Grievous (Scarlet Scars #2)(67)

“I always did love that about you,” he says. “You are so strong. So persistent. It makes you so much more beautiful when you are broken.”

I pull the blanket down, away from my face, and look at him when he says that. “You’ll never break me.”

His mouth twitches as he fights off a smile.

Reaching over, he presses his palm to my cheek, his thumb rubbing the scuffed skin. It stings. His hand moves as I grimace, exploring my battered face. I tolerate his touch until his fingertips gently caress my dry lips. He leans toward me, like he expects a kiss, but I turn away, refusing him.

Grabbing my chin, he yanks my head back toward him, his grip so rough a cry escapes my throat. He says nothing, staring me in the eyes, his mouth just inches from mine. Slowly, he leans toward me again, closing the rest of the distance, his lips just barely ghosting across mine before he pulls back.

“I brought you another present,” he says quietly. “Do you want it?”

“Not if it’s a euphemism for your penis.”

He laughs when I say that, like he finds me genuinely funny, and pulls his hand away from my face. He stands up, and everything inside of me tenses, because I think that’s exactly what he means. I think he’s going to unzip his pants, that he’s going to pull it out, and I’m tired... so goddamn tired... of being just a body. A body with holes, but one without a heart and a soul, a body to be touched and fucked and tossed aside afterward.

But instead, he reaches into his pocket and retrieves his cell phone before crouching down in front of me once more.

“It is nothing that exciting,” he says as he looks through his phone to bring something up on it. “It is just a little video.”

If he expects me to be relieved by that, he’s crazier than he looks. I’ve starred in his videos before. I know how they go. And I know there are cameras down here; I know he’s recording my every move. The last thing I want is to have to relive the things he’s done to me.

“I don’t want to see it.”

He raises an eyebrow, like that actually surprises him. “You do not want your present?”

“I want nothing you’re offering,” I whisper, turning away, gripping the blanket tighter to me as some of the cold seeps in.

“If you are sure,” he says, standing back up with a shrug and turning away as he says, “I thought you would want to see your daughter, but I guess I was wrong.”

I blink a few times when those words hit me, watching as he approaches the stairs, like he’s just going to leave the basement. “You’re lying.”

He keeps walking, his steps slow, but he casually holds his phone up, pressing a button on the screen.

Instantly, I’m hit with her voice.

It’s like a baseball bat to the chest. It knocks the wind from my sails, the air out of my lungs, my heart seizing, viciously squeezing, like nothing inside of me wants to work. It hurts. Jesus Christ, it burns. Tears sting my eyes.

I can’t see her, he’s blocking the screen, but her voice sweeps through me like a wildfire. Her words are muffled from his hand over the speaker, but I can hear my name as she says it: Mommy.

So sweet, so hopeful, as she says that word. What I wouldn’t give to see her face, to have her in front of me, calling me that again.

Tears stream down my cheeks as I stifle a sob, shoving up from the floor, away from the wall, stumbling over the blanket as I clutch tightly to it. Kassian stops the video, hitting a button before pocketing the phone again, heading for the stairs to leave the basement.

“Wait,” I cry out.

He keeps going, like he doesn’t hear me.

“Stop!” I yell, rushing toward him. “Wait a second!”

I catch him just as he’s stepping out of reach, the chain choking me, making me gag as I grab the back of his coat, fisting the material.

Mistake.

Before I can even catch my breath, he whips around, snatching ahold of my arm and twisting it. I let go, crying out, as he shoves me back further into the basement, his grip tight, his face close to mine. His expression is dark, so goddamn angry, like he’s trying to skin me alive with just his eyes.

“Don’t do this, Kassian,” I whisper. “Don’t do this to her. Don’t hurt her this way.”

He curves an eyebrow. “Me?”

“She’s so young,” I say. “She doesn’t understand. You can torture me all you want… I’ll take it, all of it… but don’t do this to her. She isn’t like me. You’ll…”

“Break her?” he asks when I trail off, finishing the sentence that I couldn’t bring myself to finish. “You think I will break her?”

“Yes,” I whisper.

“I am not the one hurting her,” he says. “You are. All she wants is her mommy, and it is not my fault her mommy would rather stay here and do this than go be with her.”

I don’t say anything to that, because quite frankly, I don’t know what to say. Nothing will make a difference or matter to this man who only sees the world in black and white, who views everything with tunnel vision, an Aristov-centric viewpoint where nothing matters except what he wants, and for some godforsaken reason, what he wants is me. He wants me broken. He wants to use me as he sees fit, and he wants me to buckle and just accept it… accept that my life is not my own, that my life will never again be my own. That my story ends tragically, locked away in his tower with no one coming to rescue me and no way for me to save myself.