CHAPTER 6: The Monster Unmasked

DAMIAN

BANG.

The gunshot cracked through the room like thunder.

Isa flinched hard.

Like the sound hit her bones.

She didn’t scream she staggered, eyes wide, mouth parted, her breath gone.

Disappointing.

I had hoped she’d do it. I wanted to watch the innocence die in her eyes, watch her become one of us.

But not yet.

She still clings to the illusion of mercy.

That’s fine.

Breaking her will be a far more exquisite process.

I looked down at the corpse another loose end from Vincent’s camp.

“Clean it up,” I said.

Richard moved instantly.

Isa didn’t.

She just stood there, staring at the blood painting the floor. Her hands trembled. Her chest rose too fast, too shallow. Panic dressed her like a second skin.

She was unraveling.

And she was beautiful like that.

Her skin was pale, her lip trembling. Blood had speckled her jaw like some kind of violent artwork. She looked like something sacred ruined.

Perfect.

I pulled off my shirt, wet with blood. Her eyes flicked to my chest and then away.

Too late.

I caught it.

Desire.

Shame.

Fear.

All the right ingredients.

I stepped toward her.

“You like what you see?” I asked, voice low and sharp.

She flinched.

The cruelty surprised her. Good.

She still hadn’t figured it out I wasn’t playing by the same rules anymore.

I grabbed her wrist. She gasped as I pulled her hand toward me.

“Feel that?” I pressed her palm against the hardness in my pants. “That’s what you do to me.”

She ripped her hand away like she’d touched fire.

But I’d seen enough.

> Her reaction wasn’t just fear.

It was confusion.

War.

Need.

Exactly what I wanted.

She backed into the wall, chest heaving.

Still thinking she can run.

---

ISABELLA

My scream caught in my throat.

The body was still warm. The blood still moving slow and thick pooling like it had somewhere to be. The metallic scent wrapped around me. I pressed my hand to the wall to stay upright.

Then I looked at him.

I shouldn’t have.

Damian stood in the center like a storm in the eye of its own destruction. He peeled off his blood-streaked shirt, calm and deliberate.

His chest was sculpted, tattooed, slick with violence.

I couldn’t look away fast enough.

He saw it.

He always sees it.

“You like what you see?” he said, voice curling like smoke.

I didn’t answer.

He didn’t wait.

He grabbed my wrist and shoved my hand to the hard bulge beneath his pants. My body froze.

It wasn’t arousal.

It was shock.

It was horror.

It was him.

I yanked my hand back like I’d been burned, my spine pressed flat against the wall.

But he only smiled.

He pulled a white handkerchief from his back pocket clean, absurdly clean and wiped a smear of blood from my cheek. Like he was claiming me.

“You better get used to this,” he murmured. “Because this is only the beginning.”

My stomach twisted.

Then he turned, like the conversation was over.

“Richard,” he said.

The door opened. Richard entered, jaw locked.

“Take her to the estate,” Damian said. “She’s moving in.”

My heart dropped.

“No…” I whispered.

He wasn’t finished.

“I want her in blood-red silk. Thong only. No bra. Diamond choker. Six-inch heels. Hair slicked back. Red lips.”

My skin crawled.

I didn’t answer. I couldn’t.

He leaned in one last time, his voice like a hook sliding into my ear.

“Don’t be late. I hate waiting.”

Then he was gone just like that.

His footsteps faded, but the echo of his voice stayed.

I stood there, frozen.

Not from fear.

From the weight of what I’d just seen.

The man who once held my hand in secret?

Gone.

All that was left was a monster in human skin

And he had my name on his leash.