Kill Switch: Chapter 6

Present

“Arms up!” Tara called out.

I reached up, leaping across the floor, the muscles in my back and shoulders stretching tight as I tilted my head back and my face toward the sky.

“There’s the energy!” she shouted. “Let me see it again! Good!”

I exhaled as I hit the ground again, my right foot landing on the border of sandpaper lining the perimeter of the “stage” to signal when I was within two feet of the edge. Beyond that, there was another six-inch-wide border to alert me I had no more room and to stop.

Sweat trickled down my back, and I swung around, veering right again as I stepped, glided, and then arched my back before coming up on one toe and stretching high for a moment’s pose and coming down again to continue the dance.

The music filled the room, my unconventional number of Nostalghia’s “Plastic Heart” choreographed by me and soon-to-be performed at nowhere for no one.

No one would hire me. I tried to stay positive, especially since I needed out of here more than ever, but it was getting harder and harder to not feel stupid for leaving college.

Tara was one of my instructors growing up, and I continued to rehearse at home, but I also came to the studio from time to time, since my father had paid for five hours a week for room rental until the end of the year. I didn’t want to use anything he left for me, but I sucked it up as an excuse to get out of the house. Damon hadn’t been back since the wedding days ago, but it was only a matter of time.

And I loved it here. I only thought about dancing here and nothing else.

This was where my earliest memories of dancing were, and I guessed I was luckier than some. There was a time I could see, and I’d had four years of ballet training before I lost my sight. I knew how pliés and arabesques felt and looked. I knew movements and steps, and I knew a little technique. I’d continued with a private trainer when I went to Montreal, even though I knew my prospects weren’t good for a career later on. I’d always known the reality.

I’d have a hard time in a chorus with other dancers and especially with a partner. It wasn’t impossible, but everything took longer to learn and not many would accept that challenge.

And I certainly wasn’t the first ballet dancer with a visual impairment, but I was the first in a five-hundred-mile radius. I held out hope. Someone had to start the phenomenon in other parts of the world. Why couldn’t we have it here, too? The only major problem was finding a company and a coach to take on the work.

I slowed with the music as the song ended and finished, bringing my arms down, wrists crossed in front of me, and fingers displayed gracefully. At least I hoped they looked graceful.

“Here,” Tara said. “Stay like that.”

Walking over, she ran her chilly fingers over the bend in my wrist.

“Straighten them,” she instructed. “Like this.”

And she took my hands and placed them on hers, which were in my ending pose. I ran my hands lightly over hers, feeling the bends in the joints of her fingers, the tendons on the backs of her hands, and the smooth line down her wrist to her arm, so I could emulate it.

“Thanks,” I told her, breathing hard.

I put my hands on my waist, my light, billowy top falling off one shoulder and baring some skin to the welcome cool air of the old, drafty building.

“Again?” she asked.

“What time is it?”

She paused a moment. “Almost five.”

I nodded. I had a half hour, so may as well soak it up before the money ran out.

I heard her steps as she walked over to restart the music, and I counted my own steps from the sandpaper glued to the floor to the center, finding my starting mark.

“You don’t have to stay,” I told her. “I have the driver. I’ll be fine.”

The Torrances insisted on our own personal drivers, and while we sporadically hired them for certain occasions growing up, we never kept any on the payroll. My sister loved the new perk. The new perk that came with her new name.

But I knew the ulterior motives behind the gesture. A driver reported our comings and goings to the one who paid them, so Gabriel and Damon were aware of our every move.

The driver was my leash.

“You know,” she started as the music began, “they offered to pay…for you to continue classes.”

I stopped. “What do you mean? Who?”

“Gabriel Torrance’s assistant called and said to have your classes billed to him,” she told me. “In case you’d like to get on the schedule again.”

She had guided me and offered feedback sporadically since my father left and I could no longer afford her. Bits here and there when she was on her way in or after a class had ended. Or like tonight when she was on her way out.

But this news of Gabriel’s offer was like a slap in the face. Another reminder that I was destitute and couldn’t have the things I’d been accustomed to.

Because of them.

Because of him. This was Damon’s idea.

