“And you’ll trust me?”
He nods again.
“I won’t hurt you, Mavy,” I whisper, pressing my head against his chest. “I won’t hurt you with your secrets.” I sag against him as he wraps both arms around me. “You never hurt me with mine. You’re safe, you know?” I realize I’m talking to myself, too. “We’re safe.”
He kisses the top of my head. “Yeah,” he murmurs. “And as long as you don’t run off with another man again, everyone else is safe from me, too.”
I laugh despite myself, and he does, too, some of our anger thawing.
“I’m so sorry, Ella. But I’m gonna grow the fuck up, okay? I’m gonna grow up, and I’m taking you with me, kid.”
I don’t wanna go anywhere you’re not going, even if you take me straight to hell.
“You fucked your sister?”
“Yes.”
“You regret it?”
“Obviously.”
“Would you do it again?”
He’s silent for a moment, as if he’s considering the question. Then he says, “You wanna know how fucked up I am?”
I nod, holding my breath.
“Here’s the truth: I would do it again because I needed to. I needed a distraction, and she was it.”
I look down at his hands on my bare feet, stroking the arch of my foot with his thumb.
“She was…” he trails off and I can’t look up. I don’t want to see him thinking about it. About her.
Sid. Lucifer’s wife. He slept with her. His sister. There are other things here I need to consider. Other, more important things that are far more sinister than a mistaken incest fuck, but… I think about Lucifer’s eyes on Sid. His arm wrapped possessively around her shoulder when we met at the bar. I think about him and Maverick arguing. How it gave Sid the motivation to say Fuck it, and get up and dance. I think about the circles under her eyes.
Think about what Maverick was just saying. That she’s unhappy. Just like Maverick’s mother. Just like all the women in the 6. His own sister, Brooklin, he said her name was, was kicked out of his house for sleeping with Atlas. Maverick told me he hated that she was with that man from the bar, Jeremiah Rain, who apparently runs some sort of crime syndicate.
But he thought Jeremiah might be less dangerous than the 6. Which is saying something, considering Jeremiah seemed like a complete psychopath in the few minutes I endured his company. Not only that, but he was a hot psychopath.
I let him kiss me.
And the 6… I don’t really want to think about that. I don’t really know how to wrap my head around an occult society that pulls the strings of politicians and pedophiles alike.
But none of that is really in my brain at the moment, in Maverick’s bed. In the past hour he’s explained all of this to me up here, I can’t stop thinking about him and…Sid.
“She was everything I wanted,” he admits out loud.
I tense, fisting the dark grey sheets in my hand, not moving from my spot against the pillows at my back. The sun is streaming into his room, from the wall of windows behind the couch and the small table in his bedroom, the decanter of amber liquid seeming to glow from the sun.
“And I don’t mean that I loved her,” he explains, but I know it’s not from my reaction. He sounds as if he’s articulating this for the first time. “It’s just…she was dirty.”
I look up, and finally meet his gaze. In the winter sun pouring into this room, his eyes look so light, such a pale blue they’re almost white. I can’t look away from him.
“She was dirty and wrong, and I’m dirty and wrong. I knew she’d let me do the things I wanted to do, and I wouldn’t feel guilty about it.”
“Did you hit her?” I don’t know why I ask it, and as soon as I do, my face warms, especially as his lips tilt into a smirk.
He keeps rubbing my feet and shakes his head. “No. I told you, I only did that with you.”
“Then what was it? What did you do with her?” I think about the girl in here, think about what he was going to do with her.
He stops his gentle massage on my foot, his other hand behind his head. His abs are pulled taut as he arches his neck back, stretching. And wincing. The cut I gave him has healed into a jagged red line.
I think about the wounds on his back. We haven’t gotten there yet.
He blows out a breath and meets my gaze again. “We don’t have to talk about this, Ella.”
“It’s okay,” I assure him. “After this, I’ll tell you all about the dirty things Con and I did in that Guinea pig shed—”
He pinches the bottom of my foot. “I told you not to talk about him.”
“This doesn’t seem fair.”
He rolls his eyes. “You were the one pressing the issue.”
True. I clear my throat, trying to get back on track. To move on. “So your father just…let Lucifer’s father sell Sid?”
He can’t meet my gaze as he answers, “Yeah.”
“But you’re still…one of them?” Unsaints. The 6. Strange names I don’t feel comfortable speaking yet.
His eyes turn angry as he looks up at me from his lashes. “I told you. I can’t leave. You have to understand that.”
“But Lucifer killed his father, you said—”
He laughs. “You say it so calmly, Ella. I don’t think you really understand this.” He runs his hand through his hair. “Not that I expected you would,” he mutters under his breath.
I sit up straighter, folding my arms. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”
He snorts. “Don’t be stupid, Ella. It’s hard for even me to wrap my head around, and I was born into it. You’ve known about it for a night.” He sighs, resting his head against his headboard, staring up at the ceiling. “It’s all so fucked. I don’t even know the worst of my father’s crimes.”
“The woman in the basement,” I press, “Ria.”
He closes his eyes, his hand on my foot tense.
“Where is she?”
“I wish I knew.” He furrows his brow, eyes still closed. “Actually, no. I’m glad I don’t.”
“What’s going to happen to her?” My words are quiet even though I don’t feel afraid. He’s right. This is all so…unbelievable. A cult worth billions, and this beautiful, broken boy is part of it? I guess that last part is the most believable of all of it.
His voice is hoarse when he answers me, “I don’t know.”
“And me?” I press. “What’s going to happen when this ends?”
His eyes snap open and he dips his chin to stare at me. “You’re mine.”
I shrug. “For now.”
He moves so fast I don’t have time to react when he slides me down so I’m lying on my back, pinning me in with his hands on either side of my head, his chest brushing against mine as he leans down to speak over my mouth.
“Sorry, kid,” he says, not sounding at all sorry, “you’re in this now, too. I can’t ever let you go.”
I smirk up at him. “I’m only nineteen,” I tease him, my fingers skimming the hard muscles of his shoulders. “I’m just a kid. What if I want out? I barely know you.”