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A surge of panic burns through my heart. “Don’t fucking do it, Micah,” I scream, flailing beneath him. “I swear to god, if you do what you’re thinking of doing, I will never forgive you.”

I wiggle in his arms, not submitting to him on this matter. This isn’t a fantasy anymore or some sex game to help us relieve our twisted urges of pleasure by intertwining our grief with love. This is life and death. And what he is about to do is fucked up.

He holds his hand over my mouth so I can’t scream. Not that it would matter if I did. It’s not like anyone can hear me. He just doesn’t want to hear it.

He enters the cabin and drops me on the bed. I kick at him, but he keeps my torso firm in his hold. The way I’m positioned barely gives me room to move, and he already has the wire ready nearby. It doesn’t take much for him to bind my hand and tie me to the bedpost.

My injured hand, he’s tying my bad fucking hand…

I start to hyperventilate as the reality of the situation settles in.

“Please, Micah. Don’t do this… We’ve come so far. Don’t leave me again, please… Please!”

He runs his thumb along my hairline, then leans down and kisses me.

I don’t return the kiss.

“You’ll be fine, London. I’ll only be gone for a few hours. I’ll be back before dusk. Just try to sleep, and when I get back, I will make you spaghetti. You love spaghetti, don’t you, baby?”

I squeeze my eyes shut. “Please,” I whisper-sob one more time as my stomach tightens and starts to swirl. The last time I felt this sick, I was hurtling through the air in a toxic airplane about to crash.

Tears burn my eyes as I think of Maison… He wouldn’t do something so fucked up. Maison’s been warning me. All these months, his ghostly presence warned me of what his brother was capable of. Micah can’t leave me alone like this; I won’t survive the silence. Only a fraction of my grief is enough to swallow me whole and leave me drowning in its depths.

I realize with a sickening pit in my stomach that I’ve been captive for months. Ever since the first time he tied me up when I left him, he was signaling this. It’s apparent in how close he keeps me at all times, watching over me even as I relieve myself. I thought he was being protective, that it was what he liked. But he doesn’t trust me enough to bring me with him. The level of control he needs is diabolical, as Nigel once so elegantly called it. Those words have never rung so true.

Micah’s dominating presence hovers over me, and I glare at him with fire and ice in my eyes. “Why are you doing this?” I ask, resolved to my fate. Perhaps Nigel was right about Micah this entire time, and Nigel’s hatred runs so deep because he recognizes glimpses of his own malevolence in Micah. Evil begets evil, drawn to each other like a moth to a flame.

He squats so he’s at eye level with me, darkness flashing in his eyes again. “I can’t let you see that part of me again, London. And I can’t let you go yet.” He frowns, studying me, his eyes running up and down my body as I’m curled up beneath him in his favorite position.

“Micah, I’m fine. I’ll be fine. I’ll stay right next to you, I promise. You don’t have to do this.”

His hand finds my cheek. “I don’t think you’re fine, London. You can pretend you are, but I notice everything about you. You muttering to yourself, staring off into space, being so fucking jittery all the time. You hear things, don’t you, sweetheart? This isn’t fine, London, and I’m fucking worried about you.”

I swallow bile down my throat. He knows… He always knows, as if my secrets are carved on my face.

Another flash in his eyes darkens his pupils as he rises and drapes my wolf blanket around me. I can’t tell what emotion just swallowed him whole, but I simply don’t recognize this version of Micah.

“Maison was right about you,” I say darkly, gazing toward the window. “When he said you were going to hurt me and that you’re sick.”

He pauses at the door, his black hood pulled over his face before he departs. “Don’t make this fucking harder than it needs to be. You’re the one who’s not well, baby. I’ll make it all better when I get back. I’m the one who’s here, London, and I’ll be the one to take care of you, not a fucking ghost.”

“I’m healing!” I unleash a scream at him, my voice carrying an unexpected force. The level of desperation pouring out of me is palpable. “That’s what normal people do when they grieve, Micah. They remember their loved ones who passed. I imagine Maison because I fucking miss him. And that is normal. I’m not the crazy one, Micah, you are. You’re a sociopath, completely and utterly psychotic and devoid of emotion. I’ll never forgive you for this. I fucking hate you!”

I regret the words as soon as I say them—because I don’t mean them—but I won’t let him try to validate his reasons for tying me up like a prisoner.

He doesn’t give me a chance to retract my words.

He’s gone.

No kiss, no hug, no words of reassurance. Just gone, leaving behind a hint of wind from the shuttering door as it opens and closes.

I’m completely alone for the first time in four months, and with no way to defend myself should I need to. My heart clenches at the thought that he won’t come back. That something will happen to him, and he will leave me tied up like this forever. I lower my head, allowing it to hang limply, as I desperately try to find a way to make myself comfortable. Thoughts swirl in my mind, wondering whether we can overcome this, if it’s possible for me to forgive him, and most importantly, contemplating who I will become while he’s gone.

Chapter Nine

Micah

This side of winter isn’t pretty.