After Xhex reached over and opened the way to freedom, Ehlena all but bolted away from him.
As the door shut, Rehv locked it with his mind and stood there, where she had left him.
Ruined. He was utterly ruined. And not because he was turning himself and his body over to a sadistic sociopath who was going to enjoy every minute of torturing him.
When his vision clouded with red, he knew it wasn’t his bad side coming out. Not a chance. He’d pumped enough dopamine in his veins over the last twelve hours to choke a horse, because otherwise he didn’t trust himself to let Ehlena go. He’d needed to cage his bad side one last time…so he could do the right thing for the right reason.
So, no, this red wasn’t going to be followed by flat vision and sensation returning all over his body.
Rehvenge took one of the handkerchiefs his mother had ironed out of the inside of his suit jacket and pressed the folded square beneath his eyes. The bloodred tears leaching out of him were for so much more than just Ehlena and himself. Bella had lost her mother no more than forty-eight hours ago.
And she was going to lose her brother by the end of the night.
He took a single, great breath, one so deep that his ribs strained. Then he tucked the handkerchief away and got on with putting his life into its grave.
One thing was certain: The princess was going to pay. Not for the shit she’d done to him and was going to do to him. Fuck that.
No, she had dared to approach his female. For that, he would cripple her, even if it killed him.
FIFTY-FIVE
That feel good? Shutting him down like that?”
Ehlena stopped at the club’s side exit and looked over her shoulder at the female security guard. “As it is absolutely none of your business, I’m not answering the question.”
“FYI, that male has put himself in a rat-hole situation for me, his mother, and his sister. And you think you’re too good for him? Nice. Where the hell do you come from that’s so perfect?”
Ehlena faced off with the female even though it wasn’t a fair fight by a long shot, given how the security guard was built. “I never lied to him-how about that for perfect. Actually that’s not perfect, it’s normal.”
“He does what he must to survive. That is very normal, not only for your kind but for symphaths, too. Just because you’ve had it easy-”
Ehlena got up in the female’s face. “You don’t know me.”
“I don’t want to.”
“Right back at you.” The bitch in that sentence was silent.
“Yeah, okay, whoa.” Trez stepped in and separated them. “Let’s just cool out on the catfight, ’kay? Lemme take you home. You”-he pointed to the other female-“go see if he’s all right.”
The security guard glared at Ehlena. “You watch yourself.”
“Why? Because you’re going to show up at my back door? Whatever-compared to that thing last night, you’re a Barbie doll.”
Both Trez and the female went still.
“What showed up at your door?” the security guard asked.
Ehlena stared up at Trez. “May I go home now?”
“What was it?” he asked.
“A Kabuki doll with a bad attitude.”
As one, they said, “You need to move.”
“Great suggestion. Thanks.” Ehlena pushed past both of them and went to the door. When she tried the handle, of course, it was locked, so all she could do was wait to be let out again. Yeah, well, screw that. Biting down on her lower lip, she grabbed for the handle and wrenched at it, prepared to claw her way free.
Fortunately, Trez came over and sprang her like a bird from a cage, and out she flew from the club, into the cold air, away from the heat and the noise and the crowded desperation that choked her.
Or maybe the suffocation was a broken heart.
What did it matter.
She waited by another door, this one to the Bentley, wishing that she didn’t need the car to get home, knowing it was going to be a long while before she was even halfway settled enough to breathe right, much less dematerialize.
On the trip back, she could remember none of the streets they passed or the lights they stopped at or the other cars around them. She just sat in the backseat of the Bentley, all but inanimate, her face turned to the window, her eyes seeing nothing as she was spirited away.
Symphath. Sleeping with his half sister. Pimp. Drug dealer. Killer, no doubt…
As they went farther and farther away from downtown, she had more difficulty breathing instead of less. The stinger was that she couldn’t lose the image of Rehvenge kneeling before her, her cheap Keds in his hand, his amethyst eyes so soft and kind, his voice so lovely it was better than the music of a violin. Don’t you get it, Ehlena? No matter what you wear…to me, you will always have diamonds on the soles of your shoes.