Chapter 12 Skylar
SKYLAR
What did I just witness?
As mad as I am at Bronwyn, as much as I wish her the worst, I wasn’t prepared to see this.
That axe. That swift paralysis.
What Jett did to her was the most sadistic act I’ve ever witnessed.
Is this how I’m going to be tortured? Or will they be more creative with me, more brutal?
My heart hammers, cold sweat breaks out across my skin, my chest cinches tight.
Not now, body. Don’t you dare betray me.
I drag air into my lungs, filling them slowly. Blinking the last tears from my eyes.
By the time Knox reaches the bottom of the stairs, my pulse has steadied.
The terror hasn’t.
“Help.” The plea slips out as Knox descends to his basement. It’s barely a whisper, barely a breath.
Knox hears it, and for punishment, his hand cracks against my ass.
The second crack stings even worse.
The universe has a sick sense of humor. Of all the men I could’ve wanted, it has to be the one who might murder me.
Slap.
“Stop it.” I punch his back, but nothing helps. It’s like hitting a wall. “Stop.”
“You stop, Trouble.” Slap. “Mine. You’re mine.”
I’m too horrified to scream or fight harder, though I really should.
He stomps across the basement, each of his steps massive. A reminder of how big he is. How easily he could squash me like a bug.
Don’t think about that.
Right. I have to think about escaping. But it’s almost impossible when I see what Knox has stacked against me besides his size.
Weapons. So many of them.
My heart stutters at the sight. From my place over his shoulder, I catch the glint of a chainsaw hanging on his wall. Dust coats it, but that offers no comfort.
If he needs to use it on me, he will.
My throat stays locked tight while his hand caresses the sting on my ass.
I’m not reassured by it.
His feigned kindness is devastating.
It unravels me.
A reckless part of me wants more of Knox’s touch. He’s warm, solid, disturbingly familiar, like I’ve known him all my life.
Shut up, heart.
Easier said than done. Shock warps the mind that way. Safety and danger blur until I can’t tell one from the other.
But I have to do it, have to tell them apart.
Knox is the enemy. And no matter how many times he calls this place home, it isn’t. Not my home anyway.
Where I grew up—my real home—is all worn rugs and antique furniture. It’s throw blankets and pillows in every color. Warmth leaks from each wall, even though my parents are hardly ever there.
Here, no throw blankets or similar comfort items lie around.
There’s the chainsaw, yes, and other horrors too.
On the shelves beside it, jars and boxes are stacked tight, each one marked with a label I can’t make out in my current state. But the thought of what might be inside is enough to send ice shooting up my spine.
Beneath the shelves sits a rough-hewn wooden table. Laid out on top of it are knives. Three of them. Long, heavy, gleaming. Fleshing knives.
Tools of his trade.
“Other than doing whatever it takes to paralyze them, you don’t damage the quality by striking below the neck.”
At the memory of Papa’s words, my mouth goes numb. As I come to terms with what’s actually going on here.
The Colberts don’t work on livestock hides.
They deal in people.
That’s why threatening to turn me into his next belt came so naturally to Knox.
The others kill them, and here is where Knox tans them.
His grandpa said something about Knox finally joining them, but this basement, it doesn’t look new. Knox moves around here like he’s lived here his whole life.
They’re all liars. All murderers.
Knox included.
No. No. Something doesn’t add up.
He’s too warm with me. Too affectionate for it to be rehearsed. Sure, brutality and dominance hang on every move he makes…
But.
It feels like he genuinely cherishes me, in his own strange, convoluted way.
Or maybe I’m just delusional.
Maybe I’m a fool for thinking he’d spare my life.
Terror clutches my lungs, almost pushing a scream out of me. I bite my cheek until blood floods my mouth, shutting down every trace of weakness.
Surrendering to your emotions makes you weak. I can do better. I will.
If I could just silence this insistent voice, the one whispering how Knox wants me alive.
It’s insane. It’s wishful thinking.
I’m going to die here.
“Let me down,” I shout, but the only response I get is his muscles flexing beneath my fists. “Why are you doing this? Why won’t you talk to me? Let me down!”
Without warning, he drops me to my feet. I gasp as his fingers tangle in my hair and yank so I’m staring right at him.
“That’s better.” The hazel eyes behind his mask burn, pinning me with fire.
“What is?”
Knox flips me around and wraps his free arm around my waist. His hand returns to my hair, and the rough pull stings at my scalp. Steals the breath from my lungs.
“You, Skylar. Screaming. Making it believable. That’s fucking better.”
“I’m not doing this for you.” Fear and fury pound in my head. “I’m not performing.”
“Fine by me.” Tugging on my hair, he twists my head, forcing me to look at the rest of the basement, at all the ways he can torture me. “As long as you scream.”
