Page 670 of Coal Hearts

The scenes were so barbaric, so brutal, I hadn’t been able to eat a thing.

Interspersed amongst the sickening windows, Victor had ordered his decorating team to drape white and black swathes of material on every wall. The black absorbed the candlelight flickering from the many candelabras while the white glittered like stardust.

I still couldn’t figure out his theme, but every Master wore the same black cloak as Henri. The same black tourmaline mask. The same aura of grim reaper gliding around the room sipping blood-red wine and laughing as they tormented their jewels.

The jewels...

If Victor had intended to make them seem like angels, he’d succeeded.

Every one of us wore the same white gossamer fabric. The girls in wispy petal dresses with trains long enough for Masters to stomp on, and the boys in trousers and shirts so fine and sheer, the shadows of their bodies were visible, teasing bastards to touch.

I looked up at Peter’s face.

His matching mask of crystals glittered with rainbows, casting pinks and greens over his lips.

I hated that we hadn’t had much time to talk.

I missed him even though he was standing right there.

I wanted to tell him I loved him but...I had a feeling that would hurt him too much. Not because I had such deep feelings for him but because those feelings were purely platonic.

He was my friend and soulmate. Just like my brother.

If I hadn’t found the missing part of my soul, then perhaps we would’ve ended up as a couple.

But...in this life, this incarnation, I was Henri’s.

Do badan, ek jaan: two bodies, one soul.

My gaze drifted from Peter’s handsome face to the swollen welts on his chest, glowing red beneath his angelic white shirt. “Oh, Paavak...I’m so sorry.”

He flinched and rubbed the lashes as if he could erase them. “I’m fine.”

“Who hurt you?”

“Branson’s back. But don’t fret—”

“Bastard.”

I wished tonight was Christmas not Halloween.

I wanted to leap forward two months and stop him from ever being abused again.

“I can give you the rest of the arnica tablets I took after Emerald Bruises. They really helped heal all my paintball marks.”

He smiled distractedly and shook his head. “Don’t worry about it. I didn’t drag you here to talk about my injuries—”

“Do you want to talk about what happened the night of Topaz Tor—”

“Nope.” He rubbed his mouth. “Definitely not.”

I winced, remembering how we’d stood side by side on that dance floor.

How we’d climaxed at the same time to different Masters.

How he’d been dragged off by a Master named Wilson and Henri had carted me the other way.

Despite my wariness of telling him I loved him tonight, I’d told him during that game.