No one else cared if I continued my dancing except him. He liked it. I was probably the only person who knew that he loved it, in fact. He’d watched me. I’d danced for him a lot before.

Fuck him.

I got back into position, lifting my chin, and craning my neck. “Can you restart the music?” I asked her, ending our conversation.

After a moment, the music cut off and restarted, and I began again, letting the volume of the song drown out everything else. The world swayed around me, and even though I couldn’t see it, I sensed everything.

The space. The scent of pine needles from last year’s Christmas tree. The cold bricks around me that I knew were there. The barre with chalk crusting the wood and the way the ceiling felt torn away and there were miles of sky above my head. I could reach and feel endless.

I was flying.

The singer’s voice burrowed into my stomach, and I broke away from my classical moves and let my hand fall down my body as I slowed, feeling every inch of my skin come alive. My feet ached in the pointe shoes, but my body was alive.

I closed my eyes, the strands of my hair spilling around me and tickling my face. My stomach flipped as I spun, and a smile twitched at the corners of my lips. God, I loved this. I was free here.

I wanted to see if you’d dance for me.

I slowed in my steps, hearing his voice in my head.

But then I picked up the pace again and slid into a closed position doing several échappés in a row as I moved my arms.

You’ll hate me.

I’ll love you.

We have to stop. Make me stop.

I can’t. I won’t.

And pressure hit down low, between my legs and making my stomach dip. I opened my mouth, filling it with the same, silent cry as that morning he was arrested as I twirled and twirled, tears stinging my eyes and hoping to spin the world so fast I’d lose sight of him in my head.

But then I lost my footing, hitting a piece of furniture as my leg slammed into wood and a sharp pain shot up my shin.

“Shit!” I exclaimed.

“Winter!” Tara called out.

I snapped my eyes open and growled, stumbling as my hand came down on the piano to steady myself.

The bench. The damn piano bench. Did I miss the markers on the floor?

“Whoa, I gotcha,” a male voice suddenly shouted. “I’m coming.”

Ethan? When did he get here?

The music cut off, and I hunched over, squeezing my leg as the shooting pain throbbed harder and harder. I winced, blowing out a long breath as footsteps scurried across the wooden floor.

“You’re bleeding,” he said, steadying me under my arm, while Tara took my hand. “Come here.”

“It’s okay,” I blurted out, shaking my head and pissed at myself. “I haven’t done that in ages. What the hell?”’

Distracted. That’s what I’d been.

“Sit her down,” Tara told Ethan. “I’ll go find the first aid kit.”

I limped, but pulled myself up straight. “It’s in the bathroom. I’ll be fine.”

“But you’re bleeding.”

“And I know how to operate a Band-Aid.” I laughed through the pain. “Go home. Ethan will help me. See you in a couple days.”

I heard a little sigh as she debated on whether or not to make sure I was okay, but she knew this wasn’t new for me. I’d gone through my fair share of Band-Aids.

“Thanks for your help tonight,” I told her, slipping out of Ethan’s hand to grab hold of his arm instead. “Later.”

After a moment, I heard the shuffle of her feet and belongings as she picked up her jacket and bag. “Well, have a good night, then. I’ll text you later, okay?”

I nodded, guiding Ethan toward the direction of her voice to follow her out the door and toward the bathroom. He tried to put an arm around me, but I waved him off.

We pushed through the doors—Tara veering left to the exit and us heading right, toward the stairs.

“How long have you been here?” I asked him as we descended to the lower level.

“Just arrived,” he said. “I had a study group that went late, but I knew this might be the only chance to see you.”

Yeah. With the trouble on the road the other night, who knew if he’d be admitted to the house. And if he were, how would it play out once Damon came home.

Home. I held onto the railing as we took the stairs two flights down, still holding onto Ethan with my other hand. Damon—or his family—owned my home now, and while he’d been clearly sleeping elsewhere all the nights since the wedding, he could still come and go whenever he liked. Without knocking. Without permission. Without an invitation.

He controlled every key in the house. The realization curdled my stomach.

“Are you okay?” Ethan asked. “I mean…not just the leg.”

“Yes, I’m fine.”

I knew what he was worried about, and I was grateful for his concern, but he couldn’t help. And I wasn’t sure I would tell him if there was something to worry about.

