Page 51 of Riot’s Thorn (Sons of Erebus: Reno, NV #4)

CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

PARKER

M y head is pounding. Did I drink that much last night? I cover my eyes with an arm and curl up on my side. My stomach hurts too. Did I throw up? Maybe if I can just get back to sleep, things will be better when I wake up. College taught me that.

Patting the mattress, I try and find my comforter I must’ve kicked off at some point, but my fingers land on a blanket with a texture I don’t recognize.

What the hell? Slowly, I pry my dry eyes open and curse myself for not taking my contacts out before falling asleep.

I peel them off my eyeballs and toss them on the floor, giving zero fucks.

This hangover is awful, and even though my eyes feel a little better, I’m thankful the room is still dark. I love the cabin, but all those windows and no window treatments mean I’m up with the sun no matter what, so it must still be nighttime.

“Oh, good. You’re awake.”

I freeze, my headache forgotten because that was a man’s voice I don’t recognize. Or maybe I do? I don’t know. Everything is fuzzy. Did I go home with someone last night?

The lights flip on, and I realize I’m not in my cabin or anywhere else recognizable.

The bedroom I’m in is luxurious, but old money luxury, Grandpa’s mansion luxury.

I’m on a four-poster bed with maroon and gold bedding in a damask pattern.

No wonder the comforter didn’t feel like mine; I’d never own anything this tacky.

Next to me is an antique nightstand with a brass lamp and a stack of old books on it.

There’s also a glass of water, a couple of pills, and my glasses that had been in my clutch.

I snatch them and shove them on my face.

I want to grab the pills because this is the worst hangover I’ve ever had, but first, I need to figure out where I am and who just spoke to me.

“Go ahead. It’ll make your head feel better. Rohypnol tends to give you a nasty hangover.”

Rohypnol? Oh, god. What happened to me?

Dad told me when I was a baby, I’d cover my eyes and think he couldn’t see me because I couldn’t see him.

It’s an adorable anecdote, but in this moment, I wish it were true.

The second I know who’s behind me, whatever this is will be real, and I won’t be able to pretend I’m simply at home with a hangover.

“Don’t turn around. Just sit up and take the pills like the good girl I know you are, but keep your back to me,” the man says. He seems to be masking his voice by speaking in a quiet, lower tone.

“Bart?” I say, but my throat is dry, making me sound raspy.

“It would only make sense, wouldn’t it?”

I pull the ugly blanket over my body. This dress felt like a good idea when I was getting ready to go to the club, but in a strange room with a strange man, I feel naked.

“What happened? Why am I here? Why the cryptic answer?” I fire off all the questions in my foggy head.

He ignores my question. “I have to hand it to you, you’ve done a good job at protecting yourself. Between the bodyguards and that white trash biker, it took some time to get you alone.”

Everything in me wants to scream and shout, demand to be released, and slap him across the face on my way out, but it won’t get me what I want. “So you brought me here just to talk?”

He chuckles humorously, and I swear, I know his voice. It’s Bart. It has to be. “I think we both know I don’t just want a chat.”

“What do you want?” I ask, reaching for the water and white pills. He could be drugging me again for all I know, but I can’t think straight with my head pounding, so it’s a risk I’ll take.

“You,” he says simply. The sounds of his clothes shifting and soft footfalls are my only clue he’s moving until there’s a presence directly behind me. I whimper when he covers my eyes with something soft. “You know, I’ve wanted you since the first time I laid eyes on you.”

“What are you talking about?”

“You were actually promised to me.” He sighs, placing his hands on my shoulders before creeping lower underneath my dress to cup my breasts.

I twist to get out of his hold, but he pins me in place, holding my back against his front, where I feel his erection.

“But after you gave yourself to that disgusting biker, I changed my mind and decided to make money off you instead.” He pinches my nipples and twists them painfully.

The door opens, and suddenly, his hands are gone. The air shifts, and I sense another body standing behind me.

“Welcome to my home, Parker,” another man says. This time, I’m certain it’s Bart.

“Bart?”

“Mr. Banks,” he corrects. “Just because you’re hanging out with inbred trash doesn’t mean you can lose your manners.”

“Why are you doing this to me?” I whisper, dread sinking into my soul.

