Lords of Pain Read online

  Lords of Pain

  Royals of Forsyth University

  Angel Lawson

  Samantha Rue

  Author’s Note

  If you are a friend or family member turn back now. We love your support. Don’t read this book. We’ll never be able to look you in the eye over dinner again.

  For everyone else; this book is dark. For real dark. More so than anything else we have written. If you have read other Angel Lawson books this is different. If you think Heston Wilcox, from Devil May Care, is bad and teeters the edge of appropriateness then turn back now.

  Killian Payne, Dimitri Rathbone, and Tristian Mercer are evil, spoiled, entitled, complicated, terrible people. We love them, but you may not. You may find their acts unforgivable. And that’s okay.

  Trigger Warning: this book contains graphic abuse, dub/non-con, intense bullying, and other uncomfortable situations.

  * * *

  Before you go! Please join our Reader Group!

  Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Epilogue

  Acknowledgments

  Also By Angel Lawson & Samantha Rue

  Prologue

  Story

  Gnawing at my fingernail, I ask, “What about this one?”

  Mary frowns through my screen. “Not enough tits, sis.”

  “Seriously?” I look down at my cleavage. I won’t pretend like I’ve got the biggest tits in the world, but I’m not totally flat, either. Things might be a lot easier for me if I were. “I’m completely hanging out.”

  “Pfft,” she says. “Show some nipple or something, Story. The Daddies cream themselves over a hint of nipple.” I tug at the top of my tank and rub my thumb over my nipple. It hardens. Mary, who I’m talking to over video chat, gives me a thumbs up. “Perfect.”

  “What should I ask for?” I snap a few test pictures, trying to look sexy and far happier than I feel. “I keep getting gift cards to Starbucks, but I have to sell them to get the cash.”

  “Then start going for straight cash,” she says, smacking on a stick of gum. “He’s obviously on the line.”

  I didn’t mean to get into being a Sugar Baby, but after posting a photo of myself on the beach in my bikini over spring break, the requests kept coming in on my ChattySnap account. I was curious at the time, but not enough to really follow through with anything.

  Not until things got bad enough.

  Three months later and I’ve got quite a following. Apparently, virgins aren’t a social embarrassment in the world of Sugar Daddies the way it is at my high school.

  “Five bucks for a tank without a bra,” Mary lists off, “ten for full cleavage with a little nipple. Twenty for topless, but I think if you change into the pale pink tank, you’ll get more money.”

  I do the math. If I send out five topless pics, that’s a quick hundred bucks. That’s a bus ticket and a meal. It’s not enough to really set me up for The Plan, but it’s a nice start. Just holding the ticket in my hand will be enough to make this all bearable, for just a little while longer.

  “Okay,” I say, pushing back the nerves that have started building in my stomach. The deeper I get into this, the scarier it is. Scary because it involves exposing myself to strangers. Scary because they’ll have a part of me—the same part of me I’ve been trying so hard to keep to myself. Scary because I need it, and if there’s one thing I’ve learned this past year, it’s that needing something means giving in to someone else’s power.

  “My tank is down in the laundry room,” I explain, antsy. “Let me grab it and just get this over with.”

  Mary hangs up and I leave my phone on the bed. The laundry room is downstairs, off of the kitchen. Even though it’s been a year, I’m still not used to the size of this house—my stepfather’s house. Before my mom married Daniel, we were living in a two-bedroom apartment that overlooked the railroad tracks. Now we’re in a cozy seven-thousand square foot McMansion with a pool and an entertainment room downstairs. For a long time, it felt more like a hotel than home.

  Now it feels like something else.

  I sneak through the kitchen and eye the discarded pizza boxes on the island. That and the trash talk coming from the basement are a sure sign that my stepbrother and his friends are downstairs.

  I pause at the realization, feeling stupid.

  Laughter bounces up the stairs, like a sharp warning. Killian and his best friends, Dimitri Rathbone and Tristian Mercer, are inseparable, spending all their time together as the reigning kings of our high school. The three of them comprise the complete royalty of the senior class. I don’t need to be living with one of them to really know them—everyone just does.

  I shouldn’t be surprised they’re over. It’s all around school that Tristian got dumped by his girlfriend the other day. If petty high school drama didn’t look like juvenile bullshit from my vantage, I’d probably call it a huge scandal. Being a girlfriend to one of these three is like winning the damn lottery. You get the infamy, the expensive gifts, and what basically amounts to three round-the-clock bodyguards. These three share everything, and they protect what’s theirs.

  She’s obviously smart, though. She probably discovered what all those other girls never will: that it’s not worth it. They’re cold boys, eyes always watching. There’s a certain cast to their faces when I’m around that makes the hair on the back of my neck rise. Luckily, I’m a junior and it’s been made very clear that I’m never to look at or address them, and under no circumstances should anyone consider my stepbrother and I family.

