Carnage (l.O.R.D.S., #5)

Set in the world of the Lords, a centuries-old secret society whose members inherit power and wealth through initiation and obedience, the novel follows Saint Beckham Carter and Ashtyn Lane Price through a violent, possessive love story spanning nearly two decades. The Lords operate through strict hierarchies: Their sons must pass brutal initiations at Barrington University before being fully accepted. Among their ranks are the Spade brothers, a small hereditary group responsible for running Carnage, a sprawling compound hidden in the Pennsylvania mountains that functions as a prison and torture facility for Lords who break their oaths. Saint is a Spade brother, as are his closest companions, Haidyn Reeves, Kashton Pierce, and Ashtyn's twin brother, Adam Price.

Part One opens with Saint's four years of initiations. As a freshman, he is injected with adrenaline and forced to fight two men to the death. As a sophomore, he is locked in a concrete pit that fills with freezing salt water, exploiting a childhood fear of drowning rooted in his mother's attempt to drown him. A mysterious prisoner in an adjacent pit coaches him through survival. His junior year requires the Spade brothers to eliminate targets aboard a megayacht. By senior year, all four are branded with the Lords crest, officially becoming Lords.

Throughout these years, Saint has been secretly watching Ashtyn through hidden cameras in her rooms. Ashtyn has wanted Saint since adolescence. As the only daughter of a Spade brother, she is destined to serve as a "chosen," a woman given to a Spade brother for his sexual use during his senior year. A Spade brother's chosen must be a virgin and has no right to refuse. Ashtyn's mother warns her that a Lord will never love her, while her mother's therapist, Laura, suggests Ashtyn has unhealthy attitudes toward sex. Ashtyn's father, Altus Price, tells Saint that if Ashtyn does not bleed during the vow ceremony, the public ritual in which a chosen is bound to an altar and claimed before the assembled Lords, Saint must discard her, effectively condemning her to sex trafficking.

Saint reveals himself as Ashtyn's chosen by waiting in her bedroom wearing a Lords mask. Overjoyed, Ashtyn submits to his control. He conditions her body to associate pleasure exclusively with him, forbids her from touching herself, and punishes disobedience by spanking her with a belt in front of Haidyn and Kashton. At the vow ceremony, Ashtyn strips naked, is bound to the altar, and recites vows while Saint claims her before the assembled Lords. She bleeds, satisfying the requirement, though the method he used to ensure this remains hidden. The Lords believe he has taken her virginity. Afterward, Saint establishes a dynamic in which he regularly shares Ashtyn with Haidyn and Kashton, who are permitted to use her mouth. Ashtyn embraces the arrangement, narrating that she loves all three brothers differently.

Their world fractures when Ashtyn witnesses a Lord's wife being restrained, stripped, and tortured at Carnage while Saint and Kashton brand the woman's neck. Ashtyn flees in terror, and her trust in Saint is shaken. Shortly after, two Lords, Tyson Crawford and Miles Hopper, break into the Price home on an initiation assignment. Tyson stabs Ashtyn's mother to death in front of her. They bind and gag Ashtyn to lure Adam back, but Tyson secretly alerts Saint, who arrives, kills Miles, and carries Ashtyn out.

With her mother dead and her brother and father missing, Saint hides Ashtyn at Carnage. His father forces an ultimatum: Saint must brand Ashtyn and treat her as a prisoner, or the fathers will throw her into the basement cells. Haidyn secretly sedates Ashtyn before the branding to spare her pain, and Saint brands "666" on her pelvic bone. The fathers are furious she was sedated, and Haidyn is later punished with electrocution and whipping, though Saint and Kashton remain unaware.

Laura, continuing mandatory therapy, reveals devastating news: Ashtyn is pregnant, and she was raped before the vow ceremony by a man her mother arranged, meaning the baby may not be Saint's. Laura adds that Saint cheated at the ritual to make Ashtyn bleed, violating his oath, and that discovery would destroy him. Haidyn takes Ashtyn to Gavin, a doctor outside Carnage, whose ultrasound confirms the dates make the baby impossible to be Saint's. Haidyn provides a new identity and shows Ashtyn an escape tunnel from the morgue. Before fleeing, she confronts Saint, tells him she loves him, and shoots him in the chest. She escapes into the night.

Part Two opens four years later. Saint, Haidyn, and Kashton now run Carnage after their fathers were killed. The Lords subjected all three brothers to six months of brutal retraining as punishment for Ashtyn's escape. Saint has spent four years searching for Ashtyn. A breakthrough comes when Whitney, Ashtyn's old friend from Barrington, is captured and reveals her location.

Ashtyn has been living as "Brittany" in Las Vegas, working as a stripper at Glass, a club connected to the Kings, another powerful organization. She self-medicates with drugs and alcohol and has never stopped thinking about Saint. On a themed mask night, Saint visits the club in disguise and has sex with Ashtyn, who does not recognize him. Afterward, he and Kashton sedate her, beat her boyfriend unconscious, and transport her to Carnage. She wakes to discover Saint has implanted a tracking device in her hip and had her intrauterine device removed without her knowledge or consent. He tells her the next time she leaves, it will be in a body bag. He institutes a regime of sexual control, denying her orgasms and using her desperation as leverage.

When Saint leaves Carnage briefly, masked men ram Haidyn's vehicle and kidnap both Haidyn and Ashtyn. For four days, a masked man calling himself "Ace" holds Ashtyn captive outdoors, whipping and raping her daily. He tells her he fathered the child she lost years ago and intends to impregnate her again. On the fourth day, her captors release her to be hunted. She packs mud into the bell on her collar to silence it and escapes through the woods, eventually flagging down a car and returning to Carnage. Gavin informs Saint that Haidyn died during surgery. Saint is devastated.

When Ashtyn goes to the morgue, Adam appears with Haidyn, who is alive. His death was faked so he and Adam could infiltrate Ace's operation from within. Ace is unmasked as Benny, a man who had been stalking Ashtyn for years. Benny was the man Ashtyn's mother arranged to drug and rape her before the vow ceremony, and Laura served as his informant inside Carnage. His motive is revenge for the child he believes Ashtyn carried when she fled.

Saint then reveals the full truth: He always knew about the rape because Ashtyn's father showed him surveillance footage. He ensured she would bleed at the vow ceremony by cutting himself, bleeding into a capsule, and placing it inside her during the ritual to fake her virginity. Ashtyn explains she left because Laura told her the baby was Benny's, and she feared the Lords would kill Saint if they discovered his deception. Saint tells her he would have raised the child regardless. Haidyn confirms he helped Ashtyn escape because he believed she deserved a chance at motherhood. Saint punches him but acknowledges his intent.

A flashback reveals that during Ashtyn's earlier time at Carnage, Saint proposed in the cathedral and they married privately with Haidyn and Kashton as witnesses. In the first epilogue, Saint and Ashtyn are expecting twins. Saint calls Nicholas, the prisoner who coached him through the pit years earlier, now believed to be Laura's husband, whom Saint freed after taking over Carnage. The second epilogue jumps 18 years ahead: Saint and Ashtyn have two daughters, Tinsley and Berkeley, and the Spade brothers' families live near Carnage. The novel closes with Saint tying Ashtyn to their bed, their dynamic unchanged after two decades.