Chapter 2
2
MILENA
I go completely still.
My skin prickles. My pulse stutters.
My lungs forget how to pull in air.
For a split second, I think maybe I imagined it.
Then the shadows…move.
A figure detaches from the far corner of the room—tall, broad, and wearing a matte black mask bearing the visage of a freaking wolf .
I scream, and just as the nightmare lunges at me, my survival instinct kicks in.
I turn and bolt, my heel catching the edge of the rug, my breath leaving my chest in sharp, terrified sobs as I shove through the bedroom door and into the hall.
Footsteps thunder behind me.
Fast.
He’s coming after me.
I bolt down the stairs, almost tripping over my feet before I catch myself and hurl myself down a hallway.
It’s only after I do so that I remember the bedroom was on the third floor, not the second, which means I just got off at the wrong stop.
Too late to fix that now.
I can hear his shoes slamming on the floor, gaining on me with every breath.
I run faster, the clicks of the heels of my shoes bouncing off the old walls like staccato war drums.
“I told you not to wear heels, princess,” he calls after me, his voice half-amused, half-feral, and all terror-inducing.
“They don’t exactly scream survival to me.”
Survival .
What the fuck have I walked into?
!
My heart is hammering in my throat.
The corridor blurs past me, streaks of warped wallpaper and crumbling molding.
I have no idea where I’m going—just away .
From the beast charging after me through the darkness.
From the madness threatening to pull me down into oblivion.
A bookcase appears out of nowhere.
I dodge it at the last second, but my shoulder clips the edge.
Pain blooms sharp down my arm, but I don’t care.
I can’t care right now.
This was just supposed to be a dare.
A joke.
Some creepy-ass house and a quick video.
Not a man. Not this .
I round a corner, nearly slipping on the hardwood, tweaking my ankle.
Behind me, the footsteps pause.
I freeze, my ears straining, every hair on my skin standing on edge.
The sudden silence is somehow even worse than the chase.
It’s like my breathing is suddenly too loud.
Like my goddamn pulse is thudding in my veins at such a volume that people two blocks away will know where the fuck I am.
I tense and go utterly still against the wall.
Then I hear it again—slow.
Measured. Deliberate.
Not the footsteps of someone chasing, though.
Someone hunting .
“And blonde …?” The rasping, deeply masculine voice slices through the darkness and teases over my skin like knives.
“I seem to recall you told me you were a brunette. However did you know that blondes are my favorite fucking meal .”
I’m in a horror movie.
It’s the only explanation.
A real-life horror movie, and now some fucking psycho in a mask is going to chase me down in a haunted house and eat me .
“I’m looking forward to seeing how that blonde ponytail looks wrapped around my fist while I watch you choke and gag on my cock.”
Jesus fucking Christ .
“Hide all you want, princess,” the feral voice growls.
“The suspense is just making me harder .”
I choke down a whimper that threatens to escape my lips, strangling it in my throat.
But not quite enough.
The man chuckles darkly.
“Come on, princess,” he murmurs quietly.
“You fucking asked for this.”
When I hear the creak of a floorboard, I bolt again, ignoring the pain in my ankle, my pulse exploding in my veins.
“ Yessss ,” the monster groans, his footsteps pounding after me as a fresh scream curdles in my chest. “ Run , little princess,” he snarls.
“Fucking RUN for me.”
I reach the end of the hall and yank open a door?—
It’s a fucking linen closet .
I slam it shut and whirl, throwing myself down another hallway, my heart threatening to claw its way out of my chest. The hallway splits left and right.
I haven’t a clue which way leads to freedom: I blindly choose right and sprint forward, half-limping.
This is all wrong. It’s not just him, not just the terror I never anticipated.
It’s that one of us seems to be playing a game that was planned, and the other is just running for her fucking life.
Then it hits me.
He thinks I’m someone else.
He thinks I’m fucking ALICIA .
The horrible realization of exactly what that bitch-cunt set me up for tonight hits like a knife to the stomach.
