Chapter 6

6

LINCOLN

I stare down at the lifeless body bleeding out at my feet. Jarad Bristol, serial child molestor and all together low life piece of shit who I have been hunting for weeks to get him to this very position. Blood drips from my hands, face, and neck, from where I ripped him apart completely, the silencer of my gun too kind for a man like him. No, I used my meticulous knife skills to ensure the maximum amount of pain was inflicted on him, until there was nothing left of him to cut. Just like my daddy taught me. He is unrecognizable, and his name will never be said again, let alone feared by little girls, yet the only thing my mind can focus on is what Logan just said.

Boyfriend.

The word sends a jolt through me. I'm now his boyfriend, he's my boyfriend, a total and completely normal step for people who have been sleeping together for months to take, yet not once did I think we would. I'm not boyfriend material, I'm a monster, a murderer, the son of the serial killer who became one himself to protect and avenge the people he loves, but those people think that stopped when the war ended. By the time Elliot Donovan's reign was over we had all become murderers, even my playful and loyal to a fault brother, Jace. Not one of us escape d Donovan's tyranny with a clear conscience, but now it's over they don't look back.

I look at my brothers and see how happy they are now. Marcus found his way back to Elle, and Riley managed to pull Jace from the depths of his despair, and I am happy for them, I am, but I never understood it. The love they have, the bond they share with one another, I never understood how you could just give your all to someone, and trust them to give it back. Not when I saw what my parents had, what I thought happiness was, until I was old enough to know better.

Which is why I don't know why I agree with Logan when he says it. Not because I don't want him, because I do. My feelings for him grow every day despite me not planning on it, yet can I give him my all? Hell, he is interrupting me in the middle of something that no one knows about, well no one but Asher. Which is another thing, Logan and I are exclusive except when it comes to him, a thought that shouldn't be so taunting, especially when I know how he would feel if he knew where I was right now.

"Wanna jerk off over the phone to celebrate?" Logan asks, cutting into my thoughts, and a choked laugh escapes me.

There he is, my light in the dark, always knowing how to guide me, and I find myself wishing he were here. Well, not here in this run down warehouse where I have just committed another murder, but here in town, here at home, here waiting for me in my bed so I can fuck away the stress of another dark day inside of my head.

"As tempting as that is, I've got some work to finish," I reply with a laugh, silently cursing at how much blood is on me, and how hard it is going to be to get off. "Rain check?" I ask, hoping he doesn't pick up on my lie.

"You can make it up to me on Friday wh en I'm home," he tosses back, and his words ease something inside of me.

"Sounds great, I can't wait," I tell him honestly, and then add, "Call me before class tomorrow?"

"Damn, is this what I can expect now, my boyfriend making demands of me?" He jokes, and I can hear the easy smile in his attitude, and I know instantly that this is something he has wanted for a while and purposely not asked for.

Something I make note to punish him for when I next see him. "You love it when I make demands of you," I purr, cracking my neck as I almost give in to his jerking off over the phone request, despite it not even being twenty four hours since I was last inside him.

"Only when your cock is involved," he tosses back, and I groan, knowing I need to leave before this turns into something more.

"Goodbye, Lo," I force out through gritted teeth, and he laughs.

"Goodbye, boyfriend."

I hear the sound of the call disconnecting yet still I keep my phone raised for a few seconds, willing him to come back to me and I'm not even sure why. Despite the carnage I have created around me, Logan somehow always seems to ground me in a way I have never felt before, and it's slowly becoming addicting. I discard my phone back into my pocket and pull on the bloody glove I took off earlier to answer the call.

There is a lot of blood to clean up, not to mention Jarad's body to discard, so it's going to be another late night. Not that I mind, if anything the cleanup relaxes me. The whole process reminds me so much of my childhood. I've cleaned up the mess of a murder more times than I can even count anymore, and I'm not ashamed to say I can do it with ease, especially when the bodies belong to people who actually deserve the hand of fate dealt to t hem.

