Home > Sancte Diaboli : Part One (Elite King's Club #6)(2)

Sancte Diaboli : Part One (Elite King's Club #6)(2)
Author: Amo Jones

I nodded. “Understood.”

I didn’t ask why they were here. I didn’t ask any of the questions that, right here and now, I should have asked.

 

 

Present

Saint

 

The day I came into the Vitiosis family burned my brain like a hot iron. His touch. The iciness of his grip around my hand. He led and I followed. He spoke and I listened. I think over the years, I confidently became the girl I am today because I had him beside me. Not always physically, but spiritually. There was an invisible bond that knitted our souls together from the moment he took my hand. I think he hated it.

I hear voices downstairs. None of them familiar. Brantley doesn’t have visitors often. At least he hasn’t for a while. The manor is always noisy, but it’s not from the people who live here, more from the ghosts of those who have left.

I flex my fingers around Medusa as she wraps her sleek black tail around my arm. Medusa was the first pet Brantley bought me when I was ten years old. I came upstairs to my room after my English session with my tutor and she was already set up in her enclosure. Brantley was leaning over the glass, stroking her back. “What do you want to name her?” he had asked, never looking up at me. I took the steps toward him, wrapping my fingers around the edge of the glass.

“You can name her,” I said, chewing on my lip nervously. Not that he made me nervous, because he didn’t.

His eyes came to mine at the exact moment thunder cracked outside my window. “I named you, Saint. You can name the snake.” Rain slapped the glass of my patio doors, but I was too focused on naming my new pet to appreciate the rain like I usually do. I liked anything dramatic and sullen.

“Hmmm.” I studied the curves of Brantley’s features. He had grown a lot over the past couple of years, aging into his new body gracefully. He was fourteen but looked more like sixteen. Lucan always had him busy doing family business things. I never knew what that was because I was never allowed out of this house unless accompanied by Brantley and only Brantley. Never a guard, just Brantley. He hid me, too. Never let me come out of my bedroom when his friends would come over. I didn’t mind.

“Medusa,” I said, smiling.

“You studying Greek mythology or some shit?” he asked, his thick brows curving inward.

I nodded, peeking into the glass. “Yeah, that’s why.”

I didn’t want to tell him that it was because he also reminded me of one of the Greek statues. Cold, pale, and lifeless.

 

I bring Medusa up to my face, searching her tiny beady eyes. She’s a little weird and always wants to eat. If I go too long without feeding her, she will try to eat me, and if that doesn’t work, she’ll try to eat herself.

So dramatic.

She’s my best friend. Well, she and Kore.

“Should I go down this time?” I whisper. I was highly disappointed when I found out Parcel Tongue was, in fact, not a legitimate language. I watch Medusa closely, as if waiting for her to answer while remaining far enough away from my face so she doesn’t snap at my cheek.

Standing from my bed, I move across the room and put her back inside her enclosure. “You just ate. Stop being greedy.” Her silky body slides over my arm as she slithers her way onto one of the small branches. I designed the inside of it just like this home. There’s a small mansion that’s made of steel which sits in the middle. The design is actually the house from The Addams Family. I just thought it looked similar to the manor and bought it off Etsy.

I turn and lean against the enclosure, finding Kore curled up on my bed, sound asleep with Hades beside her. Hades is Brantley’s dog and Kore is mine. Both Dobermans usually sleep outside my door, but when people are over, they’re in my bedroom. My white bedding will have black fur sprinkled over it in no time. Should I go down? I make my way to the mirror that’s built into the door of my closet. I could go. Brantley would probably get upset, but it’s nothing I can’t handle. A big part of me used to wonder why he never let me meet his friends, but then I remember this was Brantley. He still to this day controlled my every movement.

And I owe him.

I owe him so much.

I take in my appearance.

Yellow sundress with thin spaghetti straps. Not too loose, but fitted enough to show the curve of my hips. My hair falls over my shoulders in sleek waves, like an avalanche spilling over mountains, while my face appears far too pale for the heat that’s rushing around inside of me. I reach forward and touch the mirror. “Screw it.”

Picking up my white Converse shoes, I slip them on and make my way to my bedroom door. My fingers flex over the knob as Kore and Hades stir on the bed.

They know I shouldn’t be doing this as much as I know I shouldn’t be doing this.

I pull the door open and step outside, walking toward the first staircase which then leads to the main one. I pace myself as I make my way down, my eyes fixed on the floor and my fingers grazing over the aged wooden rails.

Silence cuts through the chatter and I know I’ve been spotted.

I bring my eyes up to face everyone. “Hi. I’m Saint.”

They look around at each other; some confused, others not so much. There has to be around ten people in here, along with a couple of adults.

“Ahh, I think this is our cue to leave,” an older man says. His hair is slicked back, with a spray of salt and pepper strands that cling to shaved sides. Tattoos crawl all over his hands and neck—so many tattoos. He takes the hand of the woman next to him and slowly escorts her out of the room. Just before they round the corner, they both cast a tight smile toward me. Pinched lips and droopy eyes. Strange. Yet both oddly attractive.

“What the fuck are you doing down here?” Brantley growls, taking the first few steps toward me all while snapping the awkward silence that clings in the air with an iron fist.

“Bran Bran!” A girl, the same one I saw in the gym not too long ago, interrupts him, her long pink hair tucked behind her ears. “It’s time.”

She knew about me? My cheeks heat. In fact, none of them seem really surprised to see me.

“She’s right,” another voice says, this time a male. I find him perched in one of the chairs, a foot pressed against the coffee table. He, like the older man, has some spraying of tattoos over his arm and neck, though not a lot. Not as much as the other guys who are in here with them. One even has them on his face. “You can’t hide her in this house anymore. She’s part of this and you know it.”

“Part of what?” I muse. My English is fluent, but the end of some syllables still has my tongue slipping and struggling around. I was told I had a speech impediment from a young age, though that has long since left the building. Now Brantley probably wishes he could get me to shut up.

Brantley moves away from me and heads toward the alcohol cabinet. His long fingers wrap around an aged bottle of whiskey as he slams it closed again and spins back around to face me. I can feel the heat radiating off of him in waves, with a tide that’s directed at yours truly. I find his gaze instantly, offering a small smile. I’ll be fine, it says. I’m going to kill you, his replies. We both know it’s not true. He tolerates me like one would a pet. He keeps me close because he thinks he has a responsibility to take care of me, but I’ve grown to know the truth. I’ve always been a pest to him, nothing more and nothing less. Me coming down here was hopefully the first step to me gaining some sort of separation from him, to remind him that he isn’t stuck with me. Or at the very least, he doesn’t have to be. I owe him my life, but he doesn’t need to be in it forever.

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