  Not that I’d ever want to be associated with an asshole like him, anyway. There for a minute, right at the start, Killian had been fine. Not kind, nor warm, nor even cordial, but a lot like a prisoner might treat his cell-mate. It was an acceptance, an acknowledgment, that neither of us had a choice in this. He’d been almost sympathetic, bordering on friendly. Briefly, I’d thought of us as allies.

  It didn’t last long.

  I’m not sure exactly when it stopped, but these days, my stepbrother goes out of his way to make it perfectly clear that he loathes me. His friends alternate between ignoring me and sending me vicious, mocking barbs as their eyes track me, waiting, hoping to get a rise out of me. I used to wonder why, trying to figure out what I’d done to make them so mean to me. Killian and his friends are the kind of boys who are blessed with it all; looks, brains, money, athleticism. They’re gods around campus and the attitude doesn’t stop when they’re at home, especially down in Killian’s lair.

  I know now that they never needed a reason.

  Hearing them is just a reminder of how exhausting it all is, tiptoeing around this house, avoiding all the landmines. There’s one at every step, it seems. The whole thing has made me paranoid. I feel like I’m constantly being watched. Or that someone has been in my room. I could handle that, though. For my mom. For security. But once things escalated…

  I take a deep
breath to settle my nerves. I have The Plan, right? I just need to get the money and then I’m home free. I’ll get my shirt, flee back to my room, lock my door, and get my business over with.

  There are three baskets of clean clothes in the laundry room—mostly Killian’s football gear. The whole room smells faintly of sour sweat and lingering body spray. No matter how many times my mom bleaches his uniform, the stench never really goes away. I bend over and sort through one of the baskets for my blush-colored tank.

  “Thank god,” I sigh, snagging the cotton shirt in my fingers. “Found you.”

  “Nope, looks like we found you.”

  My heart leaps up my throat and I spin, hand clutched to my throat. Tristian and Dimitri—Rath, as everyone calls him—stand in the doorway.

  “God, you scared me.” I exhale, darting my eyes between them. “You shouldn’t sneak around like that.”

  “Why not?” Tristian says, a sharp, lopsided grin tugging at his mouth. From the glassy look in his eyes and the way he reeks of beer, he’s clearly been drowning his sorrows down there. I’m not dumb enough to imagine he’s broken-hearted from getting dumped. Probably just nursing his bruised ego. “You’re the one sneaking around up here like a frightened little mouse.”

  Tristian is insanely good-looking. He’s all blond hair, tan skin, and lean, hard muscle. I know that, out of the three of them, he does best with the girls. Much like Killian and Rath, he’s also enormous. Intimidating not just because of his size, wealth, and popularity, but mostly because of something else.

  His smile never quite reaches his eyes.

  They’re ice blue and carry a glint of cool detachment. Just looking into them makes me want to wrap my arms around myself.

  Rath is the opposite of Tristian, with his inky-black hair, lip piercings, pale skin, and dark eyes. He’s quieter than the other two, those intense eyes always watching, tracking. We had a class together for a single semester last year, and it was enough to make me hate even being in the same room with him. A long stare from him always gives me a hind-brain impulse to hide. “Check it out,” Rath says, jerking his chin at me. “Story’s not wearing a bra.”

  Just the mention of it makes my nipples hard, doubling my embarrassment.

  “Perky little nipples, eh?” Tristian says, taking a step into the small room. My eyes flick to his hand, wrapping around the door jamb, caging me in. His lips part and he wets them with his tongue. “Are they sensitive? Did they get hard just from me talking about them? Or do I need to touch them?”

  My jaw drops and I cross my arms over my chest. “You’re a pig.” I start toward the door prepared to squeeze past them, but they block the exit completely. I jerk back, nostrils flaring angrily. “Get out of my way.”

  “Answer one question for us, Story, and then we’ll let you go,” Rath says, propping his shoulder against the jamb. He’s wearing a lazy smirk and I can smell the beer wafting off him, too. I try to peer over his broad shoulders, hoping to see Killian somewhere. He can’t stand it when I’m around his friends. He’ll get them to back off.

  Finding no sign of him, I release a frustrated sigh. “What do you want to know?”

  Rath’s head tilts, eyes taking me in. “Are you a virgin?”

  “What?” My cheeks are blistering before the word is even out of my mouth. “That’s none of your business!”

  They both laugh, the tone deep and mocking. Tristian shakes his head, eyes flashing in something menacing and delighted. “Oh Story, only virgins say it’s no one’s business. You just gave yourself away.”

  My mouth forms around a weak denial, but I clamp it shut. “Well, who cares?” I snap. “So what? I’m a virgin. Big deal!”

  “Nothing we didn’t already know,” Tristian says, taking another step forward. I move back and bump into the hard edge of the washing machine. “You have that look. All innocent and clean and pure. The kind of thing that just makes you want to...” He reaches out, ignoring the way I bat his hand away when he tries to stroke my collarbone. “Mess it all up.”

  He has no idea just how hard his words hit.

