Reckoning (Sacrifical Duet Book 1) Read online

  Contents

  Copyright

  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 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Thank you

  About the Author

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2020 by Riley Ashby

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or used in any manner without written permission of the copyright owner except for the use of quotations in a book review. For more information, address:

  [email protected]

  Cover design by Diana, Triumphbookcovers.com

  Editing by Editing4Indies

  ASIN B085F12SX5

  This book contains themes that may not be appropriate for those sensitive to sexual assault or self-injury.

  www.rileyashby.com

  Meyer

  It was after midnight when my father came to get me, clapping me on the shoulder as I threw back the last dregs of the scotch we had opened for this occasion. Drinking to excess wasn’t something I did often, but the night of my thirtieth birthday was an exception. The alcohol had dulled me enough that I didn’t jerk away from his hand, but I stepped back from him just the same.

  “I have a surprise for you,” Conrad said, winking at me under white eyebrows. I felt my smile return and only stumbled a little as I turned around, bumping shoulders with my best friend, Shawn. Conrad was in a good mood.

  “More of this scotch, I hope?” I waved the empty bottle, but he laughed.

  “Something better, I think. Come with me.”

  Sober me would have been more suspicious, but he seemed genuinely happy, which was rare. I shoved off the bottle and buried my hands in my pockets, trying to walk straight as I followed my father out of the restaurant where we had been reveling for the past several hours. I had a lot to celebrate. Not only was it my birthday, but that same morning, I had received word that the board of directors had voted unanimously to make me the COO for Schaf Industries, our family’s firm, the largest defense contractor in the nation. Some tabloids cried nepotism, but my father had refused to throw his weight behind the nomination by recusing himself from the decision completely. I had won this on my own. Years of working in customer service while attending classes full-time for a double major, then a prestigious MBA program. Eighty-hour weeks while my friends spent spring break and summer vacation in Mexico. Shawn and I downed energy drinks instead of snorting cocaine so we could stay up all night to learn the business and work the books. I barely had time for leisure, but it had finally paid off. I was now one of the highest paid people under thirty in the country.

  “Give me a hint.” I tripped over my own feet, stumbling forward a bit but catching myself right before I slammed into my father’s back. He turned only slightly to smile at me.

  “Don’t make me ruin the surprise, son. You’re going to be very happy.”

  I felt like a mafia king as we strolled through the restaurant. Waitstaff cleared out of our way in the kitchen, allowing us to pass into the small loading area at the back of the building. And there, bound on the floor in only her underwear and surrounded by men who could have held her aloft with one hand, was Madeline Sheppard.

  I had barely stopped smiling since ten o’clock this morning, but my face stretched impossibly wider at the sight of her. Hearing our approach, Madeline lifted her head and shook her hair from her eyes, though it still stuck to the blood and sweat smeared across her cheeks and forehead. It took her a moment to recognize us—it had been years since we had spoken—but realization dawned soon enough. Her eyes narrowed as she took me in, then looked at my father. “Conrad?”

  Using her bound hands, she pushed herself into a kneeling position and started to get to her feet. The brute closest to her landed a kick to her stomach, and she fell over again with a cry.

  “You’re right,” I said to my father. “This is much better than scotch.” My head was suddenly clear, my vision unwavering. I couldn’t take my eyes off her.

  The small creature on the ground in front of me wasn’t hiding behind her dark hair. The blood staining her pale skin was red in some places and had faded to brown in others. At first glance, it didn’t seem like they had hurt her too badly, but there was a large bruise wrapping around her rib cage. For her part, she didn’t seem to take notice of the cuts and bruises peppering her skin as she rolled to look at us, shifting to her knees once more even though she had been kicked back down the last time. The same brute who had hit her before looked at Conrad, who raised his hand to stop him.

  Madeline turned to my father. “What is going on? Why are you doing this to me?” The words were slurred, and I thought they must have drugged her, but she spit blood so dark it was nearly black. A splatter hit the toe of my left shoe, and I frowned. She swallowed as she looked at the blood, clearly uncomfortable at the sight of it. I filed that away for future reference as she spoke again, a little clearer this time. “Is this some sort of prank?”

  Conrad crouched in front of her and gathered a mass of her hair in his hand, yanking her head back until she cried out.

  “Oh, darling, this is much more than a prank,” he said, pushing down on the crimson bruise flowering across her ribs. She tried to curl around herself to protect the injury, but my father held firm to her hair, so she had no choice but to look at him as he spoke. “Did your mother ever tell you how she knows my family?”

  She couldn’t answer because she was gasping for breath so deeply. Her eyes flicked to me as if searching for assistance, but I shrugged at her and stuck my hands in my pockets. Conrad pushed harder on her ribs, and she moaned again. I wish I had more scotch.

  “I’ll take that as a no. That’s all right.” He released her suddenly, and she fell onto her elbows. The bone hitting concrete made a sound like stiletto heels on a marble floor.

