Darkness swallowed the bathroom as the mirror's glass cracked—not outward, but inward, like something was pushing through from the other side. Victor's reflection grinned wider, his fingers pressing against the fractured surface. "You didn't think a shower would wash me off, did you?" His voice slithered through the room, oily and intimate. I stumbled back, my bare skin hitting the marble wall just as the door burst open.
Ethan came in first, gun drawn, his body blocking the others. "Alex?" His gaze darted from the shattered mirror to my heaving chest, my nipples pebbled from fear and the bathroom's sudden chill. Behind him, Liam whistled. "Fuck, she's actually shaking." He stepped around Ethan, his fingers trailing up my arm. "What did you see, princess?"
I opened my mouth, but Victor's laughter echoed in my skull, drowning my words.
Jace pushed past them, his tablet scanning the room. "No thermal signatures, no devices—just her." He adjusted his glasses, eyes lingering on my exposed thighs. "But her cortisol levels are spiking."
Amir appeared in the doorway, silent as a shadow. He didn't look at my body—he stared at the mirror, his nostrils flaring. "Victor was here," he said, voice like gravel. "Not physically. He's in her head."
Ethan holstered his gun and gripped my chin. "Look at me." His thumb pressed into my bottom lip. "Did he touch you?"
The question sent a violent shiver through me. Because yes—in the flashes of memory, Victor's hands were everywhere: knotting in my hair, squeezing my throat, sliding between my legs with possessive cruelty. But the worst part? Sometimes, in those memories, I arched into him.
Liam crouched suddenly, his face level with my hips. "She's dripping," he announced, grinning when I tried to clamp my thighs shut. His fingers dug into my knees, prying them open. "Oh, don't be shy. We've all tasted you before."
Trey's growl cut through the steam. "Enough." He yanked Liam up by his collar, but not before Liam's tongue darted out, licking a stripe up my inner thigh. I gasped, my back bowing off the wall.
Ethan's grip on my jaw tightened. "Focus. What did Victor say?"
The words tumbled out: "He called me solnyshko."
The men went still. Even Liam froze.
Jace swallowed hard. "That's impossible. She shouldn't remember that name."
Amir stepped forward, his hand hovering over the knife scar on his ribs—the one that matched my blade's serrations. "He's triggering her memories on purpose."
Ethan's expression darkened. He stripped off his jacket, wrapped it around my shoulders, and lifted me into his arms. "We're not waiting for him to make the next move."
The Bedroom
They put me in a room that smelled like lavender and gun oil. My room, Ethan claimed, though nothing felt familiar. The bed was massive, its black silk sheets cool against my skin as he laid me down.
Jace hovered near the door, typing frantically on his tablet. "I'll block any external signals—no more hallucinations."
Liam flopped onto the bed beside me, his fingers playing with the jacket's zipper where it brushed my bare stomach. "Hallucinations don't leave physical evidence." He pointed to the mirror's cracks, now spiderwebbing across the ceiling.
Trey leaned against the footboard, arms crossed. "We should sedate her."
Ethan ignored them, his hands braced on either side of my head. "Victor planted something in your mind. A trigger. A weakness." His knee nudged my legs apart, settling between them. "I'm going to find it."
Then his mouth was on mine, demanding, relentless. I whimpered, torn between pushing him away and pulling him closer. His teeth scraped my lip, drawing blood. "Tell me you remember this," he growled against my mouth.
And I did—suddenly, violently. Ethan above me, his sweat dripping onto my breasts as I clawed his back. Ethan pinning my wrists, his voice rough: "Say you're mine."
The memory shattered when Liam's hand slid under the jacket, cupping my breast. "She's remembering," he murmured, rolling my nipple between his fingers. "Look how hard she is."
Jace made a strangled noise. "This isn't the time for—"
"Shut up, genius," Liam purred, biting my earlobe. "You're just jealous I get to touch her first."
Ethan ripped Liam's hand away. "She's not a toy." But even as he said it, his palm replaced Liam's, squeezing roughly. My back arched off the bed.
Amir spoke from the corner, his voice cutting through the haze: "Victor's watching."
The men stilled.
A security feed flickered on Jace's tablet—a live video of this room, this bed, from an angle none of us could see.
Victor's voice crackled through the speakers: "Did you miss me, boys?"
Ethan snarled, shielding my body with his. "Where are you?"
Laughing, Victor whispered: "Closer than you think."
Then the feed cut to static—and the lights went out.