I just didn’t understand any of it.
“But—” I pulled away, brow furrowing. I wanted to know what was going on. I didn’t want to be in the dark anymore, dammit. Anteros gripped me, palms on either side of my face, and devoured my lips, cutting off any train of thought.
“Leave this place.” His voice was a hoarse rumble, bluegreen gaze shadowed under our foreheads still pressed together. The need—the urgency—pierced my soul. He tightened his grip on my skull, thumbs digging into my flesh. “Come back with me.”
I still didn’t know anything about my real parents. Nothing. I shared my concerns with Anteros.
He dropped his hands from my face. “You don’t need to know any of that.” I scoffed; he said it with such callous certainty—a callous certainty about what I needed, as if he knew my own wants better than me.
I spun away, putting distance between us. “You don’t understand. You’re—” I struggled with the right words, but Anteros beat me to it.
“Orphaned?” Dark amusement colored his words.
“You knew them,” I said, pressing on. “They’re dead, but you knew them.”
He laughed caustically. “It would have been better had I not.” I still didn’t know much about his parents, just that he hated them. I rubbed my arms, focusing on the door instead of what he’d said. It was ivory with gold trim—beautiful. Just once I wished I could see something ugly, to remind me of the truth.
But that was only found in the basement.
“Fall with me,” Anteros whispered below my earlobe, closing the distance between us. He wrapped his arms around me and pulled me back to his chest, voice low, making my skin tingle. “Be my queen.”
I craned my neck so our eyes locked. “Are the Wolves gone?” His silence told me the truth. I wouldn’t be his queen. It would be just like here, like Lucia’s slaves with the names of princess. There was no way for me to integrate into Beast’s world, not without destroying everything, and he wouldn’t do that. I wouldn’t ask him to do that, either.
I wasn’t really sure what I wanted in this war. I wasn’t team Lucia, but I wasn’t team Beast, not if it included the Wolves. I was team us, but that team couldn’t be. Without him I was lost, but together was an impossibility.
It wasn’t until Beast that I saw a future, but it was a dark one. Something I was afraid to say aloud, or even in my head.
“I don’t know what I was thinking sending you that book,” I lied, gesturing between us. “I don’t want to be killing and-and,” I stuttered as he pulled me closer. “I’m not this person,” I lied again.
“You are exactly this person,” he growled, biting my ear and pulling at it with his teeth. “You fear yourself more than you fear me, more than you fear anyone, because you know what you can become.”
Damn him, because he was right.
“I—” I tried responding, tried formulating another lie, when the sigh of floorboards cut me off. My blood stilled—someone was in the hallway.
“Go.” I hurriedly pushed Anteros toward the window. “You have to go. This isn’t even my room.”
“I know. It’s Gabriella De Luca’s.” My eyes widened. He grinned. “You girls have been very naughty. Murdering husbands. Tying up bosses. Killing Wolves.” I stopped pushing him, the memory stalling my movements. He threw me a knowing smile and I pressed harder against his chest, getting back to work. “I’m still surprised Gabriella had it in her,” Anteros continued as I shoved him. My heart pounded as I heard feet approach, but Anteros didn’t give a shit. His smile widened as he made me push him.
“So was her husband,” I gritted, pushing him. He laughed. Goose bumps rose at the foreign, wonderful sound, but it was too fucking loud.
“Shut up,” I whispered, looking over my shoulder.
“I still can’t figure out who helped you escape, who really helped you. Gabriella might be smarter than I thought—a grapefruit would have been smarter than I originally thought her to be,” he added as an afterthought, “but she didn’t pull it off on her own.”
I paused, hands splayed on his chest.
Nikolai.
Nikolai had helped, and he was still helping. I needed to tell Anteros there was a snake in his house.
“Anteros I need to tell you something,” I whispered as footsteps arrived just outside the door. Anteros swung one leg out the window, grin still on his face. He gripped my face again and pulled me into a kiss.
