8. Quentin

It'shard to breathe in here. Seeing Vogue half naked in some pillock's flat after we've had to track her down because she escaped through the fucking window like some kind of a cat burglar, I'm running on a potent cocktail of adrenaline and pure fucking fury.

The van is crammed with tension, and every jolt of the wheels against the road reminds me that we're far from okay. Vogue's plea hangs in the air, raw and ragged, tearing at something in my chest.

"Stop the car," she begs again.

But Cal's having none of it.

"We're almost home," he says instead with finality in his voice.

Home. Funny how that word doesn't seem to fit anymore. Not when there's a dead man's blood on Vogue's hands. Not when secrets are clawing their way out of the dark like monsters under the bed.

Vogue's barely holding herself together. She trembles and has frayed nerves, and her eyes are hollowed out from fear or maybe disgust—at herself or us, I can't quite tell.

I watch her from my corner, feeling like my heart's being squeezed in a vice. It's not just the blood on her hands – it's what's behind her eyes. A hurt that's old and deep, something that makes me want to reach out even when everything inside screams to keep my distance.

"Please," she whimpers. "This isn't what it looks like."

"No?" I grit out. "Because it looks a lot like you sneaking out to go and fuck some skeevy guy behind our backs."

"No!" she says, finally meeting my gaze. "That's not what happened. He was trying to blackmail me!"

"So, you thought fucking him would make that go away?" Thayer's voice is like ice.

"No!" she roars, grabbing his shirt in her fist.

He glares at it and unpeels her hand from him. She chokes back a sob as he rejects her, and it makes my anger flee like she did out the window.

My heart is a dead weight, throbbing painfully against my ribs. I inhale deeply, trying to find the words, any fucking words that will undo this mess. But the truth is ugly and twisted, and it's got its claws deep in my guts.

"We need to let her talk. Do you really think she'd risk everything we have for a quick fuck with some scumbag?" I ask Thayer.

"It doesn't matter what I think," Thayer snaps, his jaw clenched so hard I can see the muscle twitching.

Cal's hand drops from the steering wheel, scuffing through his hair in frustration. He pulls over to the side of the road, earning himself a blast of the horn from the car behind us.

Whatever this is, we have to protect her.

"Let her speak," I say firmly after what feels like an eternity, my voice slicing through the tension. "We need to hear her side."

Vogue sucks in a breath like she's been underwater and just surfaced. "I didn't want you to find out this way," she begins haltingly, tears choking her words as they spill out between sobs. "I did what I had to do back in Westfield to survive. I s-s-sold myself for money to help pay rent and eat. I hated it, but it was quick money and didn't take away from my studies. I'm sorry. I don't blame any of you if you don't want to touch me or even look at me again."

My heart feels like she has gripped it in her fist and is squeezing tighter with each second that passes. My hurt for her, that she reached such a low point in her life that she felt this was the only way out and my fury at the fucker who tried to drag her back into that life. It's all fusing together until I can't tell one emotion from the other.

"Christ, Vogue," Thayer murmurs, and there's something like defeat in his voice. "Why didn't you tell us before?"

"Because I was ashamed!" she spits out the word like it burns her tongue. "I didn't want you to see me as that person. As a whore." The last word is whispered, but it echoes in the van like a gunshot.

When he turns to her, Cal's face is stone, and his eyes are ice cold.

"You think we'd care about that?" he says finally, voice rough. "You think we don't have our own shit buried in the closet?"

I nod in agreement, feeling my own secrets clawing at me from the inside. This isn't just Vogue's confession; it's a mirror held up to each of our lives.

Harry's hand reaches out to hers, hesitant at first but then gripping firmly. "You have nothing to be ashamed about. Not with us."

Vogue looks up at Harry with wet eyes and then over to each of us in turn. Maybe she's searching for a sign of disgust or rejection. But she won't find it. Not here.

