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“Yes, he just needed to get it all out,” Ryder replies, his tone cold.
There’s a sigh and some shifting. “Do you ever wonder if it wouldn’t have been kinder…”
“Stop right there,” Ryder snaps. “He’s our brother, his demons are our demons. He survived, we do whatever it takes to ensure that he stays that way.”
“You’re right,” Kenzo agrees, but sounds sad. “I just wish there was something we could do. I feel useless watching him struggle.”
“This is his battle, not even we can help him this time. Only he can, he must decide to keep going. He’s been in limbo ever since it happened, just living. I have a feeling that having Roxy here will shake that up. Force him to face it once and for all,” Ryder murmurs.
“Y-You knew that when you brought her here, didn’t you?” Kenzo snaps, angry now. “You might be smart, Ryder, but sometimes you’re a fucking bastard. He’s our brother.”
“He is!” Ryder growls. “I’m trying to save him!”
“You are trying to control everything, like always!” Kenzo yells. “For once, stop trying to be in charge, just be there for him. That’s all he needs, not your fucking experiments. We aren’t another one of your challenges to conquer, we are your family. I swear, Ryder, sometimes you remind me of—”
It goes quiet, and I can almost feel the drop in temperature, and when Ryder’s voice comes, it’s deadly, dark, and oh so cold. “Say it.”
“Of Dad!” Kenzo finishes. “You do, I love you, brother, but you get more like him every day. I’ve spent my life fighting to not be like him, but sometimes I wonder if you don’t think it’s just easier to give in. Remember what happened to him, brother, don’t end up like him.”
Peeking around the corner, I see Kenzo disappearing upstairs. Ryder is standing in the kitchen, his head hanging as he presses his fists to the worktop there. “One, two, three, four,” he murmurs. “One, two, three, four.”
He repeats it again and again, until I see his body calming, once more hiding behind that ice. When he pushes away from the worktop, he straightens, once again in control. His face is cold as he buttons up his suit and heads out the front door.
I try to dart after him, to escape, but a hand clamps over my mouth and I freeze, my eyes going wide as my heart slams and my breathing picks up. A mouth meets my ear, the smell of smoke and petrol wafting to me.
Diesel.
Fuck, they all warned me to stay away from him, and now Ryder is gone, Garrett too, not that they would save me. Even Kenzo is gone. It’s just me and the crazy, psychotic Viper.
“Oh, Little Bird, I caught a little bird,” he murmurs, licking my ear. “Tut, tut, eavesdropping like that, naughty little bird. Do you know what they get?”
I shake my head, my gaze locked on the opposite hallway, not daring to turn in case it triggers him in some way. True fear pounds through me. This man doesn’t follow the rules. He kills for fun, tortures for laughs. Wants to see me squirm, to see me suffer. I don’t know what to do, how to act around him. After all, prey always recognises a predator, and Diesel?
Diesel is all predator.
Unpredictable and consuming everything in his path, like the fire he loves so much. Even now, I can smell the cigarette on his breath, his hand rough like it’s covered in burns as he presses it harder to my lips, pushing it painfully into my teeth.
“Punished.”
I freeze as he laughs, pulling away from me as suddenly as he came. I spin, my hand going to my heart as he strolls down the corridor, the click of his lighter loud as he flicks it open and closed.
Fuck.
I really need to stay clear of that man. Something tells me he’s going to be my death. I need to escape before he decides to stop torturing me and just go for the kill.
Because right now? I’m being hunted.
Four hungry vipers are slithering closer, wrapping tighter and tighter, their dark coils shining in the light as they prepare to strike.
And I’m in the middle.
* * *
After my run-in with Diesel,I decided to hide in my room, not wanting to be caught alone with him again without any of the others there. They might not stop him from hurting me, but I think they would stop him from killing me.
At least at the moment.
So I did the only other thing I could—sleep. This time, I had no nightmares though, well, not of my past. Instead, they were of tattooed knuckles running up my thighs, dark eyes peering up at me, and when I jerk awake in the morning light, I’m covered in a sheen of sweat. My pussy throbs, and my thighs are soaked with my own wetness.
