Sancte Diaboli Part One (Elite King's Club #6) - Amo Jones Page 0,3

the first staircase which then leads to the main one. I pace myself as I make my way down, my eyes fixed on the floor and my fingers grazing over the aged wooden rails.

Silence cuts through the chatter and I know I’ve been spotted.

I bring my eyes up to face everyone. “Hi. I’m Saint.”

They look around at each other; some confused, others not so much. There has to be around ten people in here, along with a couple of adults.

“Ahh, I think this is our cue to leave,” an older man says. His hair is slicked back, with a spray of salt and pepper strands that cling to shaved sides. Tattoos crawl all over his hands and neck—so many tattoos. He takes the hand of the woman next to him and slowly escorts her out of the room. Just before they round the corner, they both cast a tight smile toward me. Pinched lips and droopy eyes. Strange. Yet both oddly attractive.

“What the fuck are you doing down here?” Brantley growls, taking the first few steps toward me all while snapping the awkward silence that clings in the air with an iron fist.

“Bran Bran!” A girl, the same one I saw in the gym not too long ago, interrupts him, her long pink hair tucked behind her ears. “It’s time.”

She knew about me? My cheeks heat. In fact, none of them seem really surprised to see me.

“She’s right,” another voice says, this time a male. I find him perched in one of the chairs, a foot pressed against the coffee table. He, like the older man, has some spraying of tattoos over his arm and neck, though not a lot. Not as much as the other guys who are in here with them. One even has them on his face. “You can’t hide her in this house anymore. She’s part of this and you know it.”

“Part of what?” I muse. My English is fluent, but the end of some syllables still has my tongue slipping and struggling around. I was told I had a speech impediment from a young age, though that has long since left the building. Now Brantley probably wishes he could get me to shut up.

Brantley moves away from me and heads toward the alcohol cabinet. His long fingers wrap around an aged bottle of whiskey as he slams it closed again and spins back around to face me. I can feel the heat radiating off of him in waves, with a tide that’s directed at yours truly. I find his gaze instantly, offering a small smile. I’ll be fine, it says. I’m going to kill you, his replies. We both know it’s not true. He tolerates me like one would a pet. He keeps me close because he thinks he has a responsibility to take care of me, but I’ve grown to know the truth. I’ve always been a pest to him, nothing more and nothing less. Me coming down here was hopefully the first step to me gaining some sort of separation from him, to remind him that he isn’t stuck with me. Or at the very least, he doesn’t have to be. I owe him my life, but he doesn’t need to be in it forever.

“I’m Tillie,” the pink-haired girl says gently. She points to the guy next to her. “This is Nate, the two people who just walked out were Scarlet and Hector Hayes, and that—” Her finger lands on the guy who is sitting on the chair with his leg propped on the coffee table. “Is Bishop Hayes. That is Eli, but you can ignore him.” Eli snickers under his breath as she carries on. “Hunter and Chase are the older generation, so you probably won’t see much of them, but they’re around a lot—” she rambles, but my eyes are stuck on Bishop, who seems to be watching me carefully. I hold his stare obstinately, ignoring the fact it’s like an open flame in a dark room. Finally, I pull my gaze away from him. “—so what else did I miss?” Tillie asks, oblivious to my wane of attention. I don’t know what she was talking about because my mind was trapped in one dimension and one dimension only.

“Ah,” I murmur, shuffling on my feet. My palms itch. Maybe it wasn’t a good idea, me coming down here after all.

“She doesn’t know anything, Little Terror, shut up,” Brantley growls from the other side of the room. It wasn’t harsh, or loud,