Rogue Descendant (Nikki Glass) - By Jenna Black Page 0,108

movement, and I couldn’t suppress a scream of pain, even though the scream itself hurt just as much.

“Sorry,” Cyrus said again as he hauled my arms around behind my back and fastened what felt suspiciously like handcuffs around my wrists.

I was in no position to object to his rough treatment, and the breath-stealing pain kept me from retorting. Once my hands were bound, Cyrus sat on my legs, and I felt him pulling up the cuffs of my pants. The clinking sound of metal warned me what he was about to do, but with my hands behind my back and his weight holding me down, there was nothing I could do to stop him from shackling my ankles together.

I blinked away tears of pain and tried to breathe. When Cyrus had turned me over, I’d come to rest with my head facing the base of the stairs, giving me a disturbing view of a large pool of blood. I presumed it was Anderson’s, since as far as I knew, I wasn’t injured enough to leak that much. It was enough blood that I knew Anderson hadn’t moved himself out from under me, and that meant Cyrus wasn’t alone.

Steeling myself against yet another blast of pain, I turned my head so that I was facing the main part of the room.

Actually, calling it a “room” was a bit of an exaggeration. It was really just an unfinished, unadorned basement. The floor was ugly gray concrete, and the walls were cheap Peg-Board, like you might see in some handyman’s garage, only there were no tools on any of the pegs.

In the center of the floor was an ominous black hole, about the size of a manhole, though I didn’t think there were too many people who had manholes in their basements, and I saw no sign of a cover anywhere. Beside the hole, there was a large collection of what looked like steel girders, only they’d been cut up into little sections, maybe six or eight inches long and piled about three feet high. And beside those girders, looming over Anderson’s limp body, was Konstantin.

Having finished securing my legs, Cyrus grabbed me under my arms and pulled me into a seated position, dragging me a couple feet so my back could rest against the wall. I could tell he wasn’t actively trying to hurt me, but when you’ve got a broken rib, everything hurts. He winced in what looked like sympathy. Some of my hair was sticking to the tears on my cheeks, and Cyrus reached out to brush it away and tuck it behind my ear. I jerked away from his touch, practically knocking myself out as my head reminded me I’d been pistol-whipped about two minutes ago.

Cyrus pulled his hand away, and I saw that his fingers were wet with blood, rather than tears. “I didn’t want the wound to heal around your hair,” he said.

How considerate of him.

“Guess everything you told me on the phone this morning was a lie, huh?” I asked. I’d thought after seeing him kill Emma with such cool dispassion that I’d allowed myself to see Cyrus as he truly was, that I’d gotten over thinking he wasn’t really such a bad guy. But the stab of betrayal as my head cleared enough for me to figure out what was happening said I hadn’t quite gotten there yet.

“ ’Fraid so,” he said, sitting back on his haunches.

“Why?” I shook my head, hardly able to believe how wrong we’d all been about him, thinking him a lesser evil than Konstantin.

Cyrus glanced over his shoulder briefly, taking in the sight of his father looming over Anderson. When he turned back to me, there was an expression of grim determination in his eyes.

“Because when Anderson’s gone, Blake will have no choice but to rejoin the Olympians.”

My jaw dropped open. I hadn’t even come close to seeing that one coming.

“How I managed to raise a son with a sentimental streak, I’ll never know,” Konstantin said, and there was no missing the disdain in his voice.

“You don’t have to understand,” Cyrus said tightly without looking at his father. “You just have to stick to the deal.”

My stomach felt like it was doing the cancan, and I wasn’t sure whether it was because I was sickened by what Cyrus was doing, or if he’d actually given me a concussion when he’d hit me. Maybe both.

My head wasn’t as clear as I would have liked, and my sense of time was definitely