I shake my head frantically. “I can’t.I can’t. He’llkillme.”
“Killing you is the last thing he’ll do. He wants tokeepyou, not harm you.”
“You didn’t see him in the cell, Max,” I whisper, my words seeped in horror as memories invade my mind. “He was insane. Heisinsane. He’ll slip and kill me eventually. If you won’t let me run, thenplease, kill me yourself.” My gut tells me that Max would be a kind executioner. Greyson would be as cruel and merciless as he’s always been—systematic, ruthless, and sadistic. I nearly killed him; he’ll retaliate against that with torture. I’d ratherdiethan be put in a cell again.
“You’re wrong,” Max says. “You don’t have a choice in coming back, but you have a choice with how you’ll handle it. Greyson is in love with you.”
“No, he’sobsessed with me!”
Max nods. “He is,andhe’s in love with you.Andhe’s furious with you. You didn’t see him these last nine months, Scarlett. He’s…” Max breaks off with a shudder. “It was bad. It only got better when he knew you were close. There are a lot of things in store for you, but none of them involve pain. If you rebel or resist, though, it’ll be tough. You mightpreferpain over what he’ll do.”
I swallow harshly. There was a moment, after Monster had taken me to his apartment and vowed to never hurt me again, that he used a certain interrogation technique that broke me—after weeks ofpainfultorture failed to do so. He weaponized pleasure against me, and it worked… to the point when I no longerwantedto defy him.
The look on Max’s face tells me that weaponized pleasure will be the very least I’m in for.
Ican’tgo back. I can’t do that to myself. I’m just starting to heal; I can’t lose the progress I’ve made. I refuse to live out my life as a slave, and I have one final ace up my sleeve that could grant me my freedom.
“You’re as bad as he is, aren’t you?” I ask Max softly. “Even worse… because I think youarea good person deep down, and you’ve buried that with so much rot it’s hidden. Monster was never good, so he’s a different story.” Max’s eyes shutter as my words hit him, hopefully making him take a nice, long look at himself. I gently twist in his grip, and this time, he lets me go. I put my hand over his, gazing into his eyes. “Don’t become like him,” I beg. “Don’t become like Greyson or Cain. Get out before you’re told to take a sex slave of your own,please.”
Max swallows harshly, taking a sudden step back. I give him a slow nod, then turn to face my door, straightening my spine and squaring my shoulders.
It’s time to pay the piper.
Chapter Three
Scarlett
Before I even step through the door, I already feel like I’m back in Monster’s apartment at the compound. Back nearly a year ago, when he first plucked me out of that horrible cell and set me on his soft bed. I’m transported to the moment I realized that Monster had put us in a deathmatch, and only one of us could walk away from it alive.
I should’ve killed him when I had the chance. I know that. When the opportunity presented itself, I knew I couldn’t live with myself if I went through with it—not when it would turn me into my father. Not when Monster had told me he loved me.
It feels like I’m opening a door to hell rather than the door to my apartment as I gently push it open, watching it swing inward with a creak.
My living room is simple. I couldn’t afford much since I refused to keep letting my brother pay for my living arrangements—which was probably yet another mistake. If I let Eric support me, I would’ve been somewhere safer, somewhere with guards and a system that even an assassin would have a hard time bypassing.
In my desperation to escape any ties to the underground, I made myself a sitting duck. I would do so many things differently if given the chance…
There’s no TV in my living room. Only two old armchairs that came with the apartment, a coffee table I found discarded on a sidewalk, and a kitchen in the back that has a two-burner stove and oven that doesn’t work.
The Monster who haunts me sits on one of the armchairs, which has been turned to face the entryway. He’s reclining in the seat, arms draped over the armrests, looking like a king on a throne rather than a man who broke into his former captive’s apartment. His grey eyes pierce me with such intensity, they’re like a knife twisting in my chest. He’s more muscular than the last time I saw him, as if he’s been spending all his free time lifting weights. His dark brown hair is slightly disheveled, and his angular jaw clenches as he takes me in.
“Flower,” he says, the nickname so soft I can barely hear it. “I’ve missed you.”
Panic swirls through every inch of my body, but it’s hardened with resolve. I know what I need to do; I just don’t want to do it. I don’t want to die, but I know how this ends—what’s been written into fate since the moment Monster kidnapped me.
I turn to face the door, giving myself a moment’s reprieve from the sight of him. I gently shut the door, flicking the lock, then move over to the entry way beside it. I open the drawer and drop my keys into it, then set my purse on top of it. Quickly and quietly, I reach beneath the wooden table and snag the weapon I hid there in case a moment like this came to pass.
I turn to face Monster, this time with a gun in my hand. It’s dangling in my grip by my side, but it’ll take a single motion to aim it and pull the trigger. I’m just not surewhereI’ll be aiming it yet.
In tense times like this, instinct tends to take over. Intuition is at the wheel, and everything else falls into the background. I don’t knowwhat I’ll do yet, only that whatever I choose will be deadly to one or both of us.
Monster’s eyes fall to the gun, then meet mine once again.
“Put that away, Scarlett. You’ll only make things worse for yourself.” He lifts a hand and crooks a finger. “Come here. I think it’s time we had a chat, don’t you?”
No, I don’t. I think it’s time to put both of us out of our misery, once and for all.
“You’re not afraid,” I observe quietly. “Do you even know what fear is?”
