Chapter 35
Agatha
The sound of my alarm cuts through the dark. My hand flails until I smack the screen enough to shut it up. My eyes burn, adjusting slowly. This isn’t the cabin. Not the crypt. Not the slab of stone where three masked lunatics fucked me raw.
This is my room. My bed. My ceiling fan ticking like always.
I jolt upright, heart slamming. My phone’s right there, plugged in on the charger. The lock screen glows: eight a.m. Monday.
“What the fuck?” I mutter out loud.
My last clear memory is the taste of sweat and blood and cum all tangled together. The triple crazies took me one after the other like it was nothing. Like I was nothing. Like I was everything.
I swing my legs over the bed and take stock of my body.
No bruises fresh enough to explain. Just the lingering ache in my body.
They brought me home. When? How? The dress is back on, wrinkled and clinging to my skin.
The lingerie too, stretched and ruined. They hadn’t even bothered to strip me when they carried me here.
My viewers are going to eat that video up. I’ve never given them more than one partner on film. Never an orgy. Never chaos like that. The comments will go feral. Lorna will either murder me or crown me queen.
I don’t have work today. Teacher’s day off.
That should mean rest, but my head’s already buzzing with the list. I need to edit the footage and send Lorna a cut, then get in touch with Chad about the calendar shoot.
My Bloody Valentine theme got checked off by the events of this weekend, so I’ll have to pivot.
Scream feels right; classic, iconic, Ghostface lurking in the corner while I strip down and bleed for the camera.
Maybe just me. Maybe not just me. A group shoot would hit harder, best-friend slasher energy, blood and skin tangled together like a death pact.
The problem is, I don’t have friends who’d ever step into that kind of frame with me. Not the ones I’d strip down with. So maybe I lean on the BTL girls. Lorna can assign someone, and Chad will definitely have opinions about who fits the look. We’ll figure it out later.
Right now, I need a shower. And to not think about the way Corwin, Garron, and Evander treated me this weekend.
My mouth is dry, my head pounding like I drank an entire bottle of whiskey, and my skin reeks of smoke, sweat, and sex.
I grab my phone and shuffle toward the bathroom. The light blinds me when I flip it on, reflecting off the mirror and showing me a stranger’s face staring back. Makeup smeared into bruised shadows under my eyes. Lipstick wiped halfway across my cheek.
I peel the dress off, and it falls to the floor. The lingerie lands in the sink, flimsy and ruined. I turn the water on hot, and steam clouds the glass before I step into the shower. The spray hits me hard enough to sting.
I run through every ritual I know. Shampoo twice, conditioner combed through until my scalp tingles.
Bar soap across my body. Scented wash layered on top.
Sugar scrub grinding into my skin as if I can scrape the weekend away.
Razor to my legs, my underarms, the tender line of my pussy.
Conditioner rinsed. Face wash until the towel comes away gray.
By the time I step out, hair twisted in a turban, towel knotted tight around my chest, I’m pink and raw, but at least I feel almost human.
I rub lotion over every inch of skin until it glows. I pull on some joggers, a baggy T-shirt, and nothing else. Bare feet on the cold floor.
My phone pings.
Evander: Hope you slept okay. You were pretty wiped.
I blink at the screen. Hold up…when the hell did his number get in my phone? I scroll down and sure enough, Garron’s there too. Corwin’s, right under it. Sneaky little fucks. My thumbs move too fast.
Me: How did I get home, and when?
The dots appear, blink, vanish, return.
Evander: Early yesterday morning. Maybe 3 a.m. You were out cold. Figured you’d want to wake up in your own bed.
My chest squeezes, ribs tight.
Me: Why take me home after everything this weekend? Why after the video? Why not back to the cabin?
Evander: You were exhausted. And you told only truths. Thought you deserved an award, Little Horror.
My lip splits under my teeth.
Me: I could go to the police. Tell them what you did.
Evander: You won’t.
The words stop me cold.
Me: You don’t know that.
Evander: Yes I do. You’re obsessed with us as much as we’re obsessed with you. Don’t start lying now, Little Horror.
My chest is a furnace. My mouth tastes like ash. I want to scream at him, want to delete the thread, want to dial 911 right now.
But I don’t.
Because he’s right.
Goddamn it. He’s right.
The files blink awake on my laptop, thumbnails lined in neat little rows like coffins waiting to be opened. I click one. The crypt floods the screen. Lantern light floods the stone. My body on the slab. Their shadows crowding me.
My stomach twists, but I don’t look away. This is what I promised. This is nothing like what my viewers expect.
I scrub through the footage, cutting seconds here, slowing frames there. The blood mix I painted onto the pickaxe gleams dark and perfect, dripping down the handle in slow motion. I almost admire it.
The props looked good on camera, better than I had hoped.
“Christ,” I mutter under my breath, dragging the timeline. “They’re going to eat this alive.”
But then the frame catches Evander stepping in, mask gone, face bare. I freeze. My throat locks. I should cut it. Blur it. Protect him? Protect me? My finger twitches on the blur tool. I should. God, I should. But I don’t.
I drag the cursor forward, forcing myself to watch. My lips wrapped around the axe handle, eyes wide, dress hiked up my thighs. Their hands. Their voices. Me saying yes when everything sane in me should have screamed no.
I hit pause. The screen goes still. My reflection glows faint in the glass, eyes hollow, mouth trembling.
The progress bar starts to crawl again, every percent another reminder that this isn’t just content anymore. It’s a record. Proof of exactly how far I’ve already let them in. By the time it hits one hundred, I’m contemplating my whole life.
Export. Save. Attach. My fingers move on autopilot, clicking through the motions I’ve done a hundred times before. Only this time, my chest pounds harder with each step. The file slips into an email draft with Lorna’s name at the top. My thumb hovers, just a beat, before I hit send.
Gone. Out of my hands.
I set the laptop aside and reach for my phone. My fingers type before my brain catches up.
Me: Tomorrow night good for the photo shoot?
The reply buzzes in almost instantly.
Chad: Yes.
I bite my lip.
Me: Thinking of bringing friends. It’s Scream themed so like a group of friends slasher vibe. Thoughts?
Another buzz.
Chad: Don’t. I’ve got a better plan. Trust me.
Me: Good. Cause I was gonna have to hire friends anyway.
Chad: Don’t pay someone. I will handle it. Have some faith.
I stare at the message. My instinct screams to argue. But I don’t. I let it sit there, glowing on the screen, and decide to leave it alone. Chad always pulls something off.
The rhinestone Ghostface mask catches my eye, glittering under the light. I tug my outfit from the closet and drape it over the chair. Tomorrow, I’ll wear it. Tomorrow, I’ll slip back into the skin of someone who pretends control is always hers.
God, what I wouldn’t give for Skeet to actually fuck me.
A chime snaps me back to reality. My inbox. Lorna. I open it, pulse skipping.
Holy shit, Agatha. Best one yet. You killed it. I’m speechless. I might actually need to go home early to my men tonight and let them take care of me after watching this. Consider it… inspirational.
A lagh bubbles out of me before I can stop it, sharp and real. My thumb taps out nothing more than a single thumbs-up emoji.