  Rath rakes his bottom lip through his teeth and I don’t like the look in his eyes—hungry and heavy. “There’s something about virgins, you know?”

  “That nervous energy,” Tristian agrees. “It gets my dick hard.”

  “I like the begging.” Rath adds, his deep voice shifting into a falsetto, “Please don’t, it hurts!”

  The anxious butterflies in my stomach turn to stone.

  “But my favorite part,” Tristian says, blue eyes pulsing and dilating, “is breaking them in. Feeling that tight pussy wrapped around my cock?” He reaches down to…shift himself. “There’s nothing better than that. Damn, what I’d give to break you in right.”

  “You guys are disgusting,” I say, lifting my chin. “I’m not scared of you, you know. You’re just a bunch of socially-stunted shitheads. That’s probably the only way you can get it, isn’t it? Bullying girls into giving it up? No wonder your sorry ass got dumped.”

  Tristian’s demeanor shifts on a dime, all traces of joking washed away. “What did you just say to me?”

  I shrug, shifting my glare to Rath. “Guess someone in the senior class has more than two brain cells to rub together." I know from the way his eyes sharpen that he’s remembering the class we shared. Looking back to Tristian, I say, “It’s not like it’s a secret that Genevieve tossed you to the curb. Too bad money can’t buy you a personality to go with your micro dick.”

  I’m trying to hold my ground and look tough, but I can’t stop the embarrassing shudder of fear at the way their faces harden, eyes sparking in anger. I sense what’s going to happen a beat too late. Tristian moves quickly, darting forward and clamping his hand around my throat. My chest hitches on a panicked inhale, hands grabbing his wrist, but his arm is like steel.

  He’s not squeezing my throat, but he flexes his fingers, and I read the message loud and clear. He could. Roughly, he says, “Pretty shitty way to treat someone who was just giving you some compliments. Isn’t that right, Rath?”

  “Rude as fuck,” Rath agrees.

  “Maybe,” Tristian says, prying my fingers from his wrist, “we should show her just how small our dicks aren’t.” He yanks my hand down until it’s pressed to the bulge at the front of his jeans. “As you so obnoxiously just pointed out, I seem to be finding myself short of a steady fuck these days. Maybe I’ll take you, after all.”

  I fight to pull my hand away, mouth screwing up in disgust, but he holds my palm there for a long moment, grinding against it. “Fighting will only make it hurt more, baby. I know that’s not what you want…or is it?” He tilts his head, like he’s assessing me. All he gets is the feel of a hard, involuntary swallow beneath his palm. “Maybe you would, huh? You like it rough? Because we’re good with that.”

  Rath stonily adds, “Crazy good.”

  I try to speak, but my voice is trapped somewhere in my chest, caught in the irony of the moment. Here I’ve been keeping my eye on one threat only to walk into another.

  This can’t happen. Not now. Not like this. Not with these guys. Not when I’ve managed to dodge worse—so much worse since moving in here. My eyes drop down to Tristian’s wrist. The corded muscles in his forearm as he holds me by the throat flex and shift beneath the skin. I test my strength against his other hand, yanking it sharply away from his crotch. I do, but I’m not fooled. He just let me. Even one of these guys would be impossible to fight off, but two? My heart goes from racing to thunderous as I realize how entirely overpowered I am here. I could fight. I could kick, scream, lash out.

  Or I could reason with them.

  They can’t be as bad as all that, can they?

  “Come on, let me go.” My voice comes out in a whisper. “I just want to go back to my room.”

  Tristian’s lips curl into a sinister grin. “But the fun’s just beginning, isn’t it?”

  A shadow moves in the doorway and my heart leaps. Killi
an’s broad shoulders fill the space. He looks between his friends and me, face blank.

  “Killian,” I say, eyes pleading, “tell them to let me go.”

  “What’s going on?” he asks casually, like his friend doesn’t have me by the throat, pinned to the washing machine. “I thought you were bringing down more beer.”

  Rath’s dark eyes remain fixed to me as he explains, “Story was just telling us how she’s a virgin.”

  My stepbrother’s face remains eerily blank. “Was she, now.”

  Tristian’s looking straight into my eyes when he adds, “We were saying how we’d be happy to help her fix that pesky problem.”

  From the expression on his face, you’d think Killian was being asked whether or not he wanted pepperoni on his pizza. So casual and aloof. Unaffected.

  I swallow to remove the dry lump from my throat. “Killian, I don’t know why you don’t like me, but—”

  “You don’t know why I don’t like you?” He barks a caustic, scoffing laugh. “Your white-trash slut of a mother wrecks my family, and brings her little whoreling with her, and you can’t figure out why I don’t like you.” His eyes slither down my body, lip curling. “I don’t give a shit what these two do to you. They could both fuck you at the same time, and you know what I’d do?” His eyes spark and blaze, and there’s no mistaking the surety of his words. “I’d laugh.”

  He means it, and for some reason, I’m surprised. I always knew he hated me, but this?