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“You.”
“Very funny.”
He doesn’t react.
“You want me to hack for you?”
No reply. He just watches me, but his eyes look distant, as if he’s seeing something I can’t.
I gulp loud enough for him to hear. “Can you be a dear and get me that bucket of candy? I’m gonna vomit, and I’d rather my ghost not be forced to scrub the floor after you kill me.”
“Breathe in through your nose. Now breathe out. That’s it. Do it again. If I wanted you dead, you would be.”
“If that’s meant to calm me, you should just shut up,” I retort as I slap my hand to my stomach.
With a sigh, he stands. “Don’t move.”
He walks into my kitchen, opens a cabinet, gets a glass, and fills it with water. He comes back and hands it to me.
As soon as the glass settles in my hand, water goes flying. I toss it in his face and scream.
Why did I do that? I should have smashed the glass over his head! If I survive this, I’m taking self-defense classes.
I throw the glass, but he dodges it. Jerking back, I attempt to roll, but he catches me and pushes me deeper into the couch. His hand covers my mouth as he looms over me.
“We could have done this the easy way, Rylan.” Using his body, he traps me, then he reaches into his back pocket, pulls out a syringe, and uncaps it with his pearly white teeth. My throat is raw as my shouts turn blood-curdling, desperate.
“I’m not the villain,” he says, but his actions prove otherwise. Bringing his hand down, he grabs my thigh and stabs it with the needle. “I need you to help me catch one.”
CHAPTER 5
Steffen
Rylan practically handed herself to me on a Halloween candy silver platter. Sure, she nailed the fake ID and erased her footprints. It was all training for the real game—when she’d finally be mine.
Mine and not theirs!
To think Rylan rented a house and pretended to be a quiet neighbor when inside she was taking on legit jobs in white hat hacking.
Such a waste of her skills, but who was I but the devil himself to judge?
And Rylan? She called to me like a goddamn angel who had wandered too far from heaven’s gates. She was in my world now, and there was no returning. I can’t save her wings. They will be ripped off.
But I can help soothe the ache, the absence of the freedom she once had.
I want her: mind, body, and soul, and I will stop at nothing to get her—to earn her.
Tonight seemed like the perfect night to reintroduce myself, since I did such a shit job the first time. I knew she had a pair of lungs and liked to scream; no doubt she would when she saw me, so Halloween night was the perfect time to let her. No one would notice.
I never pegged her for a Halloween fanatic. Most people settle for a plastic pumpkin and a half-filled candy bowl, but not Rylan. She carved and painted her own pumpkins—a dying craft, if you ask me—and bought enough candy to raise eyebrows.
Part of me wondered if she was aiming for a sugar coma. Surely my reclusive butterfly wouldn’t actually open her door to strangers.
She did.
Enter me, a happy-go-lucky trick-or-treater. I’d pick a trick and save the treat—aka Rylan—for later.
She lit up as she handed out candy, but her smile turned into a distant haze when the crowds slowed. She watched families as if they were a Hallmark movie she wished she could star in. I wanted to give that to her, the memories of a family, of being loved; fuck, I’d dress up and go door to door if it made her smile.
