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CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

I stood in front of the mirror wearing the black lingerie Alister had selected for me. I missed the white. I suddenly missed the Ivory estate. Had my life really become this way that I was missing one hell over another.

“Demi, my beautiful raven, I’m ready for you…” Alister called out. I walked out of the room wearing the four-inch Christian Louboutin stilettos he’d left for me to wear as well.

“I could have worn white…” I mustered up the courage to say as Alister looked up and down my body.

He was shirtless and sliding his pants off.

A small smile curved on his face. “No, my sweet Demi, I prefer you to wear black for me tonight. White is pure and clean and doesn’t depict the darkness I know is scorched into your soul from what they put you through. I know you don’t want to hear this, but…I think you are quite the favorite girl around here. It doesn’t seem like it now, but that’s far better than being the caged girl. Now come sit on my lap and let me adore you.” He guided me into his bedroom. The fragrance from the fresh flowers scattered everywhere and the candles flickering set a romantic stage if this was a normal newlywed dynamic. But here I was, Mrs. Alister Ivory. I knew I’d hold more power if I succumbed to him. This was my final chance of survival. I’d escape this hell eventually, I just had to be patient.

Pulling the blanket back, I screamed.

There was a dead woman wearing a white lingerie set.

“What is it, my beautiful precious raven?” Alister came racing around toward me and looked at her.

“Alister…” My body shook violently as I stumbled backward and clutched my chest.

“My bride, what is it? What is it?” Alister grabbed me and tugged me back toward the bed.

He began kissing my body and taking the lingerie off. “No, please…” I whimpered as my skin grew cold.

“Lay next to her,” he whispered in my ear as he pushed me onto the bed.

I felt nauseous.

“No, Alister, please…don’t do this.”

He slid his briefs off and exposed himself.

I slowly turned my head and looked at her. She had short blonde hair straggling around her decomposing face.

“Alister,” I cried, “I’m begging you…”

“I saw the video footage of Dr. Davenport assaulting you before your procedure.”

I was hyperventilating as he adjusted the dead woman next to me.

“This is his beloved wife, Jenna. You see, his first wife, Daisy, who had a familial connection to the Ivory family, was returned by force and he received this lovely girl he called Daisy, too. He loved her so much that he pleaded with us to fix her, and in exchange, he’d work here as a doctor until we found someone else more permanent. When I saw the footage of him assaulting my soon-to-be bride, after he knew who you were to me… Well, I had to make sure he paid.” Alister handed me a gold box. “Here, my love.”

Sliding away from the corpse next me, I began hyperventilating.

“Open it, my beautiful raven.”

Sliding the top off, I cried out before flinging it across the room. Alister laughed as the bloodied fingers flew all over his room.

“I chopped each finger off that touched you, before cutting his wife with thousands of slits and letting her bleed out in front of him. We let some of the girls drain upside down in a special room. Then, I slit his throat and brought a special bottle of wine for us to share this evening.” He nodded toward the glass bottle sitting on the bedside table and two glasses.

“The blood of your enemies will always be auspicious to drink, my love.” Alister poured the thick liquid into the goblets before looking at me.

“Please have her removed,” I whimpered as I turned my head away. The floral scent of the room no longer lingered—I could smell decomposition.

“Oh no, not yet, my bride. You see, I know you’re still sore after your surgery to…well, make you my virgin bride. I want you to see me as a caring, loving husband. But it is very important as a man of higher power to consummate our marriage on our wedding night, one way or another.”

Brushing his hand through Jenna’s hair, he smiled. “She’s not as beautiful as you, but her pussy will have to do.”

Towering over her, he wrapped his hands around her neck. “I already had them cut it a bit, but I wanted the privilege of doing this.” Twisting her neck in one swift motion, he tore Jenna’s entire head off.

