The Damaged (The Insiders Trilogy #2) - Tijan by Tijan

That was sweet.

My brother waiting to have my back … or no.

I looked just as he was leaving. “Matt.”

He paused, looking back.

I flashed him a grin. “Team Batt.”

His eyes warmed, but he didn’t return my grin. “Team Batt. All the way.”

Now that was sweet.

He went out to wait, but it didn’t take me long to finish changing. If we were walking into battle, a part of me was absorbing Torie’s and Tamara’s ways. I dressed like a warrior.

Okay, I didn’t really. They would’ve worn leather pants, black corsets, and they would’ve had their hair greased back or in braids like a Viking.

I just put on black leggings, but they had a leather strip that went down the side of my leg. I paired that with a black hoodie sweatshirt that wasn’t baggy, not at all. It stuck to me like a second skin.

And my hair … I couldn’t do the grease look, but I could do the braids. I had two braids on each side of my face, so I was half Viking right now.

It took me longer than I thought, but Matt didn’t gripe when I opened the door. He just took me in and noted, “Ready for battle.”

“Ready for battle.”

There was no guard outside my door.

I never questioned it until later. I never thought to.

That’d be my first mistake that day.





FORTY-TWO


When I walked into the breakfast area, the groups were split down the middle. My cohort was on one side and Matt’s was on the other.

Matt rounded behind me and stood in the middle.

Cedar and Fleur were in the middle, like us.

A very angry Victoria was in front of them.

I swallowed, seeing Victoria.

Her eyes were bloodshot. Her eyes almost matched her hair, which was wild and messed, and she had an unnatural pallor to her skin that I knew wasn’t healthy.

I wished I had pushed Kash more to fill me in on what happened. I had a second for that thought before her eyes snapped to mine, and I knew two things at once.

One: she wasn’t well. She had a crazy look in her eyes.

And two: she was here for me.

“He likes to fuck hard.”

She launched. That was her first attack.

I had time enough to suck in my breath, fortify my insides, because I knew more assaults were coming.

Matt growled, “Not cool, Vic.”

She ignored him, sweeping around him. The air around her got even chillier. “He likes to make you come first, maybe two times, before he lets loose, and when he does, you are the only person in the world to him. That’s how he makes you feel, isn’t it?” Her eyes were so cold. She drew back, her head high, as if she were holding court. “That’s how he made me always feel. I missed him when he tossed me aside. You get addicted to him. He does that. Makes you feel that intoxication, that high, and then he pounds you with pleasure, and he pounds you so hard you just gasp for more. Then he tosses you out, and it’s freezing out there.”

The others started to rally now.

Torie and Tamara pushed to my side.

Torie started to step forward, “Listen—”

I held a hand up. No matter what, I needed to handle this. Me. Not them.

Guy and Chester came forward, standing on the side.

Guy said to Matt, “What the fuck?”

Matt’s eyes flicked once to Guy before returning to Victoria. “Whatever happened between you and Kash is in the past—”

An unnatural laugh rippled from her.

It was unsettling to see.

“I’m not talking in the past.” She tipped her head back and let out that laugh, and an icy shiver trailed down my spine. Her eyes came back to me. “Unless we’re talking ‘the past’ as in twenty-four hours ago.”

She waited.

A beat.

Her words penetrated.

They penetrated hard, and I stumbled back a step.

I felt kicked in the chest.

A whoosh came out of me. I lost air, and the force was emotional, but it staggered me.

Pain ripped through me like a thousand knives sticking in, all at once.

My vision blurred.

“Matt,” Torie growled in warning.

I shook my head. I was hurting, but I had to hear this. I didn’t know why. I just did.

“He fucked me hard. He flew me to Greece, making me come over and over again on the plane. And it didn’t stop there. He was insatiable. What have you been doing?” Another sick laugh from her. “Or maybe I should be saying, what haven’t you been doing? What’s the problem, Bailey? Not enough for him? Or maybe it’s something else. I bet it’s something else.”

Her voice dropped, softening. She was trying to be gentle.

The look didn’t fit on her face.

It was a farce.

Victoria was hard, angry, and bitter. Her attempting to be pitying was a farce. She looked like the Joker.

I reeled from what she was saying.

Kash was on a trip.

How would she have known that unless she went with him?

“Or maybe it’s like mother, like daughter? You were his side piece, just like your mother was for Peter Francis.”

“That’s enough!” From Tamara this time. “Shut her up! Shut up.”

“Victoria,” Matt growled next to me.

Victoria ignored Tamara, her eyes going to Matt. Some of that pitying look dwindled. “It’s the truth, Matt. You know it. He stepped out on your mom with her mom. How can you stand next to her knowing that? That her mom helped destroy your chance to have two parents—”