The Bloodlust Alpha

27|| disrespect

But this?

Goddess.

This is entirely different.

The others before were tasteless. Unimportant to a fault. It was simply professional. Business. No real driving emotion or motivation other than extracting information and getting the details I needed. It was a necessity than it was indulgence.

This however, was personal.

And because it was personal, there was a little bit of indulgence.

I walked over to where I'd been heating up silver. The metal lighting up from dull gray into bright orange as I watched flames lick onto the blades. It would hurt. I knew it would. Silver by itself was pain unlike no other, but heated?

That was inhumane.

"If I didn't need you to speak, I would've cut that tongue of yours by now."

I walk around him, curling around his seated figure, dragging the tip of the scorching hot silver blade across his chest and around his back. I didn't press hard enough to cut too deep, but it was enough to draw blood.

The line I traced cutting into his flesh had blood gathering together in small clumps. It rolled down his skin slowly, almost excruciatingly slow.

It was sort of fascinating in a way.

Red painted his pale flesh. Bruises and marks scattered across his abdomen from the beating he took from the paddle. Stringing him up to the ceiling by his wrist as Isaac and Emerson took turns beating their fists into his sides with brass knuckles had weakened him more.

The already broken ribs breaking more.

Bone shattered.

He had slipped in and out of consciousness more times than I can count but we had him coming back each and every time.

It was a game.

A game of wills.

One I was sure he'd be losing.

Benicio hissed as soon as the metal touched him, squirming against the chains binding him to the chair. His wrist and ankles were bound to the arms of his seat and the legs. There were no chances I was willing to take. Foolishness was not an option.

The last thing I needed was to tie his restraints loose enough for him to slip free. Missing arm or not, it wasn't safe to let down your guard. Underestimation was deadly.

The process of restraining him had been a major issue. That was a given.

Having to force a full grown Beta into a chair was difficult, but we'd managed. There was a lot of thrashing, cussing, snarling and mid-shifting going on, but the sedatives Ivory had given him lulled his wolf enough to prevent a full shift.

That, and the fact he was still recovering from the missing limb.

The smell of burning flesh wafts into the air, but I don't flinch. I don't pull away when he starts to dig his feet into the ground. The way he grits down on his teeth and the ticking of his jaw was enough to let me know he was being stubborn. Then again, when was he never? It was his stubbornness that got him here in the first place.

"Tell me, what do you know about Xeneron? Why didn't you help Duskfall? What is it that you're hiding?"

I bend over, staring him straight in the eyes. In all my years I've been too small, too insignificant to him, and yet here I was finally at eye level. I was more than he ever was.

More than he ever thought I was.

"How did you know about Lila?"

Benicio's lip tugs up into a smirk, bloodied teeth on show as he shook his head. He's tired and worn out, but he still had the audacity to smirk.