The Beast In Us (The Beast And Me Book 3) Read online

  I was never a violent person, but that’s not what this is about. I was never a powerful person, either. And now I am. I know that if I should be threatened, I can protect myself. What Jay and I have...for me it was never about him protecting me from harm, because he wasn’t able to. It was never that. It was never what attracted me. It was that haunted look, the pain in his eyes, the very same thing I feel, for different reasons, but still the same. We are alike. Deep down inside we are the same. We are both suffering from not knowing where we belong. And now we both know. We have found each other.

  I guess that was what Peter saw in me, too. Maybe he can still be saved. But only when he realizes that his brother isn’t the one to complete him.

  Or maybe it’s the other way around. Maybe he can be saved by following his brother’s lead.

  No, I am not that insane that I could believe that. But maybe...maybe pretending that I believe that...maybe that could help.

  I am so all over the place. I don’t know what’s right, what’s wrong, what’s real, or what’s fantasy.

  Day 152

  Val is back, but she’s different, cautious. She behaves normally, but I know that something is wrong, that I cannot trust her. I can see it in her eyes when she talks to me. She has been made. Whatever happened to her while she was gone, whatever happened out there, away from me, it had an effect. And once more I am on my own.

  I can see it in her eyes that she wants to help me, but that she can’t. She can’t help me, can’t help us. This feeling...the feeling that knowledge creates in me...it is far beyond despair. There is no word to describe what I feel. I had hope, hope to escape this, all of this, but when I look at Val, when I look into her eyes...there is no hope, there is nothing. Not a thing...oh God...please...I need it...just a tiny little fragment of hope.

  Just looking at her I know that she has been taken away, that she has been questioned, and that she hadn’t betrayed me. Yet, right now, she cannot help me. I am truly a prisoner. This is truly a cage now. There is no escape, no salvation, nothing but me.

  When I look at her, when I look at Val, I can see it; the torment, the torture, I know that she wants to help me; just as I know that she can do absolutely nothing.

  She has already stretched the reliability she had on keeping me safe, on keeping me secure, and providing my safe return to whatever this place is. And now I know that I cannot rely on her anymore. I cannot ask her to compromise her position for me anymore.

  It’s frightening; it’s terrifying to know that I am on my own. Even though I know that Jay is with me, we haven’t even had a chance to talk to each other. And all I know is that time is closing in.

  I’m still separated from Jay; and I know that this is his strategy. White’s strategy. As much as I need Jay and as much as he needs me, White needs us even more to depend on each other. Keeping us separate keeps him in power. I hope desperately that he is not aware of how right he is about that.

  And I met him. I met him today, White. He strolled into my room as if he owned the place. And as much as I was tempted to believe him on this matter, a part of me knows that he is just pretending. Because, honestly, it just doesn’t sum up. If he owned the place he would be in charge of the schedule and pretty much everything. Meeting him just like that, as if it was a coincidence just didn’t fit into his profile. And that’s just what he is, White. A riddle I cannot solve. I wish I knew how to play him, but I don’t. The only thing I know for sure is that playing the subordinate pleases him, but a part of me, the subconscious part, knows that he wants to conquer. And God knows that I cannot give that to him. The only creature on God’s living earth able to conquer me is Jay. And everyone here knows that he already has done that. The first moment he laid eyes on me, the first time he touched me. No matter the wounds he had inflicted upon me, now he is in full possession of his mind.

  I don’t know if it’s because of me, or because of us being close, of me being an idea in his head. All I know is that we can’t go on like this, and that we need to get out of here, even more, that we need to lay waste to all of this. We need to destroy this compound and all the knowledge that is hidden in it.

  Why? Because it’s monstrous! Just look what White has done with it, with the knowledge of this artificial genetic evolution. He has even gone as far as curse his own brother to endure this beastly transformation, to be still neglected by him.

  God, I never met and never imagined a person that is Dr. Clay Severin. And I know that I was naïve to not be prepared to meet a person, no, a creature, like him.

