Voices echoed in my head, layered with the sound of my own racing heartbeat.
“You’re going to feel so sweet around my big cock.”
“I can’t wait to shove my dick in your mouth while my buddy here fucks you from behind.”
I bared my teeth at them, spewing words like, “Fuck you, and go to hell.”
“Now, now, bitch,” John said, entering the barn where he kept us. “Save your screaming for when I’m fucking you. I love a girl who fights me.”
No. No. No. Not again. Not ever again.
I forced myself to focus on the present—the cool air, the distant sound of a car engine, anything to anchor me to the here and now. But it was hard to outrun my past—a past that had sunk its claws in deep and hadn’t let go in ten years since my escape.
“Grace.” Josh’s honey-toned voice drew me from hell as he wiped a tear from my cheek.
I rapidly blinked. I was not weak. I was not the teenager who was naïve to the world around me. I would not break in front of this man.
Josh smirked as though he was getting his rocks off by imagining what I was thinking.
“You know, my dad never liked when you cried. I always loved watching him whip you.”
His words hit me like physical blows, each one shattering another piece of my carefully constructed reality. My phone fell from my hands, the clatter exploding like my damn heart.
I silently scolded myself for not trusting my instincts.
“Ah, I see you’re remembering,” he said, sounding all too giddy. “I’ve been waiting for this moment for a very long time. I almost put my plan into play before now.” He tucked my hair around my ear. “But, according to the man I call Dad these days—you met him: Drew—I wasn’t ready.”
“You’ve been watching me.” It was more of a statement than a question.
“Between Drew and me, yes. But then you had to go and hire bodyguards,” he whispered in my ear. “What a lovely surprise when I saw you come out of that building alone. You have no idea how long I’ve been waiting for this moment.”
All my training, every defensive move I’d practiced until my muscles ached, every scenario I’d rehearsed—all of it evaporated like water in dry air. My body refused to respond, frozen between fight and flight. Bile rose in my throat as I realized how pathetically unprepared I still was despite years of preparation.
“Zane,” I said, internally screaming at myself to run now. But terror had rewired my brain, at least for the moment.
“I never liked that name.” He dragged his fingers down my neck to my cleavage. “My dad came up with the alias from some movie he watched. Fucked up, if you ask me.”
“Is Josh your real name?” Curiosity and all.
“Joshua Kinley, if you must know. My dad’s name was Victor Kinley. And he was a great man until you killed him.”
I wanted to puke, kick him in the balls, and pull out his eyes. But again, I couldn’t seem to move. I had to keep him talking. Brian would realize I’d been gone too long and come looking for me.
“Drew is your dad now,” I said. “He’s a weirdo.”
Josh laughed in my ear. “He likes to give people mindfucks. I thought it was brilliant that he wore a G-shaped earring and told you about the meaning of your name. He told me the look on your face was priceless.”
“Let me guess,” I said. “He doesn’t have a mother by the name of Grace.”
Keep talking to him. Brian will be out any minute.
“Of course not.” Hunger jumped off him as he pinched one of my nipples, and his voice turned harsh so that he sounded like his father. “I always had a hard-on for Thea, but you’re just as beautiful.” His face darkened as he pinned me against the SUV then clutched my throat.
I’d spent years looking over my shoulder, years worrying that this day would come, and now, here I was, facing a monster once again. Only this time, I had a strong feeling this monster would be far worse than his father.
But I wouldn’t go down without a fight.
I drove my knee up hard toward his groin, but the asshole anticipated my move and twisted, taking the blow on his thigh instead. The movement caused him to let go long enough for me to slam my fist into his nose.