“Don’t worry,” I assured.

I may not be able to handle Damon, but Ethan definitely couldn’t.

He led me to the women’s bathroom, knocking and calling out before we entered to make sure it was empty, and I walked in, releasing him and reaching for the wall to the left I knew was there. Coming around the corner, I found the sink counter and hopped up on it, immediately reaching for the paper towel holder.

Ethan reached for it, too, trying to help.

“I got it,” I told him. “Can you grab the first aid kit? It should be inside the box on the wall.”

While he walked over and lifted the lid, I wetted a couple paper towels and dabbed at the skin where it hurt. They said I was bleeding, but I had no idea how much.

I groaned as the cool water stung my cut. It was always the smallest things that hurt the most. Forming a little circle of claws, I dug my nails lightly into the skin surrounding the pain to deflect it a little. A trick my dad taught me when I was about six. The sharp ache eased a little, and I stayed like that for a moment, enjoying the slight reprieve.

“Hey, there’s nothing here,” Ethan called out. “Let me run upstairs and see if the girl at the desk has it.”

I nodded, not sure if he saw. The bathroom door creaked open and closed as he left, and I pulled the paper towels off, folded them, and re-applied them to my leg, leaning back on the mirror and closing my eyes.

What the hell was I going to do? I was twenty-one, no job prospects, and I was scared. I would never be free while he was alive, and there was still so much he could take from me. He was already heavily at work on my peace of mind.

He’d been out of prison for over a year before he made contact, and two years before he set his plan into motion. I’d gotten complacent in my sense of security, thinking he might’ve moved on. I was wrong.

My eyelids grew heavy, and my head started to float as the pain in my leg subsided. I yawned, letting the sleepiness take over. At least when I was tired, I couldn’t worry.

Just as I was about to nod off, propped up against the mirror, I heard the whine of the unoiled hinges on the bathroom door. That was quick.

“Did you get it?” I asked, keeping my eyes closed and breaking into another yawn.

He didn’t answer me, though, and I opened my eyes, blinking. Someone had just opened the door, right?

“Ethan?” I called, sitting up straight.

The theater was about to close, and other than the front desk attendant, I didn’t think anyone else was in the building anymore.

And then…he was there.

He rested his hand on top of mine where it laid on my thighs, his chilled fingers making me suck in a breath and laugh. “Hey, you scared me,” I said. “Did you get the Band-Aids?”

Fingertips came up to my face, brushing a strand of hair out of my eye, and I recoiled at the icicles on my skin. What was he doing? I took his hand off my face and held it in mine, reassuring him.

“I’m okay.”

His body came in closer, though, forcing my knees apart and his clothes chafing the inside of my thighs. He took his hands off me, and I stilled, feeling the warmth of his breath right in front of me, on my face, as he leaned in.

What the hell was he doing?

“Ethan…” I protested but wasn’t sure what to say. He’d gotten close a few times, and while I knew he wouldn’t say no to more, it just never happened between us. He wouldn’t try again?

“Shhh…” he said.

And I stopped breathing. The heat of his mouth was centimeters from mine, and suddenly, my heart started hammering. He’d never felt like this. He was never forward, and I was instantly uncomfortable, old memories coming back.

Please don’t try to kiss me, I begged.

Water pumped through the pipes above my head, and I could hear the dull hum of the furnace somewhere in the distance, but otherwise, it was quiet down here, and we were all alone.

“I need the Band-Aid,” I told him, forcing a little smile. “Come on…”

“So pretty,” he whispered over my mouth. I could taste the smoke on his breath.

Smoke…

“Okay, I got them!” Ethan suddenly shouted from around the corner, stunning me out of the quiet as the bathroom door swung open again.

I gasped, rearing back. Shit!

I darted out my hands, looking for the man who was just here, but finding only empty space.

Tears stung the backs of my eyes, my pulse throbbed in my neck, and I couldn’t catch my breath as I sucked in lungfuls of air.

Motherfucker. Goddamn him. Where was he? I searched with my hands. Where did he go?

“Hey, hey, hey, what’s the matter?” Ethan asked, coming to my side.

But I just grabbed onto his sweatshirt, fisting it as I breathed hard.