  But all my thoughts, all my pondering won’t help me, won’t prepare me to face him after all this time. One wrong word, one false strain of thought, and our plan of escaping this hellhole will be for nothing.

  I feel lost in my words and lost in my head. I hate being confined into this room and yet I know that once I show that I am mentally healthy, he will use it against me, against us. I don’t know if I can bear him seeing the real me.

  So, he was here; entering my room completely unafraid, but there was something off about the person I call White. It was almost as if something had unsettled him, made him insecure about how to act. It wasn’t really obvious. It’s the tiny things that sum up to a conclusion that things aren’t as they used to be. I just can’t put my finger on it. It’s just a feeling, nothing more than instinct. He was – in his own way – careful and almost gentle.

  “I’m here to see if you are feeling well,” he said and it was such an odd thing.

  “I think I am,” I answered, not hiding my confusion.

  “If all of this it too much for you, I would understand if you ask to change your assignment,” White continued and approached my bed, gesturing for me to sit down.

  How odd, I never thought that I had a choice in that matter. That’s what I thought, but didn’t say. The last thing I wanted was to appear as defiant. Instead I just managed to utter one syllable: “Sir?”

  The expression on his face softened undeniably, and I hated it that he reacted like that because of me behaving obediently. Just thinking of it as I write this down makes me want to throw up. There is something in the way he looks at me that I know...ugh. He’s like the creepy uncle whose intentions towards you are dawning to you once you yourself discover what sexuality is.

  I cast my eyes down to battle the sick feeling in my stomach, counting on him misinterpreting my behavior as being shy towards him.

  I cannot repeat enough how much I despise – no – hate, this man. I wish I could rip his throat out and shred him into pieces, but as much as I hate to admit it: I need him alive. He’s my key to freedom.

  He’s essential for my plan. I will need to play him, and make him believe that he is still in charge. And the worst thing is, that I will not be able to tell anyone the full extent of it.

  “I am being sincere, Meghan,” White said and my name sounded like he was savoring it like a lollipop with his tongue, I did my best not to shudder and kept my glance glued to the ground. “You have told me that you are interested in becoming a staff member, a nurse. If you still want to do that, you can.”

  This offer confused me. It still does. I have no idea what his intentions are with offering me this way out of being a test subject, but it only assures me in my theory that he’s not the big boss here. Someone might have put reigns on him and I’m not sure how that will affect everything from now on. All I know is that I need to be close to Jay and being a nurse might not be helpful.

  “What about Ten?” I ask, hoping that he doesn’t hear me hesitating calling Jay by the number he has given him.

  “What about him, dear?” White asked and I again tried to not shudder; still, hearing him using this endearment makes me feel spiders crawling down my spine.

  “Will I be able to see him?” I added, carefully moving my eyes to look at Severin.

  “As a nurse?” He responds. “I’m afraid not.”

  Maybe it’s just me but in that moment his voice sounded hopeful to me,
hopeful that I wouldn’t accept his offer, hopeful that I – for some strange, unrealistic reason – would trust him. Just like Peter hoped for his brother to accept him. White doesn’t know what I am planning.

  “I’m not sure,” I answered him, casting my eyes down to the ground again, trying to keep up the act of the innocent, shy girl.

  I knew that I probably would get to see Jay anyhow. After all, I am the one who ‘tamed’ him, but am I willing to risk not seeing him any longer? And what did White really want to hear from me? It would be a contradiction if I asked to see Jay and still played shy. I couldn’t do both. While this conclusion took over my mind, I sensed myself lifting my gaze, looking at the one that taught me what hate feels like.

  “Am I still a good girl?” I asked, remembering what he demanded of me months ago.

  My questions confused him and he wasn’t able to hide it, while my facial expression stayed the same, though I felt triumph filling my lungs and making my heart beat faster.

  “You are,” he answered after a moment of silent deliberation, while his eyes never left my face. “Do you want to continue being a good girl?” He added, and I nodded, slowly.

  A smile appeared around his mouth and I despise it, I want to throw up all across him, because that’s what the kind expressions by this man causes within my body.

