Page 22 of The Monster I Am

After this, there might not be a next time.

“After we clean you up, you’re to rest in your room. Understood?” Despite his attempts to keep his voice under control, Rhys could hear the undercurrents of anger in it. Fuck. He didn’t want to upset Jared any more than he already had.

“Yes, sir,” Jared murmured, tension leaving him when Rhys got close.

It made the protectiveness, the possessiveness, even sharper.

Geoff returned from the bathroom with a wet washcloth and the container of cream, looking at Aidan for confirmation before holding them out to Rhys when Aidan nodded.

Aidan folded his arms and watched without further comment.

Rhys took the cloth and the container, tending to Jared with the same calm care that he always showed the slave. Perhaps a touch more, knowing that he had eyes on him. He started to wipe the wounds clean with the soft cloth, then with a deft hand, he rubbed some of the ointment into cuts that had already stopped bleeding. Despite how they’d looked, they weren’t very deep.

When he was done, he glanced at Aidan. “I’ll take him to his room, then meet you in the kitchen.” He didn’t wait for permission, casting a strength enhancement spell on himself so he could scoop Jared up into his arms with the ease of a werewolf or vampire. “Hush,” he soothed when the human whimpered. It wasn’t until they’d reached the other bedroom and he’d tucked the human beneath the covers that he murmured, “You did very, very well. I’m proud of you.”

Those words were dangerous. If he was a spy for someone…

But he understood that being broken out of subspace in such a way could be disruptive, distressing, and even downright dangerous, and he had things to tend to before he could return to the slave.

“Now rest.”

Rhys turned the light off on the way out and closed the door, then stalked into the kitchen with all the predatory grace of an angry wildcat.

“Now explain to me why the fuck you barged into my house without even knocking,” he snapped.

Aidan was leaning against the wall, typing away quickly on his cell phone. It was likely one of the ones that was for highly secured communications, and it would have physical, digital, and magical protections and encryption on it.

He’d be talking to Elizabeth, then, or someone close to her in the hierarchy. About the situation that had brought Aidan here, about Rhys, he couldn’t be sure.

Likely both.

“The safehouse on 8th is compromised,” Aidan said without preamble, still typing on the phone. “Geoff got reported as a sympathizer and picked up by enforcers. We intercepted them in transit and broke him out, but we had a limited window to get out of sight before reinforcements arrived, a window that got even more limited when there was an enforcer holding surveillance outside of the safehouse. How and what they know, we don’t know, and your place was the closest one we could get to before unwanted company showed up.” The words were clipped and neutral.

“So you thought it was a good idea to come to the home of a Council representative,” Rhys said through gritted teeth, running a hand through his hair. His position was too important to risk easily, but leaving one of their own to be interrogated by the enforcers was too dangerous, too.

He went to the coffee maker, starting to prepare a pot. He was going to be up late dealing with the aftermath of all of this.

Fuck.

“All right. Fine. You’ll be safe here, at least for a little while, but I’m not sure I haven’t been exposed.” He glared at Aidan. “Especially now. If Elizabeth had contacted me back, I’d have told her as much.”

“You’d have told her that you’re cutting them up outside of those vile parties?” Aidan’s eyes were blazing as he looked up from the phone. “I saw the mark on his wrist. Do you own him? You’re keeping a slave now, Rhys? What the fuck?”

No, he absolutely would not have told Elizabeth what he was doing in private, but she was an intelligent woman, and she would’ve understood the need to keep up pretenses. The flogger she would’ve understood, and spanking, and sex…

But the knives? Maybe not.

“Dominic Bancroft gave him to me as a gift,” Rhys snapped back. “What was I supposed to do? Refuse? And I don’t know if he’s a plant, so I can’t treat him differently than I would any other slave. Think this through. If I treat him like a fluffy fucking bunny, what happens when I take him to the next party? He has to believe that I am what they think I am, too.”

At least, that was what he was telling himself.

It certainly wasn’t because he enjoyed it.

Aidan’s jaw tightened. “Why is Dominic Bancroft giving you gifts?” The disbelief and suspicion dripping from his voice gave every indication of what he thought of that particular turn of events.

“I don’t know,” Rhys shot back. “I have my theories, but it’s most likely that he sees me as exactly what he’s supposed to see me as: a fellow monster. Or it’s possible that he wanted eyes in this house, and congratulations, he now has every reason to get me taken in as a sympathizer or worse.”

“I’ve sent word to Elizabeth.” Aidan slipped the phone into his pocket. “They’ll wait for a clear window to do a pickup. I recommend you be ready to go too. And the human.”