Page 49 of Jagged Souls

A cold tremor rushes through me.

“I could fuck every single one of your limbs. Your organs. Make my own bingo card.”

He jabs me with the needle, over and over again, looking for the vein. I grit my teeth as pain crawls up my leg. I keep my face flat, but I’m screaming inside my skull, yelling at myself for giving him the idea, blaming myself for being in this situation. My heartbeat runs wild at the idea of being violated by this sick freak.

“Not such a talker now, are you?” he sneers. He stabs the needle into my vein. “The next time one of the mutts knocks you out” –he grabs the bag to connect it to the needle– “I’m going to fuck you in your left lung, close enough so I can feel your heart thudding against it. I’ll heal you so you’re awake for the whole thing.”

My throat closes as I stare at him in horror.

“Not so tough now, are you?” Squatting down, he sucks my toes into his mouth.

I jerk my leg so hard the cuff cuts into my ankle.

His teeth scrape the skin off my toes.

The needle hits a nerve, and intense pain flares up my leg.

Grabbing my foot, Eduardo runs his tongue in between my digits. He drags his teeth across my flesh.

I fall back onto the bed with a silent scream I refuse to emit. My hands fist. I close my eyes and imagine thrashing against my binds until I can escape and beat him to death. Outside my head though, I stay locked still, not giving him any other response. No weakness.

Eduardo groans as he starts to jerk himself off. Angry tears burn my eyes. I hate how helpless I am. How pathetic. I am an assassin, the mafia queen to the Shadow Domain, wife to Varius fucking Shadow himself. I should be able to do something.

But I can’t.

And I don’t know who I hate more in this moment.

Him.

Or me.

My foot throbs as the needle’s placed back into my vein, but it’s the wet slurp of his mouth, the slide of his tongue, and the hard bites of his teeth that are making me wince. He’s leaving his mark on me. I try to comfort myself over the fact that it’s not as permanent as the mark I’ve left on him. I’m winning.

I don’t feel like a fucking winner.

He releases my toes and stands quickly. I keep my eyes on the ceiling as the hot spurt of his cum hits my foot. It seemingly burns through my skin, right through my fucking bone.

Perhaps his mark is more permanent than mine after all.

Fuck.

No.

Keep it together, Micha.

You stopped him from raping you. Focus on the win.

“Surprise, surprise,” I say, working hard to keep my voice sounding bored. “You’re a minute man.” I lift my head to look at him. “When I fuck your face with your own dick, I’m filling it with needles first.”

He snatches the bag of blood up and quickly steps back. Once he’s a few paces away, feeling safe, he starts to gloat. “I hear you can feel when your mate dies. It’s agonizing to experience.” He holds the bag up to his face and looks at it in awe. “It’s poetic, really, that your blood is what’s going to kill Varius. Terra will use this to create a disease that infects only him. Then we’ll release it all across St. Augustine, and if he so much as breathes in that city, it’ll kill him.”

I jerk against my binds, my heart hammering. I play it up, let my fear out so he can see it across my face. See my panic. My terror. He just gave me a name, vital information I can pass on to Varius when I get the chance, and I want him to keep talking.

His eyes light up as he looks at me, thinking he’s won, thinking he’s found a way to hurt me without getting close enough to risk his life. “You’re going to be with me when he dies so I can study the effects of the blood bond. Then I’m going to fuck your urethra as he takes his last breath, and you’re going to tell me how it feels to feel him dying.”

“You’re lying. No one is good enough to make a disease that specific, and if you spread it all over St. Augustine, you will infect enough people to call in the SCU.” The Special Crimes Unit really doesn’t like magical pandemics. They’ll come in hard and fast after only a handful of cases. Then Antonio will be screwed. They’ve left our Families alone so far because the power vacuum that’d occur in our absence would damn well trigger World War III, but cross one of their lines, and they’re as merciless as we are.

He smirks gleefully. “Terra Harrison is that good.”