21
Lia
“Logan…”
His name is the first thing I can think to say after he’s let go of my neck. He inches back, and the smile twisting his lips has never seemed so cruel.
“Logan,” I breathe out again. “You wouldn’t. You can’t.”
“It’s up to you,” he murmurs, as he brings up a finger to wipe away the tear that I didn’t realize was falling. “Carmelo can do it, or I can. You decide.”
His voice is strangely soft, and I suddenly wonder if those other moments of softness were just tricks. Disguises. Danger, masquerading as emotion.
“Well, Lia?”
I don’t know if it’s because I don’t fully believe him to be capable of it, or because the memory of the pill in my pocket gives me some form of courage, but I blurt out, “You.”
His smirk deepens. “Okay. Lie down.”
“Lie… down?”
“Mhm hmm. On the couch.”
“Do I…” I swallow. “Do I need to take off my clothes?”
“That depends, Lia,” he smiles. “Do you want to die with your clothes on or off?”
Fuck. If he’s not planning to kill me, he sure is giving a very good impression of it. “Uhm… on, I guess.”
“Fine. Arms up.”
“Arms up?”
He clicks his tongue, apparently annoyed at having me question every order. “Yes, Lia, arms up. I don’t want it to hurt more than it has to. So, to keep you from wriggling around, I’m going to tie you up.”
My eyes widen, and the fear that makes my skin hum isn’t only because of the way he’s talking about killing me in such a casual way. Getting tied up was not part of the plan. I need to figure something out, and quickly.
“Can I first… have something to drink?” I ask nervously. “I get the whole dehydrated ghost thing, but maybe we could have a drink before you kill me? One last… moment together?”
I’m such a bad liar. He must know something is up. He must.
And yet the way he looks at me with just a touch of the old sadness sends a pang of guilt to my heart.
Why the hell should I feel guilty? He’s literally planning to kill me!
But there’s no denying he’s just fallen into my trap. Some selfish part of me may have meant to trick him yesterday, but I can’t pretend that I didn’t carefully lay out my plan tonight. I’m banking on whatever emotion he may still have for me to make my escape.
He’s looking at me with something like pity in his eyes. Like he actually believes I’m begging for one last gentle moment with him before I die.
I turn away, hating myself for tricking him like this, but hating myself even more for caring. He told me he was going to kill me. I have every right to try to defend myself.
Still, my chest feels unbearably tight as he walks slowly toward the little kitchenette and hunts for two glasses.
“What do you want to drink, Lia?” he calls to me. “There’s water or juice.”
“Uhm… juice.”
He returns with two glasses filled to the brim, and I breathe easier seeing he’s served himself some juice too. Hopefully, the pill won’t be too noticeable in it.
“How about…” I wrack my brain for another reason to send him away. “Something to eat?”
He seems on the verge of protesting, but then his gaze meets mine, and something painful flickers in his eyes. “Cookies okay?”
“Yes, please.”
I huff out another breath of relief when he returns to the kitchen. I quickly dump the crushed pill into his glass, then gulp down half of mine to prevent them from getting mixed up.
“Guess you really were thirsty,” he comments, as he returns with a package of cookies.
He takes a few sips of his juice, then makes a face. “We must’ve left this out in the car for too long.”
“I think that brand is just bitter,” I lie.
“Huh.” He shrugs then downs the rest of the glass. “Okay. One cookie, and I’m killing you.”
I force down a shiver, because he seriously gives me whiplash. It feels like every moment, he’s either on the verge of hurting me or of comforting me. I can never tell what will come next. I’m not sure he knows.
But right now, I need to focus on one thing. And that one thing needs to be not getting tied up.
I chew as slowly as possible on the cookie, but swallow it at last when I notice his annoyed expression. Then I stand up and mumble, “I’m just… going to go to the bathroom.”
This time, he doesn’t fall for it. “Enough, Lia. Stop putting it off. Lie down. Arms up.”
“Logan, I really need to—”
But he doesn’t give me time to finish my sentence. Before I even know what’s happening, he’s got me shoved down on the couch. Then he whips off his belt and ties my wrists together, knotting the other end to the couch leg.
“Logan!” I gasp.
He sits down on top of me, and my gasp turns into a whimper when he takes out a long knife.
Pure menace swirls in his eyes while he uses the tip of the knife to force off the buttons on my dress, then cuts through my bra.
I squeeze my eyes shut as he presses the point of the knife against my elbow, slowly dragging it down over my armpit, then circling my breast. It’s very odd, this soft tickle of a touch that burns my nerves, edged with the panic of knowing that at any moment, he could push the blade into my skin.
“Fuck!” I stammer. “Please, please, please, Logan…”
“Shhh, Lia,” he murmurs, pressing his finger to my lips. “Let me have some fun before I kill you.”
