The Imperfections

Despite the uselessness of her physical resistance, she’s making enough noise to make me worry someone will hear her and come to see what’s wrong. That needs to be handled quickly, before this gets uglier than it needs to.

“Stop screaming,” I snap, my voice low and dangerous as she struggles to fight me off. To give her incentive, I release the hand I was pinning down and retrieve my gun off the bed, bringing it up and pressing the cool metal against her temple.

Her eyes are wide as she stares up at me, confused as to what’s happening and why. Her whole body is alive with panic, her natural instincts telling her she’s in danger and she needs to fight like hell or run for her life.

Since I’m significantly stronger than she is, she must be realizing fighting isn’t gonna get her out of this one. Her instincts will be looking for an alternative to keep her alive, so I figure I should shine some light on the scenario I prefer and give her a little nudge in the right direction. Knowing what I know about her, I think it’ll probably be easier to silence her with fear than violence, anyway.

“Quit squirming,” I tell her, keeping my voice low and calm so she knows this isn’t a battle; I’m in charge, not her. “You’re never gonna unseat me. You’re just gonna annoy the hell out of me and waste all your energy.”

Her gaze searches my face, but she must still be too afraid to see reason because then her expression crumples and she bucks, trying to thrust me off her with her pelvis again. “Go away,” she cries out against my palm.

Pressing my hand tighter against her mouth, I lean close and demand roughly, “You make enough fucking noise to wake anyone up, I’ll kill everyone in this goddamn house. Do you understand me, Alyssa?”

Her body stills beneath me, whether because of my threat or because I used her name, I’m not sure. She’s quiet enough now that I can hear her labored breathing. She swallows, searching my face. I can see the conflict warring inside her, but after a couple of seconds, she nods her head.

“I’m gonna move my hand,” I tell her before slowly inching it away from her mouth.

She draws a shaky breath when I do, but she doesn’t scream. Maybe she can see the distrust in my eyes as I wait for her to be a reckless little pain in the ass and break the promise I coerced out of her, but she doesn’t do anything to earn it.

There’s a full-grown man on top of her in her bed, and her nubile body is completely vulnerable, covered only by a thin nightgown. Despite my threat, given the position she’s in, it’d be hard to blame her for disregarding the safety of everyone else in the house and trying to fight me off anyway to save herself.

But she doesn’t. My threat is effective, and like Theo led me to believe she would be, the girl is cooperative. She appears to trust that if she does as I say, things won’t end badly for her.

It should alarm her that I’m letting her see my face, ’cause if I just wanted to burgle the place, I wouldn’t want anyone to be able to describe me after the fact. Her gaze darts around, taking in the planes and the look of me. It’s exactly the wrong thing to do, but she doesn’t know that.

A wave of discontent rolls over me, thinking about it. I don’t like it that this girl’s barely had a chance to start her life. She’s clearly in the dawn of those youthful years where she’ll waste time making some truly terrible decisions, but unlike most of us, she’ll never get a chance to do better. She won’t be around long enough to learn all the shit she doesn’t know, all because my brother-in-law couldn’t keep his dick in his pants.

“You know who I am?” I ask her.

Of course she doesn’t. She shakes her head, still holding my gaze.

I have the impulse to touch her, probably because of all the shit Theo told me about her. I keep the gun at her temple, but with my other hand, I reach down and gently run my fingertips down the side of her face.

She makes a noise caught somewhere between a horrified gasp and a fearful squeak. Her whole body stiffens and her eyes go wider again, but she doesn’t make a noise. Her gaze leaves my face for the first time since she saw me and darts to the door.

“You expecting anyone?” I ask idly.

She looks back at me and shakes her head no, but it’s too quick and there’s a look in her eyes like she’s lying.

“You sure? I’m not asking for me—I’m asking for them. Someone comes walking through that door, I’m gonna shoot first and ask questions later.”