I make quick work of mixing up some chemicals that will erase Jarad from existence more than I already have, careful not to touch or spill them anywhere, and then I heave his body into the large container in the corner and start to pour. The smell is unlike anything you will ever experience in your life, and while his remains dissolve into nothing, I clean his blood from the floor and walls. It takes another hour for his body to completely break down, and then I just rinse him away as if he never even existed, and more importantly as if he were never here in this warehouse at all. A tried and tested method that works better than I ever imagined.

Once I'm satisfied there is no trace of him left, I head outside and strip off my clothes and throw them into a barrel to burn, standing naked in the woods, watching the flames dance under the moonlight. Then I rinse myself off with a hose, letting my body air dry as I make my way back to my SUV a couple of miles away. Most people wouldn't walk naked through the woods at night, but it's not like I am going to bump into anyone out here, so I don't really think too much about it.

By the time I make it to my car my phone reads almost 2am and exhaustion clings to me, as I reach into my trunk and pull out some clean clothes for me to throw on. Then before I know it, I am back on the road and making the drive home. As expected, when I pull up to the security gates, most of the lights in the house are off, and I check to make sure there have been no other security alerts before I let myself in.

When I enter the house only the low-level lights in the hallways and stairs are lit up, telling me that everyone is asleep, and I head straight to the kitchen to grab a drink before going to bed. I grab a bottle of water and go to cut across the main living area to the back stairs when a voice halts me.

"Late night?" Asher asks quietly, an d I turn to find him sitting alone in the dark, looking out towards the pool with an almost empty bottle of vodka in his hand.

I don't know why I'm surprised, this isn't exactly the first time he has ambushed me after one of my kills. He has been watching me like a hawk ever since he confronted me at Arthur's birthday celebration here at the house. I still don't know how he found out, but that doesn't matter now, he knows, yet he hasn't told anyone.

"I could say the same to you," I toss right back, seeing as he isn't exactly tucked up in his bed here or at his penthouse right now, and he laughs.

"Yeah, it's called insomnia, maybe you've heard of it," he drawls sarcastically, and I almost think he's drunk, or most definitely tipsy at least. One because he just made a joke, but more importantly, two, because he actually just admitted to not sleeping. I mean I'm not stupid, I find him awake almost as much as me, but he always excuses himself or disappears before daring to admit he is anything other than fine.

"I'm familiar with it," I grunt, moving slowly towards the patio doors he is looking out of, careful not to startle him as I lean and half turn myself towards him. "How long have you had it?" I ask pointlessly, expecting him to ignore me or leave entirely.

"Since I was fourteen," he replies, and I swear I feel his words like they've slapped me, because it doesn't take a genius to know the reason he stopped sleeping at fourteen.

In many ways Elle King is the center of all of us, none of us escaped the pain she went through, and I don't even like to think about the time we spent without Cassie, but it's different for him. We all know what Elle went through, what she endured and survived to get to where she is today, but what about him? What about the boy who was held down and forced to watch as his best friend was raped? Who had to discover that his father and brother w ere bigger monsters than he ever thought, and worse, he had to pretend to be one of them. Who was almost killed trying to protect his daughter and her mother, and nearly lost them both anyway. What about him? Who looks after him?

"Do you want to talk about it?" I ask gently, and for the first time his eyes collide with mine, and my heart aches in my chest. The usual piercing blue currently lacks any light, and he looks nothing like the Asher Donovan who took on his father's empire and won. Instead he just looks lost, lonely, and broken.

He doesn't say anything, and I don't either, we just silently stare at each other and bask in one another's trauma until he eventually asks, "Why do you do it?"

I don't have to ask what he means, I know instantly, and I don't know if he will understand my answer, but I give it to him anyway. "Because of him," I say truthfully. "Because every time I close my eyes I see him, and I see them, all of them, even my mother. I see their terrified eyes and their blood-stained faces. I see the cuts on their skin and the mutilation on their bodies, and it's so achingly beautiful and meticulous that his ways are ingrained in me. Because I couldn't stop my father, and because now I can't stop myself, and neither can they. Because those monsters deserve it, and because someone has to save the victims. I didn't then, but I can now."

