Kill Switch (Devil's Night 3)

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.