I nodded, forcing a defiant look. “Like I said, I don’t need help.”
I heard him breathe out a quiet laugh, and I looked up, seeing a condescending smile in his eyes.
“You don’t, huh?” he replied, sounding snide. “You got everything covered? You’re in control?”
I lifted my chin slightly, not answering him.
He strode back over, eyeing me with arrogant amusement. “It’s a nice apartment,” he commented, gazing around him. “You must’ve worked hard to earn the money to pay for it. As well as the bills to those credit cards in your wallet, and that nice, new car you just got.”
I ground my teeth together, a flood of emotions I wasn’t sure what to do with hitting me. I hated what he was saying. It wasn’t that simple, and it wasn’t fair.
He stepped up to me, narrowing his eyes. “You ran away from my brother, my family, your mother, and even your own friends,” he pointed out, “but what if one day you found that all of those securities you took for granted—your house, your money, and the people who love you—weren’t there anymore? Would you need help then? Would you finally realize how very brittle you are without those comforts you seem to think you don’t need?”
I stared up at him, hardening every muscle, so I wouldn’t give myself away.
Yeah, sure. I enjoyed the money. And maybe if I were really serious about being on my own, I’d have chucked it all. The credit cards, the car, and the tuition money.
So was I what he implied? A coward who talked a good talk but would never really know pain or the struggle of having to fight for anything?
“No, I think you’d be fine,” he said in a low, sultry voice as he took a lock of my hair, grinding it between his fingers. “Pretty girls always have something to trade in, right?”
I shot my eyes up, locking gazes with him as I knocked his hand away. What the fuck was the matter with him?
The corner of his mouth tilted in a smile, and he walked around me toward the door. “’Night, Little Monster.”
And I whipped around, just seeing him slip through the door and close it behind him.
Little Monster. Why had he called me that? I hadn’t heard that name in three years.
Not since that night.
Present
DON’T BE ALONE WITH HER.
My one rule. The one thing I’d kept to myself and promised to heed, and now I’d broken it.
I breathed hard, my arms folded across my chest as I glared ahead at the rising numbers on the elevator wall. No one else knew her.
Not the way I did. I knew better. I knew how good she was.
Erika Fane played her parts well. The dutiful, self-sacrificing daughter for her mother, the pleasant, agreeable girlfriend for my brother, and a shining student and beauty in our seaside community growing up. Everyone loved her.
She thought she was nothing to me, insignificant and invisible. She wanted me to open my eyes and see her again so fucking badly, but she didn’t realize that I already did. I knew the deceiving cunt that stewed underneath that perfect little sheen of hers, and I couldn’t forget.
Why the fuck did I take her to her apartment? Why did I have to make sure she was safe? Being near her made me falter. It made me forget.
She’d burst through the stairwell doors, frightened and flushed, looking small and fragile, and instinct immediately kicked in.
Yeah, she
played her parts well.
Don’t be alone with her. Don’t ever be alone with her.
The elevator doors opened, and I stepped directly into my foyer, rounding the corner into my darkened living room, but then I slowed, noticing the girl I had sent up and nearly forgotten about. She sat in the middle of the floor, straddling a wooden chair.
Completely naked.