But I don’t have time to digest how utterly fucked it is that she sent me into this, not now.
I don’t have time for anything but survival .
I slam through another door and find myself in what used to be a ballroom.
Moonlight filters in through shattered windows.
Dust motes swirl in the air.
Another grand piano sits broken in one corner, like a corpse.
I only get ten steps across the floor before I hear the door to the ballroom bang open behind me, and the beast comes spilling into the room like black ink.
I spin to run, but it’s too late.
A hand slams across my mouth from behind, muffling the curdling scream that tears from my throat.
The sheer weight of him—powerful, muscled, and hard—slams into my back, tipping me forward until I go crashing into the piano.
Everything goes numb.
The taste of copper floods my mouth, and sheer panic surges through my system as he brutally slams me forward over the piano.
I scream bloody murder into his hand, fighting and kicking, trying to shove him off me.
But he’s too strong.
Too powerful.
Too all-consuming.
Suddenly, his hand is grabbing the back of my skirt and yanking it up over my ass.
“This isn’t what we agreed to,” he growls.
“You have the wrong person!” I scream into his hand.
“I’m not her!”
It only comes out as muffled, garbled nonsense against the iron hand clamped over my mouth.
“You were supposed to be naked,” the monster rumbles darkly.
“Allow me to fix that .”
He’s completely heedless of my hands flailing and clawing behind me as he grabs the back of my panties and tears them down my thighs.
I scream as the cool air hits my skin.
My legs tremble.
And yet…
Somewhere deep inside me, something rotten, secret, and shameful is responding .
Traitorously.
Obscenely.
Horrifically.
It’s not this exact scenario.
But there's enough elements of it that the deranged darkness inside me ignites.
The hands on me, taking my power away.
The taste of fear in my mouth, and the smell of unbridled arousal in the air.
The feel of bulging, uncaring, unmerciful muscles pinning me and taking complete control, heedless of my wants or feelings on the matter.
What the fuck is wrong with me .
Fantasy isn’t this, not really.
Not with an actual stranger. Not with a masked fucking psycho in a derelict mansion.
“Let’s see how fucking wet and messy this little pussy got running from me. And I’d hope it’s really fucking wet, princess, for your sake…”
He shoves his hand between my thighs, and something in me snaps .
My hold on reality, maybe.
A gut instinct to survive.
I will not let this happen.
Just as he leans over me, I drive my elbow back into his ribs. Hard.
The monster grunts in pain. His grip loosens—not all the way, but enough.
My pulse roars as I whirl and slam my knee up into his crotch .
“FUCK !” He roars madly, groaning as he stumbles back a step. I grit my teeth and send a swift, well-aimed grand battement into his balls.
He makes a sound that’s half-fury, half-pain as he drops to his knees.
I don’t wait.
I fucking run .
Down the hall. Along another corridor. Past shrouded furniture and musty old portraits, and finally down the stairs.
Cool night air blasts me in the face as I stagger out the front door of Greymoor Manor, leaving it hanging open as I half-fall down the steps into the street.
My ankle is on fire. My legs barely work.
But I flat-out run down the block, catching sight of a cab pulling up at the corner to drop some passengers off. I scream and wave, charging at it like a maniac and probably terrifying the two guys who are getting out of the back seat before I dive inside and slam the door shut.
“Drive!” I choke. “Anywhere—just go !”
The cab peels away from the curb, tires screeching.
It’s only when we’re half a block away that I look back.
The mansion stands silent. The steps are empty.
The front door is closed again.
No sign of a monster in a wolf mask.
…Just the lingering electric tingle where his hands clamped over my mouth and touched my skin.
I exhale hard, and then start laughing for some weird, deranged reason: quiet, unhinged laughter that has no humor in it at all.
Take something. Leave something. Say the words.
I said the words and got them on video, though I didn't take the fucking book.
It was dropped somewhere during that mad, insane chase.
I did leave something behind, though. My sanity.