If Ethan didn’t see him, he was already gone through the exit on the other side of the bathroom.

I shook my head, trying to calm down.

I’d relaxed. Like an idiot, for five minutes, I’d relaxed, and he never did. He would always be at the ready.

“Just get me out of here,” I told Ethan. “Right now.”

“What about the Band-Aid?”

“Now!” I cried out.

And he didn’t need to hear anymore. Pulling me off the counter, he took my hand, and we left the theater as quickly as possible.

I let Ethan take me home, followed closely by my driver, I was sure. Even though I had transportation at my disposal, I couldn’t stomach anything to do with Damon. I got in Ethan’s car, told my driver to “go to hell” when he protested, and we left.

Once Ethan dropped me off and left, albeit with some hesitation, I walked into the house, Mikhail trotting up to greet me and hearing my mother’s voice coming from the dining room.

I leaned down to pet him and give him a kiss. “Feed you in a minute, boy.”

Walking into the dining room, I felt their footsteps and heard pages flipping from the dining table.

I hadn’t spoken to my family much in the past few days. Angry, I stayed in my room, chewing my nails and trying to figure a way out.

“We could do wallpaper in the kitchen,” my sister said. “Like just one wall. It’s back in style now.”

Decorating? They were fucking decorating? Jesus.

“I tried to leave a few nights ago,” I finally told them, brushing my hand against the doorframe and stopping there. “Back to Montreal.”

Silence suddenly filled the room, and I could guess both of them were trying to process if they should be angry or not. My mother wanted me safe, even though she wouldn’t do anything to ensure it herself, and I was pretty certain my sister would love having me out of the way. They would both know, however, that it would displease Damon, and there might be consequences if I ran and he couldn’t find me fast enough.

“The police,” I went on, “on Gabriel Torrance’s payroll, no doubt, caught up to me and turned me around.”

“Ethan was helping you?” my mother asked in a tone that said she already knew the answer.

I nodded. “And if I want him to stay safe, then he’d better not help me again. That was the gist of the warning anyway.”

I heard a slow but deep intake of breath and a quiet exhale, and I knew my mother was trying to stay calm, but I was done pretending to be. Damon was clever, diabolical, and patient. All of the things I wasn’t. At least not right now. I was too fucking angry.

It finally dawned on me that no one was actually on my side.

“I hate you,” I said to my mother, letting it go with my chin trembling. “I would rather live in the gutter than have him in our lives!”

I gestured to where I’d heard my sister chatting. “I know why she’d do this, but you’re supposed to protect me,” I told my mom. “He raped me!”

“He didn’t rape you,” my sister snapped back, pushing out of her chair. “We all saw the video. The whole world saw the video! You wanted him. You were in love with him.”

I shook my head. “Not him.”

I had never been in love with him. Not with Damon.

That damn video.

Tears spilled, and I couldn’t stop them. I folded my lips between my teeth to keep from sobbing. A video of us was leaked, he was sent to jail for statutory rape, because he was nineteen, and I was still a minor, but nearly everyone in this town took his side. He was a little richer, a lot more popular, and two of his friends went with him for their own misdeeds leaked on other videos, as well.

But he got the most time.

He was the only one convicted of a sex crime, and in everyone’s eyes this was a grave injustice, because their basketball star, golden boy only had sex with a willing girl who just happened to be a couple years shy of the legal age of consent. Big deal.

Hey, in some other states sixteen is old enough, isn’t it?

This is a technicality.

Did he even do anything wrong? How many of us were having sex at that age?

Don’t ruin his life. It’s not like he hurt her.

Hey, she seemed to love it well enough.

The backlash was sickening, and while other girls claimed he’d taken advantage of them, too, by the end of it, they’d all folded, and it ended up just becoming an example of how warped our justice system was when there were “actual” predators out there. I’d ruined a young man’s life. To-may-toes, to-mah-toes.

All they saw in that video was me willingly kissing him.

Touching him.

Holding him.

In their eyes, I’d wanted it, and he was ‘the man’. But they didn’t know what was really going on in that video. They didn’t know what he’d done to me to get what he wanted from me.

Footsteps approached, and I smelled my mother’s Chanel No. 5.

