Bastard's Bride (Loftry University Playthings 4)

CHAPTER1

Luke

Anger flits through my gut as I sit in the bedroom of my new house. It’s lush, I’ll give it that, but everything is too clean, too pristine. Nothing about this space looks lived-in. Granted, it’s not the sterile white cage they had me in before. I can move here, breathe here.

Glancing about, I eye the bed and opt to lay back down and stare at the ceiling. When John took me out of that dorm room, I thought I would have the initiation right then. I had no clue they would sit me down with a shrink and have him interrogate me.

It wasn’t right. He had no business knowing about my personal life. And the things he asked me? They were far too invasive to just be small talk. No. He was looking for something. What it was, I’ll never know. Nothing I said satisfied him.

When I was calm, nothing. When I allowed my anger out, then he took notice. What did the quack want me to do? Did he want me to regale him with the fact that I was abandoned as a kid, put into foster care, and then found my way into the clutches of a madman?

Violent images pass before me as I close my eyes and take a deep breath. Fragmented memories that I shoved into the darkest recesses of my soul that should have never seen the light of day. I can feel them like phantom touches as they brush over my body.

It’s the sensation of hands, his hands, as they stroke my body, demanding a reaction. The first time he touched me, I thought it was a fluke. It was an accident. But then, it became so much more than that. His insistent words still echo in my brain, right alongside the visceral memories of his hands fumbling for my belt.

The memory of his smile as he forced my head down, shoving his cock down my throat. It was a first for me. Until that time, I had only touched girls in secret; at least once they didn’t have cooties. Their hands were so soft as they caressed my face, so unlike the rough handling from Ryker.

It was a shock to the system. That first time he shoved my face down there, filling my nose with the musky, dank scent of sweaty balls and his aggression. I didn’t want to do it. I had no desire to touch, never mind place my mouth on, another guy's dick. That just wasn’t what I was into. But Ryker didn’t care. He pried my mouth open, ignoring my struggling as he shoved himself in.

He told me I’d never be good enough to take all of it. He taunted me, humiliated me, and gave me scores on how poorly I did. But there’s something to be said about hard work and training. Eventually, I didn’t even gag. He slid right in and sighed as the heat of my mouth encompassed his thick cock.

I never did get a score of ten out of ten, however. Granted, I never even wanted to be in the position of getting a one out of ten either. However, the higher the score, the better things went for me. If he was actually pleased with my performance, I got a respite from the pain.

I never wanted it. I never wanted him, but it was far better to be willing to please him than to take the bite of his fist or the buckle of his belt. I learned that early on. It was the most valuable lesson he taught me.

I skim my hands down my body, shuddering as the pain breaks through my resolve - old wounds that never healed. Oh, sure, they’d find nothing wrong with me on x-rays or ultrasounds, but that doesn’t mean that the wounds aren’t still there. I can still point out every mark that was left on me.

Some are visible scars, but most are mental, a phantom pain that wakes me up in the middle of the night or a breath of a memory as my muscles seize up. I run my hand along my arm, feeling the pockmarks of cigarette burns, so faint that you have to look closely or touch them.

Next are my chest and abs. My muscles ripple under my touch as the pain comes flooding back. There are no visible marks here, but there don’t have to be. I remember every blow, the smack of the phonebook against my skin as he slammed it against me and held it firmly to my body.

He punched the book over and over, and each blow surged deep inside me, jarring me, ripping through me until I was breathless and sobbing. I never bruised, however. I thought I would, but they never showed up.

Apparently, it was a trick he learned somewhere. The thick phonebook absorbed the force he applied to me, keeping it from leaving a mark. But I still carry the invisible bruises. It catches my breath on occasion when I move just wrong. My muscles will lock up on me out of the blue, reminding me of what happened.

I shoved all those things out, forcing them into an inaccessible part of my mind, but the damned shrink pulled them back out. He made me relive things, remember things, things I couldn’t tell him. It was bad enough to go through it, but my secret shame wouldn’t be my undoing. No matter what, that shrink would never know.

