Page 119 of Psycho Alphas: Part Two

Rogue took one sip of the drink I’d handed him as I settled back down. From the corner of my eye I saw a bitter expression twist his face. I don’t know what I was expecting to be honest. He could make a big deal out of it. Use it to punish me again. Or he could?—

I winced as I felt the cool splash of liquid down my neck as he dumped the contents of the cup over my head.

Rogue set the glass down on the table. “He snuck out five minutes after we arrived,” he said, continuing the conversation with Ace as if nothing had happened.

I could hear a faint trace of humour in Ace’s reply. “Not as dumb as he looks, then.”

I hated them.

Stupid fucking pricks.

Onlookers were drinking in every single moment of Rogue’s treatment of me, which was, unfortunately, the fucking point. But I couldn’t help thinking, as cold lemon juice seeped down my back, that Rogue’s display tonight deviated from the way it always did in my memories. He was acting for a crowd tonight, and I don’t know if it made me more or less furious.

The truth was, the rare time he was forced to go out with me to keep the Ring off his back, he hadn’t been like this. If I fucked up, he’d go silent. He’d never been one to air grievances in front of a crowd. There would be no show, no humiliation. He was quiet, private, and always calm. It wasn’t until we got home, that I’d be slammed into the cage in the basement, and he’d take his time making sure I hurt.

Tonight, however, there was a glint dancing in his eyes—something more playful than I’d ever seen before.

That hadn’t appeared until Thistle.

In a strange collision of past and present, I saw both the monster he’d once been and the man he’d become. A shell—or so I’d thought. But the way he was around Thistle… I might have been wrong about that. Instead, a creature in hibernation, a stone relic, not quiet because he’d been hollowed out, but because he was waiting to find out what came next.

But I couldn’t shake how much I’d detested him when I’d been at his mercy before, and I felt that tonight, too. It wasn’t just an ache—it was alive. An energy. An ancient hatred that scorched my veins to attention and left me on high alert. An unstoppable drive for vengeance. A need to make sure one day he paid?—

I blinked, the feeling sputtering out into darkness.

It had been so familiar, yet distant. An old friend I’d made a promise to.

But it had been years since that promise had last surfaced—years in which I’d had every chance to exact it.

Had I kept it?

Rogue was right here, holding my chain once more, a perfect painting of a world that had once been my everything. It was one that had warped so slowly that I hadn’t noticed when it died.

Frosted Moonflower appeared once more, and then she was slinking down onto the floor next to me, her lips next to my ear. “There was no way I could have stopped him doing that, Daddy,” she whispered.

I eyed her, not risking replying. The Hargrave pack, to my left, was watching far too closely.

“Anyway. Ace told me what these were for,” Thistle said, producing the blood-red pen we’d been given. She leaned closeas if she were telling me a secret. “It’s dumb-bitch-Bella talk for marking up whoever you wanna claim.”

I side-eyed her, wondering where she was going with that.

She was meticulously arranging Bunny to sit next her, crossing her legs beside me on the marble. Then she’d tugged my arm out and onto her lap, and began a doodle across my forearm.

I watched as she drew a goofy little Bunny scribble and then began to write out words as she hummed, ‘We’re gonna be pop-u-lar’, happily to herself.

I read them over when she was done and had to work hard not to facepalm.

“You’re not allowed to get rid of them,” she hissed, catching my expression. “Got it?”

I opened my mouth, then shut it, assessing the little spark of madness in her eyes. Oh, she wasseriousserious. If I got rid of her mark while we were in Bella’s territory… But Thistle might actually have signed my death warrant.

I released a breath. “Wouldn’t dream of it,” I murmured.

I’d die with a smile, I supposed.

I noticed one of the Hargrave Alphas side-eyeing me, clearly trying to read what Thistle had written. I didn’t hide it in time because he straightened, clearing his throat with a cough that sounded distinctly like it was smothering a laugh.

When she was gone, I was left with the ache of her carved-out claim on my neck, and the penned-in one on my arm. She’d returned to Rogue now, and she was scribbling marker across his neck like she intended to turn him completely red.