“Winter,” she said calmly. “Do you really think he needed to marry into this family to get anything he wanted? He could’ve easily threatened Ethan anyway to keep you in Thunder Bay and under his thumb. Or threatened us, your grandparents, or any other friends. No matter what, this was going to play out how they wanted, because they have the money and we have nothing anymore. Nothing.”

‘Because of my father’, I finished for her.

Yes, I knew. She wasn’t entirely wrong.

And in that moment, I hated my father, too. His crimes didn’t put us in this mess, because Damon would’ve eventually found another door if that one had been closed. I only hated him for leaving. Gabriel and Damon Torrance could do anything they wanted with us now. And given their reputations, I tried not to think about how bad this could get or I’d be sick.

“At least now,” my mother continued. “We have something to work for. A light at the end of the tunnel.”

The divorce settlement? Was she actually that stupid? Damon would get Ari pregnant, and there would be no way out after that!

“And what were you planning for us to do in the meantime?” I challenged. “As we wait for this year to pass?”

What would I do as she tried to wait this out, day after day, week after week?

“We survive,” she finally answered.

Survive.

Submit, you mean?

After a few moments, I left the room and made my way upstairs, shutting myself in my bedroom for the rest of the night with Mikhail. I fed him but forwent dinner myself, not hungry anyway, and I only left briefly to shower.

I couldn’t make my mother’s decisions for her, but she also couldn’t make my choices for me, and there was no way I’d do whatever it took to survive. I had my limits, and I wasn’t going back to that place with him.

If it even came to that.

But hopefully I’d find a way out of here before it did.

I blinked my eyes open in my bedroom hours later, my lids still way too heavy, but the air was chillier than usual.

Was it six yet? My alarm hadn’t gone off.

I reached over and hit the button on my bedside table, the male voice in the machine saying loud and clear, “Two-thirteen a.m.”

“Two-thirteen?” I breathed out, painfully awake now.

I closed my eyes again, hoping to fall back asleep, but my brain was already working and assessing. The night was silent outside. No rain or wind, but we would probably get snow in the next month. I allowed myself a moment to feel wistful for it, but the weight of all our troubles descended again, and I wanted time to slow down, not speed up.

I loved wintertime, though. And not because of my name. It was just a festive period, and happy things made me happy. I always decorated my room, because I could still feel the lights and the garland, hear the music from the snow globes, and smell the scent of pine. But I wasn’t sure I wanted to decorate this year. My pride was planted firmly, and I refused to make the best of this. Hopefully I wouldn’t be around for it anyway.

Turning on my side, I adjusted the pillow under my head and stretched my legs out under the sheets, feeling the space, smooth and cold.

Not warm.

Wait. Where’s…

“Mikhail?” I called out, popping my eyes open and my head up.

The dog slept at my feet, but he wasn’t on the bed. I listened for the jingle of his collar as it did when he rose to answer me, but there was nothing.

“Here, boy.” And I clicked my tongue a few times, calling him.

He couldn’t have gotten out. I locked the door.

Then I noticed the scent of something buttery and sweet, and I sat up, throwing the covers off. My heart picked up pace. She didn’t, I groaned to myself.

I made my way over to my desk, my fingers grazing a ceramic pot with what smelled like tea and a small dish with a flaky croissant. My mother had broken in to leave me food.

Christ.

I walked over, finding my door open, thanks to her. Really, it was probably useless to lock it. If Damon lost the master key to all the rooms, he could, you know, just kick it down, but still… I couldn’t not lock it, so…

I stuck my head into the hallway. “Mikhail?” I whispered.

Nothing.

I pinched my brows together. It wasn’t like him not to respond, and there was no way to get outside without someone to open the door for him.

“Mikhail?” I whisper-yelled a little louder.

I stepped out of the room and slipped quietly into the hallway, the floorboards creaking just a little under my weight.

I rested my left hand on the bannister as I followed it around, the only sound being the tinkling of the crystals on the chandelier above as the draft seeped through the old house. Carpets laid softly under my feet, and the grandfather clock ahead of me and at the top of the stairs ticked steadily, the small noise amplifying how eerily quiet the house was in the middle of the night.

