With the tension still thick in the air,their dinners arrived and they ate in silence with only occasionalcomments made between Elsa and her mother.

It was intriguing to watch them interact. Hermother clearly cared for her deeply, as any parent should. He wasglad to know Elsa had someone willing to stand up for her, even ifthe person in question was a major bitch.

As their conversation picked up, he watchedintensely, taking mental notes. If only he could draw from his ownexperience what it felt like to have a strong connection with aparent, he might understand their relationship better.

Feeling the unexpected sting of jealousy, hewaved to the waitress for another scotch on the rocks and told herto add it to his tab for the evening.

“Your drink, Mr. Laurenzo,” he heard next tohim in a familiar raspy, female voice.

Without looking up he knew immediately who itwas by her voice and scent. Dressed in her usual fashionable yetunrevealing attire, Five handed him his drink and smiled knowinglyat him. His cock immediately twitched. After everything he had doneto her, including fucking her countless times and doing the mostdebauched things to her body he could imagine, it was purely aninstinctual response; unwanted, but natural.

Without responding, he grabbed the drink fromher hand when her finger purposefully skimmed across the top of hishand. Uncomfortable with her physical contact, he glanced sidewaysto see if Elsa had noticed. She had. He draped his arm over hershoulder to put her ease since she was clearly affectednegatively.

What in the hell was Peyton doing hereanyway? It occurred to him that maybe she had purchased theestablishment. He never even thought to check into that. Why wouldhe? He hadn’t seen or spoken to her in over a year. He sighedirritably and shot Peyton a penetrating fuck-off look. Theystared at each other across a sudden ringing silence for only abrief moment before she smiled and turned her attention to Elsa andElise.

“Welcome to Juniper’s, ladies. I hope you’refinding everything to your satisfaction this evening,” sheprofessionally addressed them. “I’m Peyton, the owner of thisestablishment and…” her words were drowned out by the suddenjerking of Elsa’s body.

Victor stared down at her and her eyes burnedthrough him as the corner of her mouth twisted with some undefinedemotion that looked a lot like rage. Confused by her reaction, hegave her a questioning look but her straight glance seemed to beaccusing him coldly.

With Peyton finally gone, Elsa’s breathingbecame ragged and she reached for his drink and chugged it down inone swift motion. Victor’s mind whirled at her reaction and bodylanguage. He had no idea what she was fucking thinking, as usual,and therefore he had no idea how to console her or rein her in.

“El, honey, is everything okay?” her motherreached over the table when Elsa began to tremble.

Elsa gritted her teeth, but nodded and Victorwatched as she took in a deep breath and steadied her body. Nextshe plastered that damned fake smile on her face. God he reallyhated that phony shit.

Her mother seemed to relax and excusedherself once again to the ladies room. As she walked way, he tookall of her in. She was an attractive older woman. She was the samesize as Elsa in all respects: height, weight and breast size. Theyeven shared the same laugh lines and eyes. Elsa clearly got hermother’s good genes. If only he had been as lucky.

When her mother was out of sight, Victorturned to face Elsa.

“Your mother is an attractive woman. It’sclear to see where you get your good looks and mouthiness from,” helifted Elsa’s drink and swirled the ice around in it.

Narrowing her eyes, she countered derisively,“She’s a bit too old for you, don’t you think?”

What an absurd statement. He had never letsomething as unimportant as age stand in the way of what he wanted.Was she jealous of her own mother? He brought the drink to hismouth and laughed. This will be fun to play with.

“I don’t discriminate against age.”

Her lips thinned with irritation and her gazescorched him. “Or gender.”

What the fuck?

21:Wrath

Victor was so taken aback with Elsa’sstatement that he appeared to momentarily lose his ability to speakand almost lost his grip on the glass in his hand. Still angry atVictor for having let her sit in a jail cell while he sat at homenot lifting a finger to help her, then inviting himself to herdinner with her mother so he could play with her and comment on hermother’s looks was already more than she could take. But this? Totry and humiliate her in front of her mom by bringing her to aplace Chapter Five owns? How dare he include her mother in hisfucked up game.

She pushed against him to place distancebetween them as he sat staring at her like an idiot.

“The next time you make reservations for meand a member of my family, make it at a place where we won’t beaccosted by one of your fucking Chapters!” she whisper yelled. “Howdare you involve my mother in your sick game!”

Victor’s look of shock turned to quick angerand he gripped her upper arm and dragged her out of the restaurant.He moved so hastily she nearly fell over on her three inch heels asshe stumbled behind him.

Once outside, Victor further dragged her to adarkened corner outside where Mr. Black verbally ripped intoher.

“Say what’s on your mind.”

Elsa closed her mouth tight.

“Ten. Nine. Eight…” he began counting down.“Seven...” he narrowed his eyes. “Six…” he gritted his teeth.“Five…”

This was absurd. No one counts down. When shestood with her hands fisted at her sides defiantly, he ground histeeth loudly.

“Fucking say it, Elsa!”

“Don’t you mean Eight?”

“You lying, little cunt!” he yelled, causingseveral passersby to look over. “How fucking long have youknown?”

Elsa lifted a hand to slap him for havingcalled her something so despicable, but she stopped mid-air makingMr. Black laugh loudly.

“So I guess you are trainable after all.”

Not caring what the consequences would be,Elsa lifted her hand again and pulled her arm back as far as itwould go and slapped him with such intensity she split his lip.

“I’m the fucking liar?” she shrieked. “Youunbelievable hypocrite! I told you that if you showed me honestyyou would get it in return! My God, you were going to allow aserial killer to read about me! What the fuck is wrong withyou?”

He stepped back and spit a mouthful of bloodonto the ground and growled in such a terrifying way that Elsasuddenly felt like she was going to pass out. The look on his facewas murderous. She suddenly remembered his written words and whathis mother had done to him and though she didn’t know the details,she could only imagine.

“Oh, God, Victor…” she whispered. “I’m sosorry.”

“That’s Mr. Fucking. Black.”

“Fine, I’m sorry, Mr. Black,” she swallowedhard.

“For what?” he ground out between his teeth.“For lying this whole time or for being a nosey, fucking bitch?” hebelted out loudly.

She shook her head and tears filled hervision when she saw more blood begin to ooze from his mouth. “I’mnot sorry for those things…”

“Fuck you, Eight,” he spat out.

“I’m sorry for hitting you when I promisedmyself I would never do that again.”

His eyes narrowed with confusion.

“You don’t deserve that. I’m sorry. I…” shecouldn’t take anymore. “I just wanted to be the one to helpyou.”

His look of hatred changed to horror. “Idon’t need to be helped.”

“Tell me how I can make this right. Tell mewhat you want from me,” she squeaked out.

A group of people walked by and Mr. Blackquickly changed to Victor.

“We’ll finish with this later and by finish,I fucking mean finish.”