I look away from him, tears streaming down my face as he continues to stroke my upper body with the tip of his knife, dancing over my nipples, down to my belly button, around my lower stomach. Then back up to my neck, under my ears, through my hair…
He uses the blunt edge of the blade to wipe away my tears. They don’t seem to upset him now. If anything, I can feel him growing harder as he straddles me.
“I wonder where I should stab you,” he muses.
“Here?” He suddenly presses the knife into the tender skin below my breast, and, true to his word, I scream.
But in the next moment, I gasp in relief when I realize he only nipped at me.
A tiny bubble of blood appears on the surface, and I stare down at it in confusion, my heart racing.
“How about here?” Another nip, this time to my stomach.
It takes a few more tiny pricks of the knife for me to stop freaking out every time he marks me. And yet, by the time he lays down the knife, I’m a sobbing mess.
“Shh,” he murmurs, drying my tears in a way that could almost trick me into thinking he cares. “I guess you don’t want me to kill you, do you, Lia? Hmm?”
I shake my head, incapable of saying anything.
“Or maybe you do,” he smirks, “because your pussy’s wet. Even when you think I’m going to kill you, you’re fucking wet for me, my little ghost. I can see your panties, and they’re soaked. Do you want me, Lia?”
Fuck. He’s right. His words would be terribly humiliating at any other time, but I’m so overwhelmed all I can do is lie still, shivering all over.
“I said,” he growls in my ear, all his cruel humor gone, “do you want me, Lia?”
My mind is reeling so hard from what he’s doing to me that I only manage to understand the meaning of his words after he’s repeated them a third time.
“Yes, Logan… yes…” I whimper.
He grabs my panties and starts pulling them off. Then he pauses. “This isn’t going to change a thing, Lia. Don’t think you can whore yourself out to me to save yourself. I’m not going to fuck you if you don’t actually want me to.”
By now, my pussy is swollen with need. I can’t understand it. All I know is that I desperately want him.
He sees me squirm beneath him, and a small smile breaks out on his face. But when he looks up at me, his expression is sober as he murmurs, “Say red if you want me to stop.”
Then he grabs the knife.
“L-l-logan!” I gasp as he wipes the blade on my bare stomach. “Please… what are you going to do with that?”
“Is it red?” he questions teasingly, softly dragging the knife down to my pussy.
“I… uhm…” I blink fast. “N-no, not red…”
Did I just give him the green light to kill me?
All I can do is stare in horror as he slowly brings the knife between my legs.
The sharp tip grazes my folds, and I keep perfectly still, hardly daring to breathe.
Then he flips it around, and before I can say a word, he squeezes the blade between his fingers, and pushes the handle up my soaking wet pussy.
“Fuck!”
It feels so fucking good to be filled like this. Even better when he starts to drive it in and out, each thrust touching some deep part of me that has me clenching around it, pure pleasure frying my nerve endings.
But out of the corner of my eye, I see blood dripping from his hand.
Every moment of pleasure he gives me hurts him.
“Logan,” I blurt out. “Logan, please… please don’t hurt yourself!”
“Shut up, Lia,” he hisses through gritted teeth.
Another thrust, and another one, each of them sending me hurtling to the peak of the wave. Each of them making his hand bleed.
“Logan, please! Don’t cut yourself, please!”
“Enough, Lia.”
Fuck! He pumps the handle harder into me, and soon, I forget everything but the way the weapon is drawing all my pleasure from me, igniting my very core, until at last I’m tensing around it, my orgasm ripping through me.
It takes me a moment to realize that Logan’s moved. The knife is still buried in my pussy, but he’s gone around to the other side of me, and is untying the belt.
“Aren’t you going to kill me?” I can’t believe I’m stifling a yawn as I ask that question, but I wasn’t lying when I told Everest I was exhausted, and the orgasm has finished me off.
He chuckles and walks back to his place on the couch. Straddling me again, he toys with the knife, making the handle twist uncomfortably in my pussy. “Did you really believe I would, ghost girl?”
“Uhm…” I wince as he continues to play with the knife, then wince harder when I see the trail of blood dripping from his palm. “I guess… I guess I did.”
“Hmm.” He goes back to twisting the knife around inside me, and I start to squirm from overstimulation and from the adrenaline that still hasn’t fully died down. But a little bubble of hope pushes up through those layers, worming its way into my throat.
“Does that mean you’re not bringing me back to Carmelo?”
He looks up, blinking his eyes in a way that makes me realize just how fogged up they’re getting.
“Logan,” I insist. “Are you bringing me to Carmelo?”
“What do you think, little ghost?”
I click my tongue in impatience. “I want you to tell me.”
He stares at me, something other than just fog swirling in his eyes, and I swallow nervously.
“Well? Go on. Tell me, Logan.”
I don’t mean to sound the way I did back in high school, but the harsh, bratty tone breaks out of me.
Logan’s features harden, and even the fog in his eyes seems to grow sharper as he mutters, “No, you tell me. Tell me, Lia. Tell me why… you drugged me.”
A moment later, he’s keeled over, his body lying heavy on mine.