I would’ve heard him bark or growl or felt his sudden movement in bed at least if something made him nervous, right? He was always alert. No one was here now except my mother, sister, and me.

Trailing down the stairs, I held onto the railing with both hands as I took each step, and then I let go, walking carefully to the front door. I checked all the locks, making sure they were twisted into position.

And then I heard a little whine to my right.

“Mikhail?” I turned my head toward the sitting room.

Walking over, I took small steps and reached the rug, feeling him rush up to me, his wet nose hitting my knee.

“Hey, where did you go?” I teased, reaching down to pet him. “What…”

The scent of a cigarette hit me, and I trailed off, my face falling.

My stomach sank, and I stood up straight, my chest rising and falling, steady but quick.

He’d had my dog.

“Don’t touch him again,” I bit out.

“He came to me.”

Damon’s voice came from somewhere deep in the room, and I guessed he was probably in the high-back cushioned chair in the corner by the window. I pictured him sitting in the dark, the only light the small embers from the tip of his cigarette.

I reached down to take hold of Mikhail’s collar.

“You gave your dog a Russian name,” Damon mused.

“I gave him a dancer’s name.”

Mikhail Baryshnikov. I couldn’t help the fact that most of the revered ballet dancers were Russian. It had nothing to do with it being a fucking nod to Damon’s heritage.

Just about to turn around and take my dog, I sensed him rise from his chair as the last of the cigarette smoke dissipated into the air. Keeping my dog close to me, I stepped back to the table against the wall and swiped the pen I knew sat there with a pad of paper for messages. I kept it in my hand, hidden behind my thigh.

There was a time when he scared me, and I liked it. I didn’t like it anymore.

“I don’t want to be here,” I told him. “I’ll find a way out. You know that.”

I faltered for a moment, realizing this was the first time Damon and I had had any semblance of a conversation—albeit reluctant—since he went to prison five years ago. Any other interactions we’ve had have either been brief attacks or bitter threats in passing.

“You have nothing to say?” I prodded.

“No, I just don’t feel a need to respond.” His voice grew closer, and he took a drink of something, the ice in his glass clinking before he set it down on a table. “You can say and make whatever declarations you like, Winter, but ultimately you’ll do what you’re told. You, your mother, and your sister,” he pointed out. “You don’t run this house anymore.”

“I’m an adult. I can go where I like and leave when I wish.”

“Then why are you still here?”

My lip twitched in a snarl, but I hid it quickly. His meaning was clear. Yeah, I could’ve tried to leave the other night. If I were willing to see my friend get arrested for something he didn’t do. He and his father had advanced on me, and I’d retreated, so the truth was, I couldn’t go and do as I pleased, could I? Not without consequences.

“I do love your anger,” he said. “I’m glad it’s still there.”

Yes, it is. My anger seemed to be all I had anymore, and I missed laughing and smiling and the freedom of who I used to be. Before he happened, and the threat of his inevitable return didn’t always linger. Would I have things of my own again? Could I even fall in love anymore? After him?

“Ethan Belmont is the mediocre third son of a CEO of a failing coffee shop chain and a second-grade school teacher,” Damon said. “He spends his entire day locked in his parents’ house playing video games—”

“Designing them, you mean—”

“And sucking on an inhaler, because of pollen, or clutching an EpiPen, because peanut butter touched his bagel,” he went on. “He wouldn’t be able to haul his own body weight out of a burning car, let alone save his wife and kid.”

And you would? Please.

Damon Torrance didn’t save anyone but himself. Not that Ethan and I were seeing each other, but I’d choose him any day over Damon.

“You need a proper man,” Damon taunted, his voice getting slowly closer. “Someone who walks upright and can run a tight ship. Someone who’s a team player in Thunder Bay. Someone who can make you listen. And someone,” his tone turned darker as he stopped right in front of me, “who’s not going to question too hard when not all of his children look like him.”

I exhaled, hoping he didn’t see how my breath was shaking.

I tightened my lips, now aware of his intentions. He intended to marry me off at some point like this was the nineteenth century.

But he still intended to have his fun.

“So, let’s go, then,” I challenged him. “What are you waiting for?”

