Part of Gabe knows he ought to be playing this more carefully. Hiding the bitterness behind one of his many well-polished masks. Drunken disappointment is easy. Drunken dumbass is even easier. But people start to mark bitter, angry men, and he's already proven himself a murderer - and not even for sex or vengeance, which apparently would've made it acceptable, but an accident. That, he's found, was much harder to swallow.

He'd never killed anyone by accident before. Only ever on purpose.

But the bitter is like glass in his throat. Biting every time he tries to swallow it back.

"You really don't forget your first rape orgy," he drawls. "Truly a unique experience."