I almost do it again when I gag violently. This—the three hooks dangling from the ceiling…he’s going to hang me here. Going to watch me bleed out into one of the three tin buckets waiting beneath them.
Fuck, I won’t picture blood dripping into them.
I won’t.
Then he tilts my head again, urging me to keep looking around and—
I wish he didn’t. What I see around this basement, knowing what I know, suspecting what I do…
I choke. Can’t breathe when I see all the tanning equipment. Just like in the exhibits.
There’s a wooden beam. A salting wall, empty of stretched hide. Liming barrels are lined up in a neat row.
Only here, it isn’t clean.
Here, it’s stained.
Another piece of evidence supporting the horrors I suspect to be true.
My chin trembles. Bile surges in my throat.
“Jett laughed.” Strange how I say that instead of accusing Knox. Instead of screaming. “He laughed when he threw the axe at her. When he hurt her.”
“She asked them to kill you.” Knox is a dark shadow from above me. He makes me look at him by yanking harder on my hair. “She… Fuck.”
His growl. His fury.
His protectiveness.
They give me hope.
The man who licked me to an orgasm isn’t gone, not really.
He’s two things at once. A monster and a man who wants me.
If that’s the case, there has to be another way to get through to him, to save myself.
Wait, there is a way.
Knox is attracted to me. Even now, when he’s pressed up against me, he’s hard.
I might want sex from Knox too, but I don’t want to do it in this basement.
I can’t imagine losing my virginity in a place like this. I won’t.
The next best thing I have to offer is my mouth. A blowjob I’m already wet for in exchange for safety.
This plan is reckless, born of desperation.
It’s my last resort.
I bite the inside of my cheek, a poor attempt to control the shivers.
I’m scared. Terrified. My complete lack of experience in pleasuring a man might disappoint him so badly that he might decide to torture me, then end my life.
Or maybe he won’t care. Maybe it won’t matter if I get it right as long as I do it.
Seconds tick by as I consider this.
Heat thrums low in my belly, my breasts ache, my thighs press together.
Arousal tangles with my fear until I can’t tell one from the other.
All I know is that I have to act.
I’ve officially run out of time.
“Knox.”
Carefully, I lift my hand to his, the one knotted in my hair. My fingers brush his wrist, soft, cautious. He’s wild, and I have to tread lightly.
Without an ounce of grace, he turns me again so I’m facing him.
He doesn’t let go of my hair, his eyes dark and locked on me. The desire he can barely contain is bleeding from him.
“I won’t try to escape. I”—deep breath, I can pretend to be this attractive, confident woman I’m not—“want to reciprocate. This will be another first, but…I know you must be in…” Jesus, it’s just words. “You must need help.”
I’ve never heard a groan like Knox’s, not ever.
Full of anguish. Frustration.
Heat.
He tugs on his mask, throwing it away.
I barely hear it dropping.
The only thing that registers is him.
This man is beautiful in the most broken, rugged way.
The square jaw. The sharp cheekbones. Eyes set just deep enough to give him that haunted edge.
And his hair is thick, brown, unruly. I want to sink my fingers into it.
But what turns my shameful attraction into actual longing is how he studies me back. His gaze digs deeper, like he’s trying to carve his way inside my head.
“You want to help me?” Hard to breathe. So hard when his full lips move. When they’re so close to me. When my need is a living thing. “Do you, Skylar?”
What little confidence I’ve had shatters at his words. Tears burn my eyes.
He knows this would be my first time, and he can probably already tell I’ll fumble. I’ll gag, drool, make a mess of his cock.
His only pleasure would be watching me on my knees, laughing at my inexperience.
But I’m not backing down.
I want to live.
I want him.
I swipe at my tears, growling, “Yes. I do.”
He leans in and, foolishly, I drift toward him, palms pressing against the hard planes of his chest.
The silence between us hums, stretched thin, his eyes burning into me until every nerve in my body sparks to life.
My thighs tighten, squeezing hard.
Then—
One by one, his fingers slip free of my hair.
He exhales low and slow as he steps back.
My breath catches in my throat.
It’s happening. He’s going to order me to do it.
Except he doesn’t speak, just glowers.
His fists are tight at his sides. My eyes drag to them, then to the veins cording his lean arms.
My pulse skitters. My arousal drenches my shorts.
“Knox.” I snap back to his face. To those eyes—dark, nearly black now—that burrow into me.
“Kneel.” His lips barely move around the word, teeth gritted.
“Okay.” My knees hit the floor, the concrete biting into my skin. This basement has seen more violence and death than I ever will as a doctor. “I’ll do it if it means you’ll let me live.”
His eyebrows crush together, fury sparking. He suspects I’m lying.
By the look he levels at me, he doesn’t like it. Not one bit.
“I want it,” I blurt, the truth that might save my life. That might get me what I need, and that’s him. My chin tips down, my lashes lifting to meet his gaze. “Take me.”