  She turned her eyes to me. “Please let me go. I won’t tell anyone.” Why did she think I could help her? Did I look like a pushover?

  My father spoke before I could even open my mouth to reply. “You’re not going anywhere, little girl. You belong to my son now. If you focus on doing what he tells you to, you might just survive the coming weeks better than your whore mother. Do you understand?”

  Her face transformed from fear to rage in one fell swoop. “Don’t you dare slander my mother.” She spat in his face, blood and phlegm mixing on his cheek and dripping down across his jaw.

  One of the brutes moved forward, arm already cocked, but Conrad waved him off and pulled out a handkerchief to clean his face. He pulled her up a little higher, and then let go at the moment his other fist connected with her cheek. She fell backward, her head making a sickening thump as it connected with the concrete. She groaned and curled in on herself again. My father’s ring had opened a cut under her eye that bled all over her already filthy face. The sight
of her crimson blood brought a smile back to my face. I pictured it smeared all over her body, staining her breasts, and the taste of it on my tongue. I took a step forward without realizing it.

  My father grabbed the back of her neck and shook her. “I said, do you understand?”

  She nodded, shielding her face from further blows and trying to make herself as small as possible. “Yes.” Her voice was as small as she was, a field mouse being borne down upon by a hawk.

  Conrad arched an eyebrow at me. “Maybe you won’t have as much fun breaking her as I had hoped.”

  I couldn’t stop grinning. This was far and away the best thing that had happened today. “I think I’ll have the time of my life.” Stepping forward, I leaned down and pulled her to her feet, our eyes meeting for a split second before I tossed her over my shoulder. I didn’t even care that her blood would probably ruin my suit. “I think I’m going to take my present and head home.” Joshua, my personal security, nodded and ran off to grab the car. I turned to look at my father, who was frowning at the blood on his fingers. “Thanks for this, Dad. Best thing you could have gotten me.” Calling him Dad? I was definitely still drunk.

  He smiled once more, clearly pleased with himself. “Happy Birthday, Meyer.”

  I’d have to say goodbye to Shawn later. Right now, I just wanted to go home and play with my new toy. Clasped fists bounced against my lower back as I walked to the car pulling up at the loading bay, knowing not even I could get away with carrying a bound and half-naked woman through a restaurant. Madeline gasped in pain as I dropped her onto the back seat, then she moved away from me as I slid in beside her. I dragged her back toward me as the car pulled away, pushing at the bruises on her arm. She shied away from each one, only to meet the passenger door of the car.

  “Meyer.” She gasped. “You can be reasonable. Let me out. I won’t tell anyone it was you.”

  I frowned at her. “You know nothing about me.” She whimpered as I pulled her onto my lap and flipped on the lights in the back seat so I could see her better. My father’s ring had left a cut on her cheek; I wiped at the tacky marks on her cheeks only to send fresh blood flowing. “But you’ll learn.” I leaned forward to lick the blood off her face. I tasted my entire future in her, the key that would change the rest of my life. All it would take was one flick of a knife or the flash of a gun in the night. No one would ever know. She was mine forever.

  Her entire body trembled beneath my fingers. “God, you’re as sadistic as your father.” It wasn’t an insult; she spoke the words with real fear. My lips twisted into a grin because she got it. She knew to be afraid of me.

  “I’m glad we don’t have to dance around that detail any longer. You’ll get no reprieve from me.” I held her away from me just slightly, letting my eyes roam over her nearly naked form. Was this what she wore on a day-to-day basis? A pale bra the same color as her skin stained with her blood and dirt from the floor of the restaurant. Pink boy shorts covered her entire ass and the tops of her thighs. I tugged at the waistband briefly before she slapped my hand away with her bound wrists. That alone was enough to make my cock hard. She struggled anew when she felt it press into her leg, but I pressed a hand against her injured rib. She moaned and fell away from my hand into my chest.

  “We’ll get you some nicer clothes,” I soothed. Her forehead fell against my chest, just over my heartbeat. Every time she tried to wriggle away, her ribs moved beneath my palm, and she fell forward again. “You’ll feel better once you’re dressed appropriately.”

  “I’m not dressing to please you,” she snapped, still trying to free herself, but I pressed harder against her side. She couldn’t move without hurting herself more. She gasped and whined, every sound pulling at my groin.

  “Then you’ll go naked.”

  “Please don’t,” she begged. I skated my fingers along her thigh, feeling the heat from another bruise wrapping around her entire leg. She was in worse shape than I thought, and that made me smile.

  “Don’t worry, Mads,” I whispered, stroking her arm in a consoling gesture. She shivered, trapped between my chest and my arms. Tucked against me, she felt like the entire world condensed into one body. A world I was going to conquer and then destroy. “We’re going to have plenty of fun together.”

