lip curled back with hatred. I knew then why Rogue was shattered inside, why her trust in us could never be restored. We’d taken a few pieces of her heart when she’d left Sunset Cove, but this monster was the one who’d made sure to break the final ones beyond repair. And I found a purpose in that, something to keep living for down here in this cage. Because I simply had to live to kill this motherfucker deader than dead. It was the only thing that mattered. The one good deed that might just make all my shitty actions in my short life worth something.
“She made me promise to be loyal to her,” he said with a smirk. “Which made it much more fun fucking other women in secret while she waited at home for me, fingering that tight pussy which was reserved solely for my cock. She was obsessed with me. I was her one and only. It was fucking beautiful, and when I get her back, I’m gonna tie her to my bed for days and-”
I lunged at him with a roar of fury ripping from my throat, my fist cracking against his face as I reached for his gun, my hand clamping around the barrel.
The pistol went off and my ears popped with the blast of the shot. For a heartbeat I thought it was game over, but then Shawn yanked the gun from my grip and kicked me away, levelling it on me once more.
“Do not interrupt me while I’m speaking, boy,” he snarled in a tone worthy of my damn father, carefully pushing his hair back into place with his free hand.
My chest heaved as I glared at this fucking monster and my limbs trembled from the exertion. I didn’t get enough food down here and this was why. He kept me weak so I couldn’t win against him, but all he had to do was make one mistake and I’d destroy him. I may not have had my strength, but I had something fiercer than that. A promise to Rogue written into the essence of my flesh. I’ll kill him for you, little one. I’ll speak your name just before the light goes out in his eyes.
“Anyways, you and her are not the only broken toys I’ve laid a claim on, pretty eyes. I like seeing Luther’s little Fox crack and fall apart too. And I absolutely love how Fox despises him. They think I don’t know that. Acting like they’re unified whenever they’re on the front line, but I see the way Fox looks at his daddy and I hear rumours on the wind that confirm it. That hatred makes me very happy, Chase Cohen, you know why?”
“’Cause you’re an asshole?” I guessed dryly.
“Well obviously,” he roared a laugh. “But it’s more than that. Daddy Harlequin owes me a debt, see? A blood debt.” His eyes deepened a shade as a touch of pain entered his gaze that I’d never thought he was capable of. He ran a thumb along his lower lip as he thought on his next words, a thick silence forming between us. Shawn talked his mouth off to me but I had a feeling this was crossing a line, unveiling a piece of himself that he possibly hadn’t unveiled to anyone else before. It probably meant I was a dead man, because he wouldn’t spill his secrets to me unless he was planning on making sure I could never tell them. But I was curious all the same.
“Oh yeah?” I murmured to prompt him on and that was apparently all Shawn needed to keep going.
“Luther Harlequin took someone from me who I was very fond of, and there ain’t many people in this world I’ve ever been able to say that about, pretty eyes,” he said. “Most people are only useful or not useful. For example, my daddy wasn’t a nice man, but he taught me the ways of violence when I was just a kiddie. He wasn’t good for much else, the only thing he brought to my home was screams. Mine, my brother’s and my momma’s. So when I was ten, I took his pistol and pressed it the side of his head while he was sleeping on the porch, blew his brains out and tossed the gun down beside him. When Momma came running and found me covered in blood, she thought he’d killed himself right in front of me and so did everyone else.