“Next time, mio cuore.” His breath was steamy against my lips. We were just a thread away from one another, and I could smell his skin, could practically taste him, but even still it was too far—agonizing, the pull too intense, like someone was stretching the very skin off my body.
“We can’t meet here again,” I said, licking my lips, wanting to reach out and taste him, but knowing if I did I would get lost and we would get caught. “It’s too dangerous.”
“You want to see me.” A wicked, arrogant grin lifted the corner of his lips, and he pulled me against his thigh so I could feel him rock hard. His hand rounded my ass, tight, gripping. Then his lips were on my neck. I said something about him needing to go, but they were flimsy words, and my grip on his hoodie strengthened.
“Well I’m a fucked up girl who loves killing and you’re an animal—a Beast.” I breathed as he bit the skin at my collarbone. “We were made for each other.” It was meant to be sardonic, meant to devalue the crazy situation and our fucked up nature, but I sighed the words and instead gave it more power—gave us more power. He scored my hair, tilting my head back so our eyes locked. My heart pounded a heavy beat so loud I was sure whoever was on the other side of the door would hear it. My tongue darted out involuntarily to wet my lips and his eyes traveled down, narrowing as they followed its slide across my mouth. The air caught fire and I didn’t care who was outside the room. I wanted to burn with him.
Then with a growl deep in his throat, Anteros tore from me and pressed something into my palm—a phone.
“I’ll text you the address,” he said, voice like gravel.
“It can’t be far. I need to be close. Lucia…Lucia wants me close.” Another lie. It was hard to leave Lucia—she had eyes on me more than Anteros did—but I found ways. Truthfully I was starting to feel sick, and even just walking to Anteros’s club was weighing on me. I didn’t want him to know that, though. I didn’t want him to think I was broken.
“It will be close,” he said with a cruelly sensual grin. Just before he left he reached out his pointer finger and gently lifted the diamond rose from my neck. One, two beats passed with him holding it in suspense. Our eyes locked, a smile ghosted his face, then he dropped the pendant and climbed the rest of the way through the window, quickly jumping down. I released the breath I hadn’t realized I was holding, fingers going to the necklace like I could feel him still.
It was a marvel to watch him go, muscles rippling, feet landing on the cement with agility. He adjusted his hoodie, vanishing among New Yorkers. I looked at the phone in my hand, hope blooming in my chest.
I could still taste him on my lips, was still tingling with the touch of him, when the door opened behind me. Spinning around, I shoved the cell into my pocket. I expected Gabby. Of course I was wrong.
I wondered if she could see the sweat on my brow, if she felt the pounding in my blood. The window was still open, breathing icy air into the room, but it wasn’t enough to cool down the heat in my veins. She looked beyond me to the open window, folding her arms.
“Waiting for Gabriella?” Lucia asked.
I swallowed. “Yep.”
Another moment passed. “That’s nice. I never had girlfriends to gab with, no one to talk about boys with or to share my…secrets.” She closed her lips in a thin smile and tilted her head, watching how I responded to the word secrets.
I shrugged, not really sure what to say. Gabby and I weren’t really mulling over the latest issue of Teen Vogue, but that wasn’t what Lucia was implying. I didn’t feel like playing her game, not
when I could still taste Anteros on my lips. When I was certain she could smell him in the air because his spicy scent was sharp as a needle in my heart.
“It’s so hard to find good help,” she said after a few more seconds of agonizing silence. My brow furrowed, not understanding her meaning. “I sent someone to fetch you hours ago,” she explained. “In the end, I had to come find you.” Lucia was always so regal, her hair perfect, shining silver ringlets and the wrinkles in her skin somehow accentuating her beauty. She radiated regality in the same way Anteros radiated savagery. Whenever I caught glimpses of her, I was stunned, awed into silence. It was uncomfortable, and another reason I avoided her.