  Madeline

  When I woke up, my whole body hurt. The carpet I rested on was soft enough, but I could feel the marks left on my skin after lying in one position for so long. I didn’t have to try to remember what had happened to me because the events of the previous night were burned in my mind.

  It was a tale as old as time—a young woman attacked when walking to her car alone at night by men who wished to do her harm. But these weren’t just any random assholes out for a good time with an unlucky girl. I was a specific target.

  I had been working a dead-end job in my small town in Iowa after graduating college with my political science degree, wishing and hoping for something better. My new job at a human rights charity in New York seemed like a dream come true, but my mother begged me not to go.

  “Do you remember the men who came to your sixteenth birthday party?” she asked, tears falling down her face despite her calm tone. “If you go to New York, you’ll be playing right into their hands. They’ll hurt you, Mads.”

  I should have listened.

  They didn’t hit me until I started fighting back, but once they did, they were ruthless. There had been no consideration for the fact that I was a woman who weighed a third as much as any one of the men who dragged me, kicking and screaming, into the back of a black van. They hit me relentlessly until the pain became so much, I stopped struggling. Even then, I didn’t want to let myself think about who could possibly have been behind my abduction. The reality was too terrifying to consider.

  Meyer Schaf. I knew exactly what kind of man now held me, and I was fucking terrified. The car ride was a lesson in terror and suspense. His hands never left my body, finding every last bruise and cut inflicted upon me by his men. Straying closer than they should have to parts I would never willingly allow him access to. By the time we arrived at his house, I was exhausted from the pain and disgusted from being pressed so close against him for so long, his arousal obvious by the appendage pressing into my leg for the entire ride. The more I fought him, the harder he seemed to become. When he opened the car door, I tried to bolt only to be caught by his driver and deposited back into Meyer’s arms. I swore to myself that I would fight him with every last ounce of strength, but he simply carried me inside and dropped me unceremoniously on the floor in his bedroom. I could barely breathe past the pain in my chest.

  “Go to sleep,” he’d said in a flat tone before turning off the lights and leaving me in the dark. And my body was so exhausted from the ordeal that I obeyed nearly instantly.

  Trying to sit up, I found my hands still bound so close together I could barely move them. My fingers tingled as I tried my best to wiggle them and return blood flow to my starved capillaries. The moment my head left the floor, pain rushed forth like a wave, and I started to retch.

  “If you vomit on this carpet, I’ll make you eat it.”

  I nearly jumped out of my skin, then groaned at the pain triggered by the movement. Meyer’s voice alone was enough to make me sick on a normal day, and I had heard a lot of it since he seemed to be on TV constantly. Like it or not, I had to stay abreast of his movements and decisions, since everything he did impacted everything I was trying to do. That and my mother insisted on it. Though I’d never taken her seriously. Until now. I closed my eyes, which wasn’t difficult since the left side of my face felt swollen, and tried to get my stomach under control. When I felt more grounded, I finally looked up.

  Meyer stood over me, shirtless in low-slung pajama pants, and I had to force myself to focus on his face. His body was gorgeous, but he didn’t need reminding. Golden hair fell forward over his face as he gazed down at me.

  “This is the first day I’ve had off in almost ten years, and I don
’t want to deal with your bodily fluids.” He snapped his fingers. “Get up.”

  I was already planning to try to stand, but I didn’t want to give him the idea I was going to be taking orders from him. When I refused to move, he quickly kicked me over and pushed his foot down on my sternum, already bruised from the blows I had received the night before. I screamed without realizing I had decided to.

  “Get the fuck up, or I’ll make last night seem like a walk in the park.”

  I wanted to fight him. I didn’t really know Meyer, but I knew men like him. I knew if I gave an inch, he would take a mile, dragging me down the road behind a fast-moving car.

  But I hurt so, so much already.

  I stood, pausing a couple of times on the way up when screaming pain nearly brought me to tears. It was so intense, so widespread, I couldn’t even pinpoint where it emanated from. My whole body felt like one big bruise.

  On my feet, I took a quick look at my surroundings. Red, of course. The color of blood. Crimson carpet complemented the black drapes. A deep mahogany bedframe with a scarlet top sheet falling off the mattress on one side. The magenta bruises on my body matched the décor. With further dismay, I saw that the same scratchy twine that bound my wrists now tethered me the bedframe. I suspected Meyer had purposely chosen the roughest material he could find.

  Turning to look at him once more, I started when I realized he was approaching me with a knife. Before I could move, he slid the blade between my wrists and easily cut my bonds. My hands screamed as blood surged back to them, and I heard myself whimper.

  Grabbing my face, he barely missed the most swollen flesh on my left when his fingers dug into my cheeks.

  “Do you understand why you’re here?”

  I shook my head because it was the truth or close enough to it. My mother had never told me why she feared this family so much, no matter how much I wheedled and begged. My father would get angry if I broached the subject with him; it was the only time he would raise his voice at me.