He leaned into my body, reached behind me, and wrestled the pen out of my hand. “For you to bring bigger dogs to this fight,” he gritted out through his teeth. “You can do better.”

My face flushed hot, and my legs went weak. He tore the pen away from me and retreated. A moment later, I heard him light another cigarette as I fought to tighten every muscle in my body.

“I will,” I told him. “And no matter what you do, I will never obey you.”

“Please don’t,” he shot back, dropping the lighter on the table and blowing out smoke. “I have Arion for that.”

His footsteps approached again, and I braced myself.

“She’ll be useful,” he said. “On mornings when I wake up, and I’m hard, and I just need to get inside something tight and hot.”

My jaw clenched just a little more. The image of him and my bed and one morning so long ago…

I ignored the sting in my eyes. God, I hated him.

“But at night,” he said, dropping his voice low and stopping right in front of me again, “when I always have too much energy, like you know I do, and I remember my mouth on a stomach, damp with sweat, and my fingers stroking a bare little cunt…”

My heart thumped against my chest, the memory of how he felt making me pause.

“Maybe I’ll find my way three doors down the hallway to her little sister’s room again,” he continued. “Slip her panties down her legs and start eating…”

I shook my head, fighting the memories that raced through my mind. “I won’t let you have anything else from me,” I told him. “You raped me. And it wasn’t statutory rape. It was rape.”

“I can see why you might want to believe that. Maybe you feel ashamed or guilty because you liked it.” He paused and then continued. “But be careful, Winter. I can still put you through quite a lot.”

“Oh, I’m scared,” I shot back.

There was nothing else for him to take.

He stood there for a moment, quiet and still, but then his hard voice pierced the silence.

“Mikhail?” he called.

And I jumped.

“Ke nighg-ya,” he said.

What?

My dog yanked out of my grasp and trotted away on the command.

“What are you doing?” I darted forward. “Give me my dog.” And then I called, “Mikhail!”

But I didn’t feel either of them near me now. Where did they go? What was that he said? Was that Russian? Mikhail didn’t know any commands in Russian.

I heard the dog’s collar and tags jingle from a few feet away, and a lump filled my throat.

“That’s a good boy,” I heard Damon coo to him. “He’s smart. He knows who his master is.”

Mikhail went to him?

“Mikhail,” I said. “Mikhail, come here.”

“Now the question is…” Damon continued, and I heard him approach again. “Do I keep him or give him to my father. I haven’t kept a dog as a pet in years. Not sure I have the knack for it.”

My nerves fired. “Give me my dog.”

“You want him back?” he asked, getting closer. “Then beg me.”

“Fuck you!”

He grabbed the back of my neck, fisting my hair. “A dog is a dog and a bitch is a bitch,” he bit out. “Neither of you is very much use to the world, so I don’t care either way.”

I planted my hands on his chest, trying to pull away.

Mikhail.

No.

“Beg me,” Damon taunted. “Beg. Just whisper it. Just say please.”

He couldn’t take my dog from me. What was he going to do to him?

My face started to crack as I thought about Mikhail, and I wouldn’t know where he was or if he was okay. If he was hungry… Would Damon take him away?

Damon kneaded my scalp, still gripping my hair. “Whisper it,” he said, his breathing turning ragged. “Whisper it like I did your name the morning they found me in your bed and arrested me, Winter. That’s all I want to hear. A little whisper.”

His hand shook where he held me, and my stomach knotted so hard, I was in pain. Please stop. Don’t do this.

“Killing him would probably be more merciful than giving him to my father,” Damon added. “He’s not good with dogs—”

“Please,” I burst out, a tear falling. “Please just give me the dog back.”

“On your knees,” he ordered.

I closed my eyes.

Goddamn him. He knew exactly what to do. Every time.

I wanted to rip him apart.

I hate him.

But slowly, I lowered.

I fell to my knees, my teeth clenched but still shaking as his hand stayed in my hair.

“Please,” I whispered, closing my eyes in disgust at myself. “Please.”

“Again.”

“Please,” I begged.

I waited for him to say something—to say I could have my dog back—but he just stood there, holding me by my hair.

He just stood there.

Was this what he wanted to see? Me degraded? Me scared?

He loved me scared. It got him excited.