“I got the message.” I rubbed my hands on my jeans, pausing when I felt the bulge of the phone. I slowly stood up straight, desperate for any way to end this conversation and get away, to hide the evidence. “I was on my way to see you.” It was a lie, and I was sure she knew it. Silently, Lucia came closer to me, long and bony yet beautiful fingers reaching to lift the necklace from my skin.
“I would imagine you would be more curious to know of your family.” She twirled the diamond between her pointer finger and thumb. My stomach raged, thinking to how Anteros had only just recently held it. It didn’t belong in her hand. “Of your mother,” she finished, dropping the diamond. I pulled back, hand covering the pendant instinctively.
“I am,” I said, voice high with excitement. Was she serious? I’d been asking about my family, about who I was, since we’d arrived at this fucking place—but she knew that. She turned as if to leave without another word.
“Tell me what you know about my mother,” I demanded to her back. Fuck. I’d been doing my best to keep my emotions under control, but seriously? Was she really going to just leave like that? She paused and lifted her head.
“Stop avoiding me and you’ll find out,” she said over her shoulder, sounding amused. I felt ill, unable to speak as she disappeared out the door. I wanted desperately to know about my mother and the origins of my family. My month with Anteros had taught me when I was being used, though, when someone was fucking with my mind.
I didn’t know why she was fucking with me. I didn’t know why my grandmother would want to screw with me. When I was younger I used to imagine having grandparents like the other children. Their grandparents would bake them cookies or let them play games at their houses. There was a game we were playing, but I wasn’t sure what it was and I couldn’t possibly know the rules.
I waited a few minutes after she left before I followed. The hallway was empty and I quickly scurried the rest of the way down to my room—the best room for the best granddaughter, Lucia had explained with her ghostly smile. When she’d said that, I thought my dreams were coming true and I had finally gotten a grandmother like all the other kids. Now I knew the true reason: Lucia had given me the room because it was the corner room, which made it almost impossible to leave at night.
There was an unwritten rule about leaving. I never got in trouble if I left during the day, I was simply followed. When I went to the thrift store, a soldier followed me. Watching me. Studying me. Reporting to Lucia what he saw. It made me feel more caged than when I was here, sitting in my room, alone.
There were cameras all over the club and basement but, as far as I could tell, the bedrooms weren’t equipped with any. It made sneaking around easier and made my prison bearable. Some days I could steal freedom, and the night always belonged to me.
It was how I’d found Anteros.
I pushed the door open and stopped short in the doorway when I saw who was sitting on my bed.
“What the fuck are you doing here?” I snapped. Nikolai stood up off the four-poster bed draped in shining silk.
“We need to make a few things clear.”
“Like boundaries?” I asked. “And personal space? I agree.”
“I know you’ve been seeing Beast.”
“That’s a lie,” I said with a wave of my hand. “And not a very good one.”
He narrowed his eyes. “I don’t have time to play games with you, especially since you’re so terrible at them.”
I folded my arms and matched his glare. “What do you want?” I barely got the words out through my gritted teeth.
“Simple: you can’t tell him about me.”
I laughed. “One, I don’t see him so that would never happen. Two, if I did see him, fuck you.”
“You love him,” Nikolai continued like I’d never said a word.
“Why would I love the man who imprisoned me?”
Nikolai’s movements reflected in the shiny hardwood as he got closer. “I don’t really care about the whys of your Stockholm syndrome bullshit. All that matters is that you do, and he somethings you.” Nikolai narrowed his eyes and stressed the word ‘something’ like he still couldn’t believe Anteros could feel any type of emotion.
“So you probably wouldn’t want him finding out that you’ve been fucking me,” he continued, “and that you were the mastermind behind all of this.”
“Your lies are getting—” Nikolai held up a hand, cutting me off before I could protest. He pulled out a smart phone and I had my arms folded, ready to roll my eyes at whatever was on the screen, when I gasped. The first video showed a drugged Anteros as we dragged him to his room on Christmas Eve. The next showed me opening the Bible and checking the needle on New Year’s Eve, making it seem like I’d added it alone.