“You did this to yourself, my dear. Your dad and I had plans for you. We were going to strengthen alliances and make both of our companies a lot of money. All you had to do was keep your legs closed.”

“You’re not making sense.”

“Can you give us a minute?” Bart asks, but he’s not talking to me.

“Sure.” The other man bends to whisper in my ear. “You ruined yourself for the respect marriage gives you, so now you get to experience being passed around and fucked like the whore you are. I can’t wait to tear your ass up.”

A shiver runs up my spine, and I swallow hard. “Please. Just let me go.”

“That’s not going to happen,” Bart says after the door snicks shut. “I have too much invested in you.”

“You’re talking in riddles. Why am I here?”

“For that answer, we have to go back to when you were just a beautiful little girl.” He trails a finger down my arm, making my skin crawl.

“Your grandfather and I had a plan. It took years for us to put things in place, and then, right when we were ready to start making moves, his heart gave out. It was an unfortunate complication.”

“What plan?”

“Your grandparents were so disappointed when your dad knocked up some piece of trash whore with big tits and a pretty face. They tried to talk sense into him and convince him to get rid of both your mom and you.” The way he so callously talks about ending my unborn life is disturbing.

“But your dad wasn’t like us; he had higher morals and was determined to ‘do the right thing.’ We thought surely, after you were born, he’d see reason, because what young man wanted to be saddled with a baby? But again, he was a disappointment.”

I can’t make sense of what he’s saying. Dad never told me any of this. “I don’t understand.”

“I figured you didn’t know, or if you did, you only knew bits and pieces.

” The mattress depresses next to me, and he places a hand on my knee.

“Since your dad was determined to keep you around, your grandpa switched to Plan B, which was making you an asset. There are plenty of powerful men out there who need wives of a certain standing, so we approached your dad about promising you off in order to build business alliances—when you were of legal age, of course. But your bitch of a mom got in the way again, and your dad refused to put his foot down.”

“He loved her,” I bite out, turning to anger instead of fear.

He scoffs, his hand moving higher. I push it away, but it returns, and this time, he squeezes my thigh to the point of pain, making it impossible to get him off me. “Love? Love means fuck all in our world. Your dad did you a disservice by not teaching you that.”

“Agree to disagree.”

“You’re a dreamer like him.”

“What does any of this have to do with why I’m here?”

“Didn’t you ever wonder why you lived in a shit box of a house, clipping coupons and wearing secondhand clothes, when your grandparents were wealthy beyond imagination?” he asks.

“Dad said it was so I grew up appreciating the things I had.”

“Wrong. It was because your grandparents cut him off. It wasn’t until your grandfather had your bitch of a mother killed that they started opening up to the idea of a relationship with you and allowing your dad back into the inner circle of the company.”

Even if he’s telling the truth, I’ll never know because everyone involved is dead. “Grandpa wouldn’t do that.”

“Wouldn’t he?”

After everything I’ve learned about my family over the past couple of months, I don’t doubt he would, but I’m not going to say it out loud, not to him. “Just finish this story time, please. You’re boring me.”

His hand moves higher, and this time, I’ve had enough.

I shove him away, but he’s expecting it, and we wrestle for control.

He may be older, but he’s always put time and energy into fitness, so he quickly overpowers me.

Flipping me onto my stomach, he shoves me into the mattress and pins my hands behind my back.

“Once your mother was gone, we again proposed a marriage for an alliance. In return, he’d get access to all the fun your grandpa and I had been having for years.

He said no, but we convinced him just to come to a party once and see what the money and power of the alliance would give him.

That one taste was all it took. After that, he was hooked, and you were engaged. ”

“I was a little girl.”

“Exactly. That’s what I’m telling you. These plans have been in place for so long.

” He yanks my dress up and caresses my butt cheek, making me struggle, but with one sharp bend of my wrist that sends searing pain up my arm, I stop, at his mercy.

“Then, your grandpa went and died, which almost had your dad pulling out of the arrangement. If he didn’t marry you off, I’d lose a lot of money.

I’d already invested in the merger, knowing my shares in your dad’s company would more than double.

So, I had a talk with him and made sure he understood I was going to make money off you one way or another.

If I had to sell you with the other girls I trafficked in and out, I’d do it. That threat secured all our futures.”

“Until Dad was murdered.”