The plan was simple: search her room, her devices, her life—one I could hold in the palm of my hand and unravel, thread by thread. Watch an Etheridge dance to my beat.
My decision to pay her a visit seemed right.
That’s how I should’ve known it was all wrong.
I thought I came prepared for every eventuality. I kept to the shadows, slipped past the cameras, and killed the security alarm. But nothing—nothing—could’ve prepared me for the sight that waited for me at the foot of her bed.
Like now.
I brace myself as it begins. With her head slowly thrashing from side to side, fist slamming into the mattress, clutching at the sheets until her knuckles go white. I pry her fingers loose, only for them to fly to her hair, yanking at the strands, trying to rip them out by the roots. I catch her wrist and peel her fingers back, one by one, until she surrenders. But that’s not enough for the riot thrashing underneath her skin, searching for an escape. All her efforts to maintain restraint fail, as her lips tremble and she reaches for her arm. I hook her mouth before she finds a part of herself to mark.
Only I get to do that now.
She digs her fangs into my flesh, muffling the screams she won’t allow anyone to hear. And I let her.
It’s like some cruel joke. Something so strong shouldn’t be so easily frayed.
I should know.
For a few moments, I sit there, watching the pain slowly drifting out of her. The girl is all kinds of broken. Pain and hurt and scars neatly hidden under the princess charm. You couldn’t tell from looking at her, walking around the campus with her head held high, chatting with the barista for half her lunch break, or dancing at the club like nothing dark ever touched her, that she isdrowningin an ocean of agony. One would be forgiven for forgetting she just lost her parents when she doesn’t let one single weakness show.
For a few seconds, I wait, my fingers still in her mouth. Who knows if it will start again? But she’s sleeping softly now, breaths rising and falling in an even rhythm, like it wasn’t her who just mauled my fingers.
I pull out the strap from her dressing gown and use it to tie her wrists to the pole of her bed, loose enough for her to free herself when she wakes up.
She doesn’t fight me. She can’t.
The girl is dead to the world, knocked out by whatever pills are in these little white bottles on her nightstand. I could fuck her right now, and she wouldn’t even know. That thought alone was enough for me to ride through the storm and break in tonight.
I step into the lounge, closing her door behind me.
Herso-calledfriend lies on the sofa, snoring like a pig, louder than the television.
I didn’t come here for her tonight. I came for him.
That was my second mistake.
If I had found him lurking in her bedroom while she lay there defenseless, I would’ve put a bullet in his head and slept like a baby. I would’ve done it anyway when she stood there pleading forhim. He has no idea how close he came to meeting his end tonight.
My feet take me closer to him, moving on their own accord.
Can I leave him breathing here, with her in the next room?
The thought of him so close to her makes my fingers itch, wanting to claw around something. But I must suppress that urge tonight.
It takes all my will to walk away, but I leave before I change my mind.
About him or her.
Riding against the storm, with thunder and lightning quaking from the skies, I reach 99 at around 3 a.m. Even though tonight’s event was designed to lure her out, it’s one that I haveto attend. If only because of the expectations that come with my name.
I park in my usual spot and take off my helmet, letting the pounding rain wash my face, then head to the back entrance. My feet pause when another set of splashing footsteps catches my attention.
“Mr. Grant.” A deep voice makes me turn around, my hand rising to shield my vision from the hammering rain.
A tall, broad, older man steps into the faint light from the lot, rain tapping the black umbrella and falling in clean lines on all sides. The Etheridge guard.
A slow smirk builds on my face. “Jack, is it?”