“You fucking saved those? You said you erased the tapes.” He shrugged and pressed a finger to the screen. The room filled with sound. I listened, expecting to hear what we’d said during those times, but it was all wrong.
“We need to get him to bed,” Nikolai’s voice said.
“I’m going to kill him, actually murder his body,” mine replied.
I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. It was my and Nikolai’s words, but none of it was how it should have been. I remembered saying that Beast was going to kill me and that he was going to murder my body, but somehow Nikolai had doctored it. It was altered, but it sounded so real—it looked so real.
I stumbled back, hand grasping the bed’s glazed wooden poster for support as the video continued. Everything was wrong, wrong, wrong. It really did sound like I’d masterminded everything. It sounded like I was in love with Nikolai. It sounded like I’d planned everything with Vic and Lucia. It sounded like I’d planned to have the needle placed in the hotel room. My stomach dropped, feeling sick. Nikolai pressed another finger to the screen, making the picture and sound go black.
“It’s amazing what technology can do these days.”
“You wouldn’t,” I said, even knowing he would. I just couldn’t process what was happening. I spun away, feet padding across ancient, shined hardwood. I went past the beautiful, one-of-a-kind furniture in gold and cerulean, going straight to the window.
Nikolai was at my back. “I think you know I would.”
“But that’s not true. You twisted my words. It’s all a fucking lie.”
“Do you think Beast will believe that?” Nikolai asked. Breathing labored, I focused on my nails digging into the ivory paint on the sill. Did I think he would believe me when all evidence pointed to the contrary?
No. I didn’t. Not when the trust between us was already so tenuous. I would find a way to eventually tell him who Nikolai really was, but first I had to get Nikolai’s fucking phone or figure out a way to convince Anteros without any doubt.
“I trust you will do what I asked,” Nikolai said to my back. I didn’t respond, but I didn’t need to. He’d won this round. When I heard the snick of the door closing, I wanted to scream, but instead I scythed my nails tighter into the sill until paint curled up where my nails bit the edges.
The night sky was made a blank canvas by the blinding city lights. The air was crisp and the smell dug into my chest, tearing open the parts I desperately tried to keep shut. I still agonized over the way I’d left Anteros, wondering if what I was doing was correct. Sometimes I hated my
self more than I ever hated him. It was a hate I rarely acknowledged, but nevertheless felt every day. I hated myself for leaving him, felt myself wishing I were his slave. When that happened, new hate flowed all over again—hate at myself for giving in, for letting him into my heart, and for wanting to keep him there.
Do you know what I want from you, Frankie?
I thought I had, thought I’d finally figured out the big, bad Beast, then he’d responded in a way I never saw coming.
Love.
I lifted the necklace, feeling the hard edges as I got lost in the snow-dusted city. Each night I ruminated over his response. I wondered if his love was just a trick, a mind game. After he climbed through Gabriella’s window, I was no more certain. Were we Romeo and Juliet? Or was I Ophelia, destined to go mad wondering?
I looked over the tops of brightly lit skyscrapers, beyond to where I knew he was. My mind told me a Beast couldn’t love. My heart, though…I exhaled, letting the necklace fall from my grasp. My heart was going to get me killed.
Three
A week had passed since Anteros crawled through Frankie’s window and his blood boiled for her. As much as he’d itched to tear apart the city until he got to her, he’d had to wait, had to find the perfect moment and meeting spot. That night, he finally had.
Pulling open his desk drawer, he grabbed the burner phone with Frankie’s number and quickly texted.
Tonight. Meet me at this address.
Just as he sent the location, the door burst open and with it, the lively sounds of laughter and saxophone flowed like a wave crashing over the pier. Anteros put the phone back as Nikolai came through the door, a piece of paper in his hand.
“I had to take down some flyers off the wall outside,” he explained. In the dim light, the flyer was still bright and bold, black letters stood out against the red paper. Colorful dots of lights from the club flared across the lettering.
Slay the Beast, Save the Prince.
Beauty, a Hate Story the End Page 5