"So why in the fuck did we find you with your tits out in his flat?" Thayer is not so easy to forgive.

I clench my teeth, feeling my own anger bubbling beneath the surface. It's not aimed at her but at the whole fucked-up situation.

"Because he was going to expose me. He had videos of me, and he was blackmailing me. I've got too much to lose. I didn't think you would want me if you knew all of this. I had to protect what we have."

Thayer's eyes narrow as he processes this, his anger now given a new direction.

"So, you went to this flat to kill him?" Harry's voice isn't just cold—it's arctic. "We'd have done that for you, Vogue. If you'd trusted us."

"I'm sorry," she bleats.

Cal turns around and sets off again,

We ride in silence back to Crestmont, each lost in our thoughts. The campus looms before us, pristine and oblivious to the darkness we're bringing home.

As we pull up outside the building, Vogue finally speaks again, her voice small but firm. "Thank you for not leaving me there... for giving me a chance to explain."

I take her hand and drop a kiss on her knuckles. "Always, Vogue."

"How did you find me?" she mumbles.

Thayer holds up the knife. "Tracker."

She closes her eyes, her face scrunched up as if she is trying to hold onto her temper, but she brought it on herself, and the punishment for this isn't going to go unmet. "I see," she says eventually.

"I told you never to run out again," Callum says coldly. "This is becoming a pattern."

"For a good reason," she argues.

"Yeah, well…" He trails off as he opens the van door, slamming it shut behind him. We all follow in silence as we head back up to the penthouse.

Once inside, Cal locks the door and turns to her. "Tie her up."

I nod and grab a zip tie from my pants pocket, grabbing her wrists in front of her and locking them together.

"What the fuck?" she growls.

"This is a punishment to make sure that you never run out again, for a good reason, a bad reason, or because you want to escape from us. You are never leaving here alone again, whether you mean to or not."

Vogue's eyes widen as she looks at me. "What does that mean?"

I ignore her and cross over to the case that Thayer brings into the living room. He holds it up as I open it and pull out the mircochipper, before turning back to her.

"No," she says, backing up, shaking her head. "No!"

"Yes," I grit out, approaching her.

"Get the fuck away from me!" she screams, but Harry and Thayer are already on her, holding her steady as I press the tip of the microchipper to the soft skin at the nape of her neck. Her body goes rigid, defiance sparking in her eyes even as tears stream down her cheeks.

The device beeps once, and it's done. Vogue doesn't say another word, just stands there trembling from anger or fear, maybe both. I toss the microchipper back into the case with a clatter that feels too loud in the silence.

"You've got to understand why we're doing this," I start, trying to find some ground where we can stand together again. But Vogue's having none of it.

"Understand?" she spits, glaring at us with betrayal etched into every feature. "You think tagging me like I'm some fucking animal is something I can just accept?"

"We're protecting you," Cal interjects, his voice a low growl that doesn't quite hide his fear of thinking we'd lost her in more ways than one.

"By taking away my choice?" She yanks at the zip tie, futilely trying to free herself. "By treating me like I'm your fucking property!"

"We need to know you're safe," Harry tries to reason, stepping forward. Vogue recoils as if he's struck her.

"Fuck you," she hisses.

I reach out and grip her by the throat, slamming her up against the wall behind her, hard enough to rattle her teeth. "This is your punishment. Your penance. Be a good girl, and we will remove it. Until then, you will always be where we can find you."

"You're a fucking dick," she hisses, "all of you!"

"You're going to take my dick and suck on it now, like the good little kitty you are, and it might knock a week or two off your sentence."

She meets my eyes furiously as I push her to her knees.

I know I should feel guilty for enjoying the way she looks at me, fury mingling with resignation. A lesser man might waver under that gaze, question his methods, but I'm not a lesser man.

Vogue doesn't say anything else. She's smart enough to know when she's outmanoeuvred. Instead, she opens her mouth when I press my cock to her lips and takes me in, her eyes never leaving mine. It's a battle of wills in the most fucked-up way possible.

