“It’s okay,”I silently mouth when his nose trails down her neck, over the bumps of her erratically heaving chest, and past her quivering stomach.
She squeaks when he thrusts his nose between her thighs to authenticate her purity, but since she trusts me, she doesn’t slap him away as predicted.
Although disappointed by her lack of gall, I’m appreciative of her submissiveness.
My father growls, his stamp of approval delivered without words. “Who would have known? The lack of purity these days had me wondering if women were born devirginized.”
He laughs, prompting me to mimic him. I either laugh or be subjected to torture. Nobody wants the latter, not even a madman like me. I prefer delivering the punishments, not being on the receiving end of them.
“Charles!” my dad barks.
Like magic, Charles appears out of nowhere.
“Take…”
“Megan,” I fill in.
“Megan to her room and order her some supper…”
“We’ve already eaten.”
My father continues talking as if I never did, “Then draw her a bath. Let’s relax her muscles before exhausting them.”
When Charles places his hand on Megan’s back to guide her into my father’s manor, her eyes stray to mine.
“Go on,” I say, demanding she follows Charles’s lead.
I’m not going to lie. It isn’t easy for me to do. She killed for me. She maimed for me. She would go to the ends of the earth for me. But everything she has or will do for me, the man standing next to me has already done.
“What time will the show begin?”
My father stops watching Megan’s reluctant retreat to shift on his feet to face me. His pupils are massive, his excitement palpable. Although he doesn’t like my deep snarl, he isn’t stunned by it. Hunting has never been my thing. I like a slow, panther-like game, the watching from afar before creeping up on them unaware. I don’t like my women reeking of fear, sweat, and blood before sleeping with them. I like them smelling that way once I’m done with them.
After absorbing the low-hanging sun for a few seconds, my father returns his eyes to mine. “An hour. Possibly two.”
His eagerness to get the hunt underway isn’t surprising. He’s on the brink of a mental breakdown. That’s why he’s acting so maniacally. Megan is his ticket out of Crazyville. She will give him the relief he needs without requiring him to move a piece on his chessboard.
He’ll just destroy mine instead.
“Are we doing it here or at the stables?”
My father’s lips quirk. “We?You’re joining the hunt?”
Ignoring the bile burning my throat, I nod.
“Good.” My father smiles, welcoming the challenge. “We’ll do it at the stables. I don’t want to scare my little pet too soon.”
His reply would make most people assume he is referring to Megan. I’m not most people. But I am confused.
If he already has a pet, why does he want Megan?
My unasked question is answered when my father curls his arm around my shoulders to guide me into the house. “Come, son. Let me introduce you to your new mother.”
My father’s choice in captive is nothing out of the ordinary—early thirties, big worldly eyes, slim frame, and naked head to toe. Her hair is the same burned charcoal color my mother’s was, and her nipples are a similar shade of brown. She is pretty, but with her eyes brimming with fear instead of psychotic tendencies, she is demure. Boring.Nothing like Megan.
“Please,” she whispers when we return to the hall. I assume her plea is for me until she adds, “I did as you asked. I won’t disobey you again.”
Now my father’s desire to hunt makes sense. He wants to punish his latest plaything for disobedience by showing her what will happen if she doesn’t follow his command to a T. He could hunt her instead of Megan, but since she is nearly an exact replica of my mother at the age she was before he killed her, he’s giving her one final chance to make amends.