Reaching down between my thighs, I grip my cock through my pants. It presses up against the zipper, and I long to just unzip and whack off. As disgusting as those memories are, it’s almost like my body still responds. No matter what, I can’t escape the training that forces me to be hard when I’d rather just run away.

The pressure continues to build in my body, needing an outlet, but I refuse to give in right now. I don’t know when they’re coming back, and I don’t want to be caught with my pants down in any sense of the word. The damned shrink already exposed me enough.

No doubt he’s already told them about me, revealing every salacious detail he could pull out of me. I wonder what he would have told them if I admitted that I longed for Ryker’s cock?

When he was fucking me, he wasn’t hurting me. For him to actually slide his dick into any available orifice meant that he wasn’t beating me. I had done well. According to him, I had earned the right to be his receptacle.

Just the memory of his touch is enough to still get me hard, and it disgusts me. It twists in my gut like a living thing, flopping about until I’m about to hurl. It’s only one fraction of the rage that simmers just below the surface.

Ryker was the lowest common denominator, an evil monster of a man that preyed on the young and innocent, robbing them of their childhoods. The only regret I had when it came to his death was that I didn’t do it myself. I wasn’t strong enough.

The bastard wrapped me around his fucking finger in a way that I couldn’t escape. I wanted to. God. How many times did I dream of taking him out? There were so many ways. I wanted to bathe in his blood, to smear it over every place he touched, to remind myself that he was no longer in control of me.

Honestly, the best way would have been to hold him over the tub and slit his throat, draining him dry. Then, I could have slid beneath the vermillion. I would have closed my eyes, held my breath, and dipped down below, letting it cover me. And if it wasn’t enough blood, I’d mix it with the bathwater.

Hell, it would still be the same principle. Red tinges my vision as my darkest desires come floating to the surface. Many thought I did his dirty work because I wanted to. But nothing could be further from the truth. Being beholden to that psychopath made me do things I detested.

The one good thing was getting rid of Finn’s parents. Ryker was almost tender that night. Granted, it hurt every time his dick slid up my ass, but this time, he actually used lube. He rubbed me afterward and told me I did a good job. And dammit, I did. Killing them was a rush I’d never forget.

It was a low blow to the Kings, a hit, a palpable hit, as Shakespeare would say. And Finn and Junior? Just one more way to hit at the stupid Raven society. Anything that brought them down was worth it. Ryker didn’t even have to be nice to me afterward. That one was all for me. The terror on their faces mimicked my own when Ryker got his hands on me, and it felt nice being in power for once.

Still…. My stomach churns just a little when I think about what Ryker probably did to them. There’s no way he didn’t put them through the same hellacious ordeal as he did me. The fact that no one even thought about rescuing me yet searched the world over for those two…. It just wasn’t fair.

What made Finn and Junior so special that people actually cared about what happened to them and not to me. By turning them over, it was my way of taking power over the situation. I hurt them because I hurt. And yet, even when Ryker gave me his signature, “I’m proud of you, boy,” smile, it didn’t ease the guilt that ricocheted through my brain. It still doesn’t.

The only thing that actually makes it lessen is that they were rescued. They got out. No doubt they probably don’t even remember half of what went on. But I remember. I can trace every single memory on my body as if it was tattooed on me in a special ink that only I could see. My main goal was to bring down the Ravens. Finn and Junior just happened to be collateral damage that I used to ease my own ravaged soul.

How ironic it is that I did everything in my power to help bring down the Order of Ravens and Wolves, and yet, here I am, about to go through my own initiation to join a damned secret society. It was sickening. I wanted nothing to do with this school or their protection. I could protect myself.

The moment Micha ever tries to come after me will be the last day he lives. I don’t care if I die in the process; he will go down with me, and with it, all the other sycophants of his goddamn society will crumble. An organization is only as good as its head, and Micha is an asshole that thinks he knows how to control people.