Good.
“Andi, please,” he says. “I’ve been doing a lot of thinking. I want to apologize. I want you back. I think… I think I’ve figured out what you were looking for all those years ago.”
I blink. “Excuse me?”
He takes a step in my direction. “I wasn’t the person you needed me to be back then,” he says. “I wasn’t willing to explore the things you wanted. But I think I know how to be that person now.”
“You have no idea what you’re talking about,” I counter.
My phone is in my hand. I need to text James, but I’m too terrified to look away from Adam, even if we are on a street with people around us.
I don’t trust him.
“I’m going to turn around,” I say slowly. “And if you follow me, I will scream.”
A glimmer rises in his eyes that I don’t like. “Seeing you with that scum the other night brought back a lot of memories,” he says, referring to Maddox. “It reminded me of everything you’d ever asked me to do with you. The games. Your little craving for bondage and role-playing. It got me thinking—realizing, really—that maybe… maybehewas the kind of man you’d wanted me to be.”
“Maddox is ten times the man you are,” I manage.
Adam chuckles. “We’ll see if the rest of the world agrees once I tell everyone who he is.”
“Don’t take your anger out on him,” I argue. “Leave him out of this. This is between us. Maddox has nothing to do with it. He’s never hurt you—”
“He took something from me. Something that he doesn’t deserve,” Adam interjects. “I plan to get it back.”
“God, you’re such an idiot,” I snarl. “I’m not a toy you get to pick up and put on a shelf as if you’ve somehow rescued me.”
“Aren’t you? Little Andersyn Matthews. Mommy’s broken girl, only looking for someone to shield her from her past, and yet still craving the monsters in the shadows.” He slides the mask over his face, and bile rises in my throat. “How’s this for your craving?” he asks with a tilt of his head.
“Adam, this isn’t fucking funny,” I counter, my voice rising.
Mother fucker. Everyone’s going to think this is a bit. A scary fucking bit.
I back away a few more paces, but he advances. A few people snicker at the exchange outside the building, egging Adam on.
My chest is tight. I don’t know when I last took a breath.
“Go ahead,” he says. “Run.”
Fuck.
I do.
I. Fucking. Run.
I bolt through the throng of people standing outside and head down the street. I can hear Adam’s boots hitting the sidewalk at my back, hear the voices of people thinking this is a joke, laughing as I pass them by.
I don’t know where to turn, where to flee.
In my panic, I run out into the street. Horns blow. One car slams on its brakes a second too late. Its nose barely nudges my legs—
I don’t stop.
Ican’tstop.
My phone hits the ground.
I start to run back for it and realize Adam is too close. I have to leave it.