I actually thought I liked it, too, once.

And as the seconds passed, and he held me there as my heart thumped in my chest, it was like we were teenagers again for a moment.

When I liked the games he played with me. Before I realized I was the toy.

The terror and the dread. But the exhilaration and the safety I felt in his arms.

How I’d never hated anyone as much as I hated him, but how I loved what I felt with him more than I loved anything I felt with anyone else, either. I was so stupid.

His fingers started to move, caressing me so softly as his breathing turned heavy and strained. “Winter…”

My clit throbbed once, and I broke, silently crying as shame heated my cheeks.

What the hell had he done to me?

He pulled me up, pushing my hair behind my shoulder and his voice suddenly normal.

“Good girl,” he told me. “Of course, you can have your dog. Did you think I was a monster?

I jerked away from his hands. “It hardly matters. You already ruined my life. Long ago.”

“In the treehouse when you were eight,” he finished my thought for me. “I remember that party. It’s funny, though. That’s all you do remember, isn’t it?”

“What are you talking about?”

“The fountain,” he pointed out. “Do you remember what happened in the fountain before we went to the treehouse that day?”

The fountain? I searched my brain through my confusion, not coming up with anything that stood out as out of the ordinary. I was eight, so I couldn’t remember every detail after all this time. Just that he was hurt, and I’d tried to help. The events after the fountain were what mattered.

“Nothing happened,” I told him.

I wasn’t letting him take what happened that day and turn it around on me. I was nice to him. Nothing I did or said deserved what happened after. Neither did anything I did or said years later in high school deserve what else he took from me.

Part of me was still curious about what he was getting at, though, and I thought he might elaborate, but he didn’t. He left me in the dark.

He sighed. “I’m out of my own control, Winter,” he said, not explaining any further. “There are no choices. We are who we are, and we do what we do. It’s nature. Like game pieces, I will play my part, because I can’t resist. I can’t be what I’m not.”

I frowned. He sounded resolute. Like this was the end for me.

“I hope you won’t disappoint,” he finished.

So, this was it, then? He was going forward with whatever ugly desires that simmered inside his twisted brain, because he was determined to not understand the pain he caused and that crimes have consequences? He’d gotten what he deserved.

I won once. I’d do it again.

“Just pick new tactics,” I told him. “I don’t appreciate you ambushing me in the bathroom like some pervert.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Bridge Bay Theater,” I prompted. “I was alone in the bathroom today. You came in and messed with me. I thought you would’ve learned how to up your game in prison.”

He laughed once, took a drag of his cigarette, and exhaled.

“I have no idea what fantasy you were concocting in your dreams, but I was in New York all day,” he said. “I just got back an hour ago.”

“Yeah, of course you were.”

“Why would I lie?”

I paused, realizing he might have a point. He had no motive to deny it. It was no secret he had it out for me and my family. And there was probably no proof he was there, and even if he was, an alibi could be forged to say he was elsewhere.

With just us, here in this room alone, he’d take pleasure in doing and saying whatever he wanted with no one else to hear.

He stepped up to me, and I could smell the tobacco on him, as well as the fragrance of his clothes, the expensive fabric and the leather of his shoes.

“I’m better than that,” he nearly whispered down on me, and I could feel the ice on his cool breath from the drink he’d just had. “Why would I corner someone in a public space when anyone could walk in and interrupt me? I would need privacy.”

His fingers brushed my hair off my cheek, and I jerked away.

“Like a big house?” he told me. “With miles of empty forest outside and no neighbors. No traffic. Nothing.” I heard the sick smile in his voice and didn’t miss his meaning at all.

He already had it all planned out.

“Everyone else is gone, leaving her alone,” he continued. “No one to help. No one to hear her. No one to stop me. A whole night. Just the two of us.” He whispered now, his breath on my lips. “In the house together. So much space to run, and only so many places to hide.”

I curled my fingers into fists, and if I didn’t know it before, I knew it now. He had changed, after all.

He’d gotten worse.

And in his head, he did the time, so may as well do the crime.

Dread curdled my stomach as he brushed past me.

“Goodnight, Winter,” he said.

And I didn’t mistake the hint of excitement in his voice.