Her tongue is warm and skilled, her teeth grazing my length defiantly. I chuckle and pull my knife out, holding it against her throat. "Try it and find out."

Her anger ignites, but she draws her teeth back.

But the sight of her on her knees reminds me of everything we've been through—how far she's come from dirt poor in Westfield to this decadent room where power plays are as natural as breathing. I groan, threading my fingers through her hair and guiding her movements.

Thayer watches us with darkened eyes. "You still think you're in control here, Vogue?"

She doesn't answer with my cock stuffed in her mouth.

Harry moves in behind her with a pair of sharp scissors and starts to cut her clothes away, bit by bit, as she sucks my cock, my knife held to her throat, chipped like a pet.

When she is naked in front of me, I pull back. It's taken every ounce of control not to shoot my load down her throat.

"Get her on her feet," I murmur.

Harry hauls her up, not being gentle about it. She stifles her indignation, making me fall even more in love with her.

"Do you love me?" I murmur, cupping her face tightly, towering over her.

"In your dreams," she spits out.

"Wrong answer, kitty." I shove her back to the couch. "Open your legs for me."

"No."

"Do you want me to gag you?"

With fire in her soul, she does as I asked, and I grip my cock tightly, tugging on it as she watches. I can see she wants me. If she truly didn't, I would walk away. We all would. But she can't help herself around us, just as we can't around her.

"You're going to take my cock now, kitty. I'm going to use you like the whore you used to be, and I'm going to dump my cum in you before my brother takes you the same way and then my friends."

She whimpers, her bottom lip trembling.

"But you know what the difference is?" I murmur as I position my cock at her cunt. "I love you. I don't give a flying fuck about your past, who you fucked, how many you fucked or how many videos there are of you out there. You're mine. Ours. We worship you, and you took that for granted, so we are going to use you before we love you again. Do you understand what I'm saying to you?"

"Yes," she whispers.

Her admission is a razor blade—sharp but somehow relieving. There's grace in her submission, a sick sort of symmetry to the chaos we now inhabit.

I slide into her, her wet cunt a reminder that despite the roughness and the pain, there's a connection between us that can't be severed by force or fear. "Good kitty," I grunt as I start to move, thrust after thrust, reminding her who she belongs to.

Cal watches with a predatory stillness. "Are you sure she gets it, Quen?" His voice is deceptively calm, but there's an edge to it that suggests he'd jump in at a moment's notice if I faltered.

"She gets it," I reply without looking at him. My focus is on Vogue, on reasserting the twisted dynamic we've built amidst chaos and carnage.

Her eyes are glassy with tears that don't fall—pride or fear, who fucking knows anymore? But her body betrays her; it arches into mine despite how fucked up this all is.

Having been worked up by her hot, dirty mouth, I come quickly, unloading into her pussy with an orgasm that won't quit.

Pulling out, Cal replaces me. There's no gentleness when he settles between Vogue's thighs. There's only ownership—an unspoken claim that we all know rests on dangerous ground. We tread the line between possession and obsession, the latter always threatening to swallow us whole.

We're not gentle with her. This isn't about love—not in this moment. It's about penance—hers for straying too close to the fire and getting burned, ours for letting her get close enough to need saving in the first place.

Cal fucks her hard, fast. It's over within minutes. He grunts loudly, his cum mingling with mine deep inside our girl. Harry takes his place, quickly thrusting his cock into her, taking what he needs from her as we watch this degradation of Vogue Jameson. He doesn't last much longer than Cal or I did. When he's finished with her, he steps back, and Thayer moves into place. He is still raw from all of this, from seeing her in that flat. He lifts her up and turns her around, forcing her to her hands and knees on the couch. He slaps her ass hard, and she cries out.

"Never do that again, baby girl," he almost purrs, and it stirs my cock back into action.

Good, because this is far from over.