Sinfully Devoted by Amber Torney
Chapter Six - Logan
Beep. . . beep . . .beep . . .beep . . .
The sound of the monitors pulled me from my slumber. Surveying the room, I saw that Jonah was laid out in the roll away, dead asleep. Stryker was sitting opposite me, his head resting on the bed, one hand resting on her face, while the other engulfed her tiny hand. Like me, he hadn’t left her side since we’d arrived. Couldn’t say I blamed him, to be honest.
Everything about the night that Kyle died had been playing on loop in my head. Every time I fucking closed my eyes, I was reminded of the last conversation I had with my parents. They fucking knew. There was no denying it. Every time it replayed, I would remember more and more detail. They had been arguing about not speaking up and helping out my Tiny Dancer’s dad.
Getting up, I stretched my arms. We had decided to take turns sleeping. All of us had agreed that no one other than Jonah, Stryker, Damon, and I, were to be left alone with her. Her injuries were extensive. Broken ribs, bruising over most of her body. She also had a concussion, and had needed stitches for the cuts above her eye and lip.
The bed enveloped her fragile frame. She was hooked up to several machines: one for breathing, another monitoring her heart, and the final was an I.V. The doctors had gone on and on about how she was severely dehydrated. Due to the swelling, it was hard to figure out whether she had eaten over the previous week, but I’d say it was a winning bet that she hadn’t.
Grabbing my bag, I took out the journal that had turned my world upside down. I couldn’t help but wonder what would have happened if I’d only gotten to her a second earlier when we were at the cabin. Maybe I’d pushed too hard for her to forgive me. Why was my cousin so determined to make my Tiny Dancer his?
Over the previous day or so, I had been reading the journal more thoroughly, considering I’d had nothing better to do. I couldn’t help but think that I may have been the catalyst that made Kyle take her this time. And if I had just continued to read the damn thing in the first place, I would have found out sooner that Kyle was still alive. The more I read, the clearer it became that he was consumed with trying to one up me.
It was all in there: records of his observations and interactions with her for the past four years. So far, I had made it to last Christmas. It was around that time that he had decided to start putting his plans together to snatch her. They were all incredibly detailed entries, from what I could see.
I need to start getting things in order. My Kitten has started to become too relaxed in her current environment. I’ve been able to get the Juilliard letterhead, and I am aware of the summer program auditions coming up next month. I know she has been extended an invitation to attend. Her stupid mother has been bragging over the phone with my aunt, told her all the details. I’m grateful that they have stayed in contact with each other. It has made it easy to keep tabs on her when I’ve had to return stateside.
Once the audition has happened, I’ll send her an acceptance letter with the date and time, and when she steps off that plane in New York, I’ll sweep in and take her. With that in place, the last part of my plan is to get the bunker started. Uncle Max and Dad have had the plans drawn up already. While they don’t know who I will be bringing in there, they know I will need it for a few months. Long enough to break my Kitten, and bring her to heel.
Just looking at her now makes my dick hard. I can’t wait until I have her back in my god damn bed. I’m never going to let her go this time. Nope, this time I’m going to tie her to me for life. I’ll have her barefoot and fucking pregnant within months of locking her within my personal playroom.
“What are you reading?” Grumbling as he stretched out his neck, Stryker reached over and grabbed the journal. “The fuck, man? He’s been planning this for how long?”
“Since he was healed.” I couldn’t help the hatred that had started to seep into my veins. As far as I was concerned, my cousin could rot in hell. That goddamn journal had caused nothing but pain and destruction; it was some sort of Pandora’s box. Opening up old wounds, and creating fucking new ones in its wake.
“You have read this page, yeah?” Stryker growled. When Stryker was angry, he became calculated. His usually calm demeanor gave the unsuspecting victim a false sense of triumph, right before he became a ripper, making the person on the receiving end wish they could wake up from the nightmarish hell that only Stryker could rain down on them. “You saw your father’s name, right?”
“Yeah, I’m still processing all that,” I said quietly. The betrayal that had been unfolding ever since I’d found that damn journal was all-consuming. My stomach was doing somersaults as I tried to deal with the reality of all of it. “It’s not the first time he has come up in here either, man.”
“So, what are you still processing then?” he asked. I didn’t know whether it was confusion, but he was questioning my reasoning. “There is no way in hell that your father wasn’t aware of what had been going on. Fucking hell, Logan, he played a hand in the design of that fucking bunker.”