  I feel stained, corrupted, and it’s his fault. Every time this man looks at me softly, I feel this rage burst within me and the suffocating urge to kill him. I’m not a good girl. I’m not anymore. He has ruined me, every fiber of me. Knowing this, it’s a miracle that I didn’t try to claw his eyes out right then and there. Instead I just looked at him, with my eyes open wide, like a girl begging for acceptance.

  He bought it. I didn’t have to look at him or wait for him to speak again with his voice that reminds me of spiders. It was the time he needed to continue speaking.

  “Then I will need you to continue your work,” he said and I wasn’t entirely sure what he meant.

  I couldn’t really try to wrap my head around it because he reached out and took my right hand in both of his – needless to say that I scrubbed my poor hand fiery red to get his filth off of me. God, I dread the day when I have to burn my skin down with a boiling hot shower. I pray that day never comes.

  “Ten is fine,” White added, misinterpreting my zoning out as fear or any other kind of speechlessness. “But he still needs you.” – I nodded – “And we would like to see what you can do with the others.”

  My mind instantly focused on White using ‘we’ instead of ‘I’ so that it took me a while to realize what he was asking of me. It wasn’t enough being Jay’s play toy anymore, and I know that I enjoyed that, crazy as it was – but was he really talking about pimping me out to other beasts? I just had my second miscarriage and he really wanted me to have sex with other beasts? Was I getting this right? The thought of it alone paralyzed me – and I guess that was a good thing because otherwise I would have crushed his hand right then and there. Again, he was wrong about my speechlessness and I allowed him to understand the situation how he felt it right, but I was just stunned.

  He let go of my hand and was about to stand up and leave when I found my speech again.

  “Do you want me to...bring them back? Or do you want me to...” I tried to say the words but they just wouldn’t leave my mouth.

  I knew that it would have the effect I wanted, but in retrospect, I hated that feeling of not being in control of myself. I needed to know if he wanted me to have sex with any other beast. It’s not that I didn’t believe that he would ask that of me, I just wanted to know for sure. I needed to know that he didn’t care at all about emotions, about bonds between people. I already knew though, how else would he be able to treat his own brother like that? But yet again, treating Peter like crap might have been just a poor attempt at whichever parent had moved to another partner.

  White grabbed my hand again and this time I flinched. He interpreted the way he wanted to, again, and I was fine with it, as I would always be. However it was painful, my whole stature was nothing but a tensed muscle, close to ripping when I looked at him.

  “Do you want me to get pregnant again?” I heard myself ask and I was just floored by myself, and White didn’t feel any different, obviously.

  It did take him a few moments to wrap his head around what I had just asked and maybe even around my ability to anticipate what he wanted from me.

  I cut him off when he was about to answer: “If I have to, I want it to be Ten.”

  White griped my hand tighter and nodded, patting the back of it gently: “You are a very good girl, Meghan. I am proud of you.”

  I have no idea for how long I sat there, paralyzed, after he left. All I remember is frantically leaping towards the bathroom and scrubbing my right hand until it felt boiled and sore.

  I agreed on trying to get pregnant for a third time. In exchange the only cell I will enter in the next weeks is Jay’s. And still, I feel as if I made a deal with the devil, as if I am becoming a demon myself.

  Maybe it’s just the beast inside of me stirring, but I know better. I am becoming a monster myself.

  Day 153

  I can’t comprehend these intense feelings. They are just too strong, too immense, too consuming. I never thought I would be able to feel like this.

  The day started off normal, typical, no surprises, apart from Val entering my room and getting my vitals. It was almost too normal for 22 weeks, almost six months in this hellhole. Six months since White fabricated my death, since everyone outside of this place thinks I am dead. But that’s not what has upset me, what has put my emotions through the ringer. No.

  I got to see Jay; and oh so much more than that.

  Val tried to prepare me for what would be happening, but the moment I heard that I was scheduled to meet ‘Ten’ I was living in an alternative universe, no, in a dream state. I didn’t recall anything until the moment he walked through my door.

