Addicted

vail. His eyelids were fluttering and he was barely conscious.

“Enough of this!” Quinton exclaimed. “Come to me, Zoe!”

I hated to let go of Jason but I had to try something, and there was nothing on the floor that would help out my cause. I placed Jason’s head on the floor and slowly got up. “Quinton, I have an idea. If you really want us to be together, why don’t we just leave? I’ll go anywhere you want to go. Just don’t hurt Jason, okay?”

“How admirable, Zoe.” He looked me up and down like he was pondering my offer. “However, I don’t believe shit you’re saying.”

“I’m telling the truth.”

“Truth?” He started laughing again. “You don’t know the meaning of the damn word.”

Quinton suddenly grabbed my arm and flung me against the kitchen counter, making me hit my ribs against the overhang. I screamed out in pain. He walked up behind me and pressed himself up against my back. “Oh, did I hurt you?” he asked, pulling back the hair out of my face so he could see my profile. “I didn’t mean to hurt you, baby.”

I asked a logical question. “If you don’t want to hurt me, why are you here?”

He took a deep sigh. “Because I’m confused, Zoe. Part of me wants to wring your little neck, but the other part of me wants to carry you away someplace and make you love me.”

I didn’t reply. I just stood frozen in place while he started licking all over the back of my neck.

“Maybe if I fuck you right here, right now, in front of Jason, I might be able to figure out the solution to my bitch problem. You think?”

“You’re sick,” I blurted out, searching the countertop for something to hit him with. Since the cabin was a rental, most of the countertop was cleared off.

He swung me around to face him. “I’m sick? What about you?”

“Okay, we’re both sick,” I readily admitted. “But Jason has nothing to do with this. Let him go,” I pleaded. “For the sake of my kids.”

For a brief second, I thought I saw a tear forming in Quinton’s left eye.

“Please, Quinton! You remember what it was like to grow up in a home without parents! Look at what it did to you!”

“Shut up, Zoe!” Quinton punched me in the face. “Shut the fuck up!”

Before I could react to the punch, he started ripping off my clothes. He lifted me up on the counter and hit me again in the face until I had no choice but to succumb to his advances.

I shut my eyes because I didn’t want to see what I knew would be next. I heard him unzipping his pants, and then he entered me roughly. I laid there in fear while he had his way with me. The mere fact that he was fucking me with Jason in the room made me want to crawl up in a hole and die. I just wanted the whole thing to be over with. I began to think about all the things I would never get to do, including watching my kids grow up.

I opened my eyes when Quinton dropped the gun on the counter so he could grab my hips and push himself deeper into me. I tried to gauge whether it was within my reach and stretched my fingers out in a useless effort.

Quinton noticed what I was doing and chuckled, “Forget it! Not a chance! Just fuck me, Zoe! Fuck me hard!”

I wouldn’t move my hips, and that made him even more irate. “Fuck me, dammit!”

I clamped my eyes shut again and prayed for it to end. That’s when I heard the crack, like a walnut being opened with a nutcracker.

Before I could see what was happening, Quinton was suddenly no longer inside me.

“Who’s the punk now? Who’s the punk now, you fuckin’ bastard?” Jason exclaimed, beating Quinton on the head ferociously with the butt of the gun.

By the time I managed to get down off the counter, Jason was on top of Quinton on the floor, still beating the shit out of him. A handful of Quinton’s teeth were scattered on the floor, and his face was so bloody it was almost unrecognizable.

I tried to pull Jason off him. “Jason, that’s enough!” He kept beating him, and I was afraid he would kill him. “That’s enough, Jason!” I reiterated, pleading with him not to take a life. “Death is too good for him! Let the police handle him!”

Jason finally stopped hitting him and tossed the gun aside. I got down on my knees and hugged him tightly. He started crying and he wasn’t alone.

I kissed him all over the face. “I love you, Jason!”

“I love you too, Zoe,” he whispered. “This is forever.”