“I know that. I’m not fucking stupid. It’s all there in black and fucking white, Stry.” It made me sick reading the extent my father had gone to in helping Kyle. I was beginning to think I didn’t really know who my father was. “I can’t go back there, Stry, not after what I’ve discovered that they’ve done. I don’t have a family anymore. This went a lot deeper than I’d realized. I have nowhere to go.”
“Logan, I know you’re hurting, man. What your family has put you and Phee through, it makes me sick inside. I’m sorry it’s played out this way, we were all taken for fools. And I don’t mean to make you feel as though we’re not here for you, but she is going to need all of us.” He placed a hand on my shoulder, and I appreciated the fact that he was trying to offer some comfort.
“Thanks, Stryk.” Stryker was right, and his anger matched my own. It wasn’t just about me; I was well aware that the one we needed to find answers for was lying in the bed we were surrounding. We’d both been unsuspecting pieces in a game we didn’t even know we were playing. For a while, my family had been winning, too, but now the tables had turned.
“Look at her, beaten, bloodied, and bruised, because of members from your fucking family.” I could feel his pain. I knew he didn’t mean to throw their actions in my face. Hell, I wanted their blood just as badly as he did, but my need for answers was stronger. “I’m sorry man, I don’t mean to take it out on you. This shit is all messed up.”
“I know, Stryker. It’s why I’ve been reading through this fucking thing,” I shot back, holding the diary up and waving it in his face. That thing could hold answers that we would never get from the psycho asshole holed up in a cage at the Lennox Family warehouse. “I have to find out why she was the target.”
“You can come live with Phee and I.” Looking up, we found Damon leaning against the door frame. From his comment, I’d say he had heard most of our conversation. I was surprised that we hadn’t woken Jonah with all the talking. Sighing as he entered the room, Damon looked at Phee, nodding her way. “Any change?”
“No, nothing yet,” Stryker answered as he lightly stroked Phee’s hand. She brought out the softer side in him; she brought it out in everyone in the room. “They have her pretty sedated. They won’t tell us too much, as we’re not next of kin, but they don’t expect a change too soon. Not with all the injuries she has.”
The mere mention of what she had gone through had me clenching my fists by my side. Just another fucking reminder of how much I had failed her. Standing, I started to pace the small room. “Goddamn it.”
Damon walked over, kissing her forehead, before taking the seat I had just vacated. “We moved your cousin to the cages at the warehouse. Before leaving the hellhole, he had her in, we checked out the other rooms. We cleared out the surveillance room too, but did you know there was a two-way mirror in that room he used? The fucker had people watching as he violated her.”
“Fuck. It just gets better. Any way of determining who visited that shithole?” I was starting to feel sick all over again. Who the hell was I related to?
“Yeah, I wouldn’t put it past the douche to have kept records. There was more than just the mirror thing, too.” Disgust rolled off Damon. That guy was tough as nails, but to see him rattled like that, that was something else. “The area we found Phee in was just the tip of the iceberg; the further in we went, the more rooms we found. The room Phee was kept in? That was like the Taj Mahal compared to the rest.”
“Like some kind of holding cells?” Morbid curiosity had me trying to find out more. After all, my sperm donor had played a part in designing that little prison. I needed to know exactly how fucked up the Ducane Family tree truly was.
“Kinda, but from what I can gather, their intent would have been to house their victims.” Looking back up at Phee now, I saw the question we are all wanting an answer to flash in his eyes. “How much do you know about your family’s business?”
“Not much. By the sound of things, I’d always thought Dad was some sort of investment broker, you know, with all the traveling he did. But I’m starting to think I need to find out more. ” I hated the fact that I sounded like a fucking spoiled little rich kid who until then had never questioned where his family made their money, but now— now I was starting to believe that it came from nothing good.
“That’s a fucking understatement,” Stryker ground out. Getting up, he leaned down, kissing Phee’s cheek, before heading to the door. “Still want to believe that your parents are nothing but pawns?”
“Cool it, Stry. It’s not his fault, and you know it,” Damon reprimanded him, before turning to me.
“Sorry, man,” he grumbled, before slapping Jonah on the shoulder.
“When was the last time you took a break? Had something proper to eat?” Turning back to me, Damon took a long, hard look. I knew he wasn't that concerned with my wellbeing, we were still learning to trust each other, but at least he was trying. “When was the last time you showered, Logan?”
“That shit doesn’t matter while she is laying there,” I said, gesturing to Phee. As I looked at her, it was like another blow to my already decimated heart. “All that matters is finding answers, so we have something good to tell her when she wakes up.”