Slamming my eyes closed, I covered my ears. I could hear her screams even though they didn’t exist. I could hear her pleading for her life and not paying this price for her husband’s sins. As usual, that is what women had to do since the beginning of time…pay for the sins of a man.

I heard a loud thud, and then Alister was lifting me toward the body. “No, no…Alister…” I cried.

He tilted my body in a way where my head was resting where hers was just moments ago.

“Open your eyes and make the sounds of pleasure for me. I promise, my virgin bride, you’ll feel me deep inside you soon enough.”

I kept quiet as he pushed himself inside the dead woman. Clenching my teeth, I swallowed the stomach acid that rose into my mouth.

“Demi,” he shouted and slammed his hands around my neck. I gagged as he smiled and thrusted inside her.

“Yes, baby…it feels so good, doesn’t it. You feel so good…” He moaned as his hands left my throat and grabbed my breasts.

“Alister…” I sobbed.

“I love when you say my name, my beautiful raven.” The scent of death had me in a nightmare haze.

My new husband was having sex with a dead woman’s body.

He exhaled in a euphoric trance before pressing his lips to mine. “You are perfection, my love,” he said into my ear as I cried hysterically.

“It’s okay, it’s okay…Demi.” His voice shifted from the sick monster I just saw moments ago to concern.

“How can you be like this, Alister?” I pushed his body away from mine and scrambled off the bed.

“Get dressed, Demi,” he boomed as a loud knock echoed on the door. I quickly grabbed my robe and tugged it over my body, then hid in the bathroom. Locking the door behind me, I could hear him snap his fingers and then voices speaking to him. My back slid down the door as I panicked.

“Clean her up, then take her into the bath.”

He was going to bathe her? Then what? Have her stuffed and displayed for me?

“It was a fucking disaster, Bradley. She didn’t take to the ceremony. I don’t know if I should have her tonight and do the blood ceremony. But we must at least do that.”

“She’s not a virgin. Conrad married her.” Bradley’s voice cracked as he spoke. He was, after all, the man who took my virginity because I begged him to let me have one choice in my life.

“Don’t fucking say his name and my wife’s name in the same sentence. I need her to compose herself. Ian was powerful because Daphne was by his side, and I need Demi to do the same. No other woman understands us the way she does. If she wanted to run, she wouldn’t have gotten on that boat with you.”

“If we don’t do the blood ceremony, then the marriage isn’t sealed. We didn’t…” I heard more footsteps and wondered if others were there to clean up.

“She knows about her.”

“Shut your mouth, Bradley! She doesn’t know anything. That isn’t the woman she thinks it is.”

“I need a female front to recruit more nightingales since we are killing them too quickly. Then the breeders…well, you already know we’ve faced countless miscarriages and issues. The only way to keep inventory up is having a face like Demi’s out there.”

“Uncle Alister, have you ever thought that there is an end to all this?” Bradley’s voice shattered me, and the pause had my heart stopping.

“Do you know what the greatest gift in the world is, Bradley?”

I wiped away the tears streaming down my cheeks.

“Power,” Alister filled in. “Without power, you are nothing. This legacy the Ivory men have created is nothing without power. Lucrative businesses, all interconnected, fuels men to want to be more than average. Average men do not make the world flourish, powerful men do. I have single-handedly given the gift of life and family to couples who should have that. The poverty-stricken classes reproduce rampantly. If wealthy couples don’t have legacies, then what will become of this world?”

“Where is she?” Bradley asked.

I assumed Alister pointed to the bathroom because the footsteps grew closer and louder.

“My wife is upset with me, isn’t she?” Alister said mockingly as he harmoniously knocked on the door.

Each thud had my stomach flip as I pressed my back against the door harder in hopes he wouldn’t open it.

“What do you want, my love?” he crooned.

I cleared my throat. “I want to talk to my sister.”

The door unlocked. Slamming my eyes shut and clutching my knees to my chest, I was terrified as he pushed it open.

“Your wish is my command, my queen.”