He stops the words spewing out of me with a hand clapped to my mouth, then drags me over his lap. I’m lying across his thighs in the most humiliating position as he keeps a firm hand over my face, his other hand landing… somewhere on my lower back, just a little too close to my ass for comfort.
My face flames red as in the front of the car, my bully’s two friends guffaw loudly. Dane and Liam. They’re disguised too, in devil attire, but I know it’s them. They’re always with Quill, and anyway, they didn’t cover up the greasy mop of blond hair or the buzz cut that shows just a hint of red. Goddamnit. I hate them almost as much as Quill. But not quite as much.
“You should spank her,” chortles the blond chubby guy. Liam. “That’ll teach her a lesson.”
“Mmmppphh!!!” I protest loudly, writhing around, trying desperately to get free. But Quill’s hand is still pressed against my mouth. His other hand edges toward my butt and I close my eyes in utter humiliation, expecting him to follow through on Liam’s laughing suggestion. Instead, he grips it possessively, so hard I nearly cry.
I glance up and see that Quill is looking at Liam through his paper mask. I can barely see his expression, only his blue eyes through the slits, so why do I shiver? How can a paper plate look so… murderous? And yet, there’s no doubt about it. I assumethat the murderous expression is directed at me, even though he’s staring at his friend. And it’s a far more powerful expression than he’s ever given me before. He’s definitely got it in him to end a life. Maybe he’s going to kill me. The realization suddenly terrifies me.
I gulp nervously and stop thrashing around. I don’t want to die. Especially not at Quill’s hands.
I don’t know why that makes a difference, but it does.
Some tiny little part of me still clings to that desperate, sad little memory of my silent protector. I stay very still, willing the paper plate to… calm down.
It does, after a while. Just as we reach Astley Lake.
It’s deserted now, because I guess the little kids are trick-or-treating and the older ones are busy acting like hoodlums on Main Street. But some people took it upon themselves to decorate the place, and the spiderwebs hanging from the trees make me shiver. It’s already a spooky enough place without the Halloween decorations.
The minute the car is parked, Quill grabs me and throws me over his shoulder.
“Hey!” I squeak out. “Put me down! You have no right to–”
This time, hedoesgive me a hard smack to my bottom, and I’m back to squirming against him, trying desperately to land some kicks to his torso so he’ll let me go.
But he holds me to him, his arm a firm band of iron. The guy’s not much older than me, but he’s made of solid muscle. What the hell?
“What are you going to do?” I ask, nerves mounting and overtaking my anger and humiliation. “Where are you taking me?”
A moment later I figure it out as he lifts me from over his shoulder. He whips my glasses off my face, shoves them into his back pocket, and I just have time to notice he’s wading into thecold autumn water before he dunks me.
“What the–what the–!”
The word is drowned out by the water closing in around me. Crap, crap, crap. Is he trying to kill me?
I’m thrashing in the water as he holds me down, feeling like I’m going blue in the face from the cold and the lack of air. Why is he doing this to me? What the hell did I do? This isn’t fair. I didn’t do anything. Screw him.
My mind goes through a million emotions before settling on anger as he drags me back up. Furious, I try to knee him in the balls, and when that doesn’t work, I spit in his face. Dane gasps and Liam lets out a bark of laughter from where they’re standing on the shore, but Quill merely stares at me, his face a mask, both literally and figuratively, before he dunks me again.
“Holy crap! Stop that, Quill! Stop tha–”
I’m back to being completely submerged in the water, fighting for air, and now, panic takes the place of anger. He’s leaving me in far too long. I’m going to die. He’s actually killing me.
But then he lifts me back out again, and I suck in breath after breath of air. It’s like he knows exactly what my endurance is as he continues to dunk me again and again. Just long enough to allow me to wonder, each time, if I’m going to die, before he drags me back up.
By the time he’s finished with me, I’m limp with exhaustion, my body sagging in his hands. His paper plate is angled at me, and between the lack of the moon and the holes cut out over his eyes that only show pools of darkness now, I have no idea what he’s thinking.
I don’t even know whatI’mthinking. Well, I’m thinking I’m going crazy.
Because there’s just no way, as he’s putting me through this nightmare, that I’m finding comfort in his touch.
There’s just no way.
And yet, it’s the truth.
It’s only because his hands, one of them clutching the front of my shirt and the other my hair, are the ones dragging me back from the water each time, I tell myself desperately.
But they’re also the hands plunging me in.
