Then I was walking up the staircase. I turned right and glared at the door that held my Dolly inside. I picked the lock with the pin from my cravat. The lock turned, and the wooden door opened. As quietly as possible, I snuck into the room, gun and blade braced for whoever was beyond. An empty room greeted me.
I walked lightly over the wooden floor, then I suddenly heard a voice coming from below. “You always were so eager, little Ellis. Always ready for Uncle John.”
White-hot rage surged through me as his voice assaulted my ears, spewing his fucked-up shit to my Dolly. I searched the floor for its origin . . . and my stomach fell.
A hole in the floor?
A rabbit hole.
Dolly had fallen through a rabbit hole.
My eyes widened at what that meant. What that would mean to her, how she would perceive that fall in her damaged mind . . .
She would no longer be in Wonderland. Which would mean . . .
“No,” I whispered. I circled the hole, only to freeze. Dolly lay on a bed in the center of the room. I shook with rage at what I saw next.
That fucker. The Jabberwock hovered above her. Dolly’s eyes were lost, staring at nothing. A catatonic body on the bed.
My broken little doll.
I backed away from the hole. I searched the room, looking for another way to get to her. There was a door in the corner. I moved as quickly as I could and pulled it open. A narrow stairway lay beyond, leading to the room below.
I crept down the stairs to a door at the end. I breathed, trying to keep calm. He’s her kill, I reminded myself. When she comes back—because she will come back to you— Dolly will have the Jabberwock’s head on a platter.
I counted to five and kicked through the door. The wood gave way easily under my wrath. The Jabberwock looked up.
Him and me, both here for the doll. Vying for ownership.
She was mine.
And he was as good as dead.
The Jabberwock leaped from the bed. His eyes widened, and then he spoke. “Heathan James.” He shook his head. “I never thought I’d see you again. In fact, I paid a lot of money to make sure I wouldn’t.”
My lips curled in disgust. This prick didn’t even deserve a conversation. All I could see was him pinning my girl down on this bed. All I imagined in my mind’s eye was this prick holding her down, raping her, then ripping her baby from her stomach. I seethed, my anger inflaming my senses from the inside out.
Bursting into the room, I fired a shot from my AK-47 straight into his leg. He reached for the gun holstered at his waist. I fired another round into his wrist. Blood spurted to the floor as he screamed.
My dick twitched at the heavenly sound.
The Jabberwock fell to the floor. Head up, he began scrambling for something. I glanced down and saw Dolly’s knife near my feet. Slinging the strap of my AK-47 over my shoulder, I bent down and retrieved the knife. The Jabberwock was a tenacious bastard. Slowly, he crawled forward, murderous fury illuminating his eyes.
I let him crawl to my feet—right where he belonged. “Fucker,” he spat, spraying my shoes with his bloody saliva.
I tipped my head to the side as I surveyed his pitiful form. “Sick Fux, apparently,” I replied with a hint of sarcasm. I smirked. “You seemed so much more frightening when I was a child.” I bent down until I was mere inches from his face. His cheeks were mottled red, no doubt a result of the pain my bullets were inflicting on his body. I looked over at the bed and saw my Dolly staring up at the ceiling. My breath hitched as I watched her chest. Then I exhaled, relief like nothing I had ever felt before settling over me, when I saw it lifting up and down, slowly.
Then my eyes dropped lower . . . and this time I became a fucking inferno. I shook uncontrollably as I saw Dolly’s dress bunched around her waist. As I saw her panties on the floor . . . and as I saw her legs parted. Her limbs were paralyzed. The Jabberwock had forced Dolly out of Wonderland, back into the room of doors to which he had exiled her for all those lost years.
I tore my eyes away from Dolly and focused them on the rapist at my feet. My hands wrapped tighter around Dolly’s blade.
Her kill, I sternly reminded myself when my blackened soul tried to usurp control and finish off the fucker. I looked at the bed again. At the catatonic state she had so easily entered under his touch. His mind games had again ensnared my Dolly. After the years of turning her innocent mind to mush, just so he could take her every night, fuck her until she became a mindless automaton, doing whatever he commanded.