Chapter 186

[ 877 words ]

Author’s POV

“The second you crossed that threshold,” Sebastian said softly, “walking out again stopped being something you decide.”

“Help! Somebody, help us!” Dorothy’s screams cracked off the walls. “They’re taking us against our will—”

He didn’t so much as blink. “Scream. I own this hotel. Every floor, every room, every soul working in it answers to me. You could scream till your throat tears open. Down here, no one hears a thing.”

“Sebastian, please.” Linda groped for the smooth Alpha she thought she’d once charmed. “We can talk about this. Whatever you think we did—”

“Talk.” His voice dropped, quiet and lethal. “Did you talk to my mate when you threw her in that van? Did you talk to her in the dark, when she was screaming your name through the door and clawing it bloody?”

Linda’s face went gray. “That woman lied to you. About everything. She played you for a fool. Why are you still standing up for—”

“So I should thank you.” This time he laughed, and it was worse than the cold. “You hunted my mate down, put a whip to her back, and I’m supposed to take that as a favor? You want me down on my knees, thanking you both?”

“You don’t have to thank us,” Linda said fast, missing the trap entirely. “Just let us go. We’ll leave the city. You’ll never see us again—”

“Oh, I’ll let you go.” He let it hang. “Not yet.”

Fynn stepped up and set a small bottle in his palm. The liquid looked like water. Sebastian raised it over Linda’s head, letting the light run through it.

“Do you know what this is?”

Her answer came out a whimper. “What… what is it?”

“See for yourself.”

He turned the label to her.

ACID.

Her knees buckled. Only the enforcers kept her off the floor. “Sebastian, no, you can’t, please, I’m begging you—”

Dorothy saw the label and every scrap of her superiority drained out of her. “Sebastian, we’ll apologize to Emilia, we’ll crawl to her on our knees, just not her face, please—hurting her won’t get you anything, the Council—”

“Every time you say her name like you’ve got a right to it,” Sebastian said, almost gentle, “you buy her another second under this bottle. Keep going.”

Dorothy’s jaw clamped shut.

“The Council,” he went on, and there was something like amusement in it now. “You want to talk pack law to me? My mate was hunted and tortured by wolves who serve your household. Under our law, that blood is mine to answer. No elder alive will question an Alpha for it.”

“Please,” Linda sobbed. “We said we’d say sorry—”

“You gave her no mercy with that whip in your hand.” His eyes glittered, flat and animal. “I’m an Alpha. I can be crueler than anything you did to her, and I won’t lose a minute of sleep over it. Did you really think I’d hold back?”

“Sebastian, my mom already said we’d apologize to my sister—” Linda tried.

“Apologies.” No laugh now. Just ice. “What you did to her doesn’t come off with words. You laid hands on my mate. In a pack, harming a Luna is harming her Alpha. You didn’t just beat a girl in a dark room. You cut me open.”

He nodded. The enforcers hauled Dorothy back from her daughter. Sebastian crouched over the case Fynn had set down and drew something out.

A whip. Leather, well-worn. Familiar.

“Is this the one?” He let it uncoil through his fingers. “Is this what you took to her back?”

“I… I didn’t… we never—”

“Don’t lie to an Alpha.” His voice sheared straight through hers. “I can smell it on you. I can hear your heart stumble. My wolf already knows what you did.” He let the whip drop full-length to the marble. “Now you learn it from the other end.”

The whip cracked across Dorothy’s back. Her scream ripped out raw, the sound of something being slaughtered. He didn’t pause. It fell again. Again.

“Mom! Mom!” Linda fought the hands pinning her, face soaked. “Stop it! Please, stop!”

After the fifth strike he lowered his arm. Dorothy lay crumpled and sobbing on the marble. He looked down at her with a face carved out of nothing.

“That,” he said quietly, “was the beginning.”

“Please,” she gasped. “No more—”

He walked past her to Linda, the bottle in his hand, then glanced back over his shoulder.

“Still playing unconscious?” Almost conversational. “Keep it up, and your daughter loses her face for good. Choose fast.”

Dorothy’s eyes snapped open. She dragged herself across the marble, back screaming, and collapsed at his feet. “I’m awake. I’m not pretending. Please, not her face, please—”

Sebastian smiled.

Then he uncapped the bottle and flung the contents straight into Linda’s face.

Her shriek was primal. Then she went limp, fainting from pure terror.

Dorothy shook so hard her teeth clattered. She couldn’t look. Couldn’t make herself see what was left of her daughter’s face.

A long moment passed before Fynn fisted a hand in her hair and wrenched her head up. “Look at what you did.”

Her eyes opened. Dread. Then confusion.

Then shock.

Linda’s face was untouched. Not a mark on it.

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