The words fall from my lips with ease in a way he always seems to achieve, and Asher absorbs every one as if he is flipping them over in his mind, trying to work out every secret inside of me. I watch as he places the bottle of vodka on the table beside him and stumbles to his feet until he can face me completely.

"You were just a child," he says almost softly, and I know he wants to placate me, but I am long past those days.

"So were you," I snap back. "Yet still here you sit, drinking away your sorrows thinking that somehow it will help." It's a low blow , we both know it, but after the long night I've had, I'm not really in the mood for this pseudo-therapy session we have found ourselves in.

"Should I go out and kill someone instead?" He taunts back with a sarcastic smirk.

"Maybe," I shrug. "It might make you feel better." I want to add that I bet I could also make him feel better, but that's a conversation he isn't ready for. So, instead I turn towards the stairs and start to head to bed, but he follows.

"Did it make you feel better?" He calls out to my back, and I can feel his presence storming behind me as I move up the stairs.

"There are very few things in this world that make me feel good," I toss over my shoulder, stalking towards my room filled with an energy I can't even put into words.

Just as I am about to reach for my door, Ash steps right in front of me, blocking my way. "Who was it this time?" He demands, and his anger is palpable in the air between us, and I feel my cock stir to life in my jeans.

"Jarad Bristol," I sigh, seeing no reason as to why I need to hide anything anymore, given all my cards are already on the table, these ones anyway.

"Rapist?" He asks with a lethal tone.

"Child rapist," I correct, and his head falls back as he closes his eyes and curses, but my focus is on the long column of his throat as he swallows down the emotion no doubt choking him now.

I want to replace it with my hand, to cut off every thought in his head with just my touch, so much so that my fingers burn with the need. My cock is now fully hard in my pants and if he looks down he will be able to see it, and I'm not sure what I want more. To choke him with my hands or with my cock, but this stalemate between us where he pretends to hate me is becoming unbearable .

"Did you make it hurt?" He grits, and it's only then I realize he is back looking at me, and I nod, forcing myself to keep his stare.

"I always make it hurt," I tell him, and flashes of ways I could make him hurt rush to the forefront of my mind, and I swallow thickly, ignoring the raging hard-on I am sporting for him and only him right now.

"You've got blood on your neck," he pants, in a way that is so achingly attractive that I am seconds away from throwing caution to the devil himself and slamming Asher Donovan against the wall and claiming him, as Logan's words from earlier flash across my mind.

You, me, and him.

"Well unless you're going to help me clean off, Dark Prince, I suggest you get out of my way." My words aren't meant as a taunt, but I swear I see a flash of something in his eyes before he snaps out of his stupor and moves from in front of my door.

"Goodnight, Lincoln," he nods, turning towards his room, and rushing inside and slamming the door before I can even respond.

I barely make it inside my own room before my hand is fisted around the base of my cock, and I am stroking it hard and fast, groaning at the instant relief and not caring if he hears. In fact, I hope he does, I hope he listens to the sounds of what he does to me, because just his very presence drives me insane and has done so for almost two years.

I stroke faster, the flame for him inside me igniting to an out of control blaze. "Oh fuck," I curse, dropping my head back against the door, closing my eyes and imagining we are still out there together. I imagine putting him on his knees, I imagine me getting on mine for him, countless filthy scenarios of all the ways I could ruin myself in him, and all it does is make me jerk myself faste r and moan louder.

A sound crashes through the wall, and I know he hears me and it thrills me, forcing my balls to draw up in anticipation as my orgasm barrels forward. I fuck my hand without pause, tightening my fist on every upward stroke until hot blasts of cum burst from my tip, and still I don't stop until every last drop has been milked from me.

It's only then I call out, "Goodnight, Dark Prince." Which is greeted with another smash in his room, and I can't help but smirk.

He is so close to breaking and I can't wait to feel him snap.