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Celeste protests the entire trip from the formal dining room to the first available parlor we find. I yank the door open and fling her inside. Considering she weighs a hundred and ten pounds at most, the strength at which I do causes her to fall over.
I do not care. I stride up to where she’s crumpled on the floor and drag her up by her bony arm.
She gets off on this. On my reprimands. On my rough treatment. As I wring and shake her and growl in her face, she only softens in my grasp. A dreamy expression passes over her, and she claws at me as if to embrace.
I shove her away from me in disgust. “Do you really believe what you did will do you any favors?”
“Baby—”
“Call me baby one more time, Celeste, and I will snap your wrist like a twig. Do not test me.”
“Kaden,” she corrects herself in a gentle, delirious coo. She steps toward me as if I haven’t just shoved her away. “I was following club rules. The prostitute is to die. You’ve heard the Owner. Instead, you’ve brought her into your home. You threw me out days before.”
“You fucking crazy bitch,” I rage. “That’s because I didn’t want you there! I don’t want you period!”
“She hurt Klein.”
“I don’t give a fuck.”
“She’s poor. AndBlack.”
I advance toward her, my expression so dark and murderous, a flicker of fear finally bleeds onto Celeste’s gaunt face. She tries to step back, but it’s too late—I wrench her closer by the wrist and then do what I did earlier.
I crush her. My grip tightens on her wrist to the point of severe pain.
She screams and wiggles her body to escape me. It’s useless. Her weak attempts futile.
I only squeeze harder, twisting her wrist. “How many warnings have I given you? Yet you insist on being a lunatic. You attempt to degrade Lyra for something as irrational as the color of her skin. Yet you are a drug-addicted whore. Lyra has infinitely more worth than you will ever possibly dream, you deluded bitch.”
Tears fill her eyes, and she begins swatting at me.
I release her. I do it so suddenly, and she’s so erratic, that she loses her balance and falls on her ass. She remains where she is, her long, bony legs bent at odd angles and tears and mascara streaked down her cheeks.
“I have gone easy on you, Celeste. But I will not tolerate your interference. The next time you do, I will run you through with my sharpest blade. You mean nothing to me. Less than nothing. Scum on my shoe holds more value. Stay away from me. Stay away from Lyra. Do you understand?”
With a feeble noise, she nods.
It’s the most broken I’ve ever seen her. If I were more human, I’d feel sorry for her. She’s that pathetic and lost.
However, it’s a necessary evil—it’s the only way she’ll understand. Should it turn out that she still hasn’t learned her lesson, Lyra won’t be the next person I eliminate.
Celeste will be.
* * *
“You will do fine. You are overthinking the situation, which places pressure on yourself.”
Lyra exhales a deep sigh that deflates her posture. She’s seated at the piano bench on stage at the Velvet Piano. Erma, her manager, has agreed to allow her to practice hours before the bar opens. Though she’s off tonight, tomorrow is her audition with Fyodor Kreed.
I’ve realized it’s the culprit for her distant behavior.
Lyra’s nervous, racked by imposter syndrome and self-doubt, and when she feels this way, she becomes withdrawn.
A tendency I do not exhibit but that I understand.
I am not capable of imposter syndrome or such high levels of self-depreciation as she is. I have the opposite issue—I think extremely highly of myself at all times.
Lyra believes she is the worst piano player in the world.
