Tragic Beauty (Beauty & The Darkness #1)(74)

I close my eyes, knowing this is it. This is my moment. I lick my lips and start with the one place I know to start. I form the words and say the one thing I haven’t said. “I’m sorry,” I say. “I’m sorry I broke my word.”

He stops, in front of me now, the Cat hanging on my shoulders. “It’s a little late for that, Ava.” His voice is low, dark.

I swallow and push forward. “I’m sorry I hurt you.”

“Shut up! Shut up, Ava! I don’t want to hear it!”

The Cat is gone, but I know it will return. I breathe, I center, I keep myself soft. I hear the hiss, hear its howl, and feel the claws sink into my back. The pain. So much pain. I gasp. I welcome it. Let it spread.

Then I keep going, the words coming easier. “I’m sorry for all you suffered.”

I expect another strike, but instead he grabs me by my hair and flings me up against the wall, then his grip is around my neck, choking me.

Calm. Keep pulse low. Conserve oxygen.

I’m not supposed to look at him, but I do. I see dark circles under black eyes. I see black hair falling over a broken face. I see rage. I see pain. I see a beast so lost, he has no idea where to go.

I reach out with my good hand and touch his sunken cheek. His grip tightens and the air thins.

Shayne wants to soften, I can see it, but he can’t. The beast won’t let him.

“Don’t look at me!” he yells.

He strikes my face and then I’m flying. Flying across the room where I land in a heap on the concrete. My hand screams, but I ignore it. He’s coming for me. I hear him. Feel him. Feel his grip.

He drags me by my hair to my feet and jerks my arms up to the shackles that hang from the chain. He’s breathing so hard and so angry when he binds me and cranks the chain up until my feet leave the ground. “This won’t save him. It won’t save him, Ava!”

My heart explodes.

Gavin’s alive!

He’s alive!

A renewed strength builds inside me, easing the fear and greasing the flow of words.

“I’m not doing it to save him,” I say. “I’m doing it to save you.”

“Liar! You’re a fucking liar!!” He strikes my face again and I taste blood.

I swallow it down and gather more words, knowing if there’s ever a time I need to use them, it’s now. They’re all I have. “I can’t save him, I know that. He’s at your mercy, not mine. But I can save you, Shayne. If you’ll let me.” I use his name, even though I’m not supposed to, hoping to reach the man trapped within the beast.

“Don’t call me that!” he shouts. “I told you! You don’t get to call me that!”

He storms off, grabs the Cat off the floor and disappears behind me.

Breathe.

Focus.

The Cat howls and its claws are on my back again, this time ripping me open. The pain forces a scream from my lungs, but it’s okay. I know pain. I know it intimately. I hear the hiss and feel the claws again, and again, and again, all along my back, my hips, my bottom, my thighs. So hard, so brutal, my control starts to slip. So much pain. Too much pain. More than I can manage. He’s on my front now, tearing me open. My breasts, my stomach, my legs, my arms. Tears break and gush down my face. Tears of joy for the man who still lives, and tears of sorrow for the man in front of me.

He drops the Cat, and his hands are on me, smearing my blood all over, like a mad painter at his canvas. It stings and burns, but I let the pain seep, let it soak in while he groans and strokes himself to the sight of me. He moves to my back and enters me in that place. His place. He does it violently, because he has to.

I scream at first, because I tear. But I clench my teeth, focus, dig for pleasure amid the pain. It takes a bit, but I find it. In his thrusts. In his need.

“It’s okay,” I say. “I forgive you.”

His roar shatters my ears and his flesh becomes his weapon, stabbing me with such vicious thrusts I think my insides will break. The blood slithers between my back and his chest while I throw my head back in surrender, resting it against the beast while he rages. I groan, feeling the pleasure rise all its own, even though that’s not what he wants for me. That’s not his intention. He wants only pain for me now, but I take the pleasure anyway. Because that’s what he’s taught me. Pain and pleasure are one. He grows angrier, but can’t help himself, and his fingers surge between my legs, brutally circling me, taking me to that place. Teeth tear open my neck. More blood slithers. So violent, the devouring. When he comes, I come with him.

And then it’s there. That peace. That eye of the hurricane. I hang there, his heart pounding against my back, his heavy breaths like fire along my skin. He buries his head in my neck, and wraps his arms around me, hugging me.

“Ava,” he whimpers.

His body begins to shake. I don’t understand, don’t know what’s happening, until I realize—he’s crying.

“Shayne. It’s okay. I’ll help you. Let me help you.”

“You should’ve killed me,” he weeps. “You should’ve killed me, Ava.”

I think maybe I’ve broken through to him, but he growls and wrenches himself away from me. He’s behind me, pacing back and forth, muttering to himself, words I can’t make out.

“Shayne?”