I’m going to shower,” I say, as though that’s going to make the situation any better. “Just please…” I can’t believe I’m about to ask this of her, but I can’t think of what else to say or do. “Please don’t tell Father Zachariah. I’ll talk to him later.”

After I come up with a plausible story.

When did I start lying so much, both to myself and to others?

Eve doesn’t say anything for a while, and I shift uncomfortably.

Finally, her lips part, and a simple, quiet, “Okay,” escapes.

I should be relieved, but the guilt continues to gnaw at me. “Thank you,” I say. I force a smile. “Give me ten minutes.”

I squeeze her shoulder on my way past her, grabbing clothes to put on after my shower.

Once inside the bathroom, I turn the water on and stare at myself in the mirror.

She’s right; I really am filthy. Spending the night under the bridge hadn’t been a good idea, but I’d been so afraid of getting even more lost in the dark that it had felt like the only thing to do.

It had allowed me to see the world differently, too, though now I’m not sure if that’s actually a good thing.

For a few minutes, I had walked among the people I’ve scorned for so long, and I feel more empathy for them than I thought possible.

I should’ve invited them back here, where Father Zachariah could help them.

Why hadn’t I?

I get under the cold water, the temperature feeling like a shock to my system, and I start to scrub myself clean. I’m careful with my back, but the water pounding down on it has me biting back a sound of pain.

My cock has gone flaccid, and I’m grateful for that, at least.

By the time I get out of the shower, my teeth are chattering from the cold water, and I dry off thoroughly.

It leaves smears of blood on the towel, but there’s nothing I can do about it by myself.

I leave my shirt off, only dressing from the waist down, then I toss the dirty clothes and towel into the hamper.

I open the door to the bathroom, only to freeze when I realize I can hear two voices.

Two.

And one of them belongs to Father Zachariah.

The betrayal that washes over me is acute, and I consider closing the door again and locking myself away. It’s too late now, though; they’ve gone silent, and I grab my shirt and put it on despite the way it clings to my damp and bloody skin.

I step into the living room, avoiding looking at Eve. “Father Zachariah,” I whisper.

“Levi,” Father Zachariah says, and his voice is thick with disappointment. “Eve tells me you bathed in sin.”

I don’t look at her.