  Time did stop. And it felt as if I had held my breath for months until that very moment I saw him.

  I don’t think that I had ever been aware of every tiny bit of his features, of the way his chest moves when he inhales – even more – when he catches my scent. I wasn’t aware of how his features seem to come alive when he sees me, scents me, becomes aware of me. It’s a revelation. Every. Freaking. Time.

  When the door closed behind him it was as if someone had cut his strings. Jay closed in on me and without hesitation his large hands framed my face and pulled it towards his. Our lips met like two magnets merging. My body melted into his, just like every inch of my body. We seemed to be like two ions forming an element. I couldn’t stop my hands from raking across his skin, from pulling him against me. We were like two continents colliding, creating a new surface of the earth. I wanted nothing more than to lose myself in whatever Jay was.

  Clothes didn’t exist. I couldn’t sense them. All I was aware of was the heat of his body and the sense of his skin. His fingers crawling across my own skin was similar to lasers cutting through metal, and yet not.

  I heard him rip my t-shirt to shreds and I didn’t mind, because once his fingertips touched my skin they seemed to melt away like snow under a spring sun. I was the most precious thing to his touch and it made every fiber of my being explode into ecstasy. And we hadn’t even gotten fully undressed yet. Jay peeled off every layer of my remaining clothing like a man starving and digging through the earth to find something edible, but once he had reached my skin he seemed to turn into a reverent being, almost being scared to touch it. Almost as if he believed that I would shy away once he dared to truly touch me.

  It was me who caught his hand when he was pulling back and placed it against my cheek, pulled it down slowly to my neck and towards my collarbone and further down to where my skin turned soft.

  I heard him groan, groan in despair and need. My knees gave in as his hand enfolded my breast so gently, delicately. His mouth closed in on me, his free hand fl
ew around my back, pulling me close against his searing hot body. I knew that he wanted me just as desperately as I wanted him. Every minute apart was a waste. It was blasphemy to who we were.

  Jay lifted me up as if I weighed nothing, and I hadn’t noticed how he had pulled off my panties, but I didn’t care. Hell, why would I? I wasn’t even aware of how he had motioned me toward the next wall. The only thing that was important was his mouth against mine, his tongue entwined with mine, his hot, velvety skin against mine.

  I hadn’t been aware of the fact that my entire being had just waited for him to pull me close. I didn’t feel the concrete wall behind my back as Jay slammed me against it

  His lips crashed against mine and I couldn’t wait to drink them, even though I had kissed him for endless moments already. It wasn’t enough, it would never be enough. I didn’t care that there were people watching, I didn’t care that there were people accessing; hell, I didn’t care that in front of one of the monitors it was White himself looking at us, watching us. I didn’t care at all.

  I was wishing the earth to disintegrate in this very moment. It would have been my wish come true, to simply cease to exist while having him as close as possible: Jay.

  Him entering me felt like a sharp knife cutting through my flesh, and yet it didn’t. It was more like a missing piece sliding into place after far too much time. He filled me up just perfectly and more, reaching towards the point that it was almost too much. We were merging into one being, reaching ecstasy. As every single time we met each other like two parts of the puzzle, feeling sheer euphoria the nanosecond we melted into one.

  There just are no words to describe it. Even though he is this separate, self-aware body, this perfect negative to my positive, the two of us summed up felt like just so much more.

  In this moment I couldn’t recall any other moments we met and merged. This time it simply felt too perfect, too much as if it was meant to be. I felt like losing myself and embracing it, as if I was becoming a larger piece of myself. This rhythm, this united heartbeat, this perfection that was us; that is us. This ache, this ecstasy that is us, that molds us into two pieces of one item, it feels unearthly and yet so perfect. Right then and there I knew that we are meant to be, as if the gods and angels had come down to earth to proclaim what I already knew. No matter the moments we came together before this, no matter which emotions we felt until now, right then and there we met perfection. Right then and there I knew we became larger than one, larger than two. In fact, we became three.