Chapter 2
REMI
Maybe Trevor isn’t bringing me here to apologize after all.
My eyes flick to the cars parked in front of the cozy little wooden cabin tucked away in the dense trees, then to the gray clouds hovering above us. Not only are his asshole friends here—I recognize their flashy cars—but I know I’m right about the weather.
I’m going to end up getting snowed in at some small cabin with Trevor and his frat-boy buddies, and he isn’t even here to tell me he’s sorry.
I knew this weekend was a bust, but I’m a pushover. I’ve always been one—a people pleaser, ready to do whatever it takes to follow the path of least resistance. I would probably still have come, even if he’d told me he was going to invite all his friends.
It’s why I’ve broken up with Trevor five times, and we’re somehow here. At this cabin. So he can make it up to me.
When it’s going to snow.
God, I’m probably going to get trapped up here for weeks with a bunch of assholes, and we’re all going to starve to death, and the last person who will remember my face is a store clerk who looked like he was ready to quit his job over how big an asshole my not-boyfriend was to him.
At least if I have to die, I’ll be remembered by someone handsome.
That guy at the store had been… well, he’d been perfect, honestly.
He was all lean muscle and blond hair. Even in the fluorescent lighting, his eyes had been this gorgeous golden-brown that I could have gotten lost in if I’d let myself.
He was all full lips and a sharp jawline…
It’s the world’s smallest consolation prize for the world’s unluckiest man. It doesn’t stop me from holding onto the thought as I climb out of the car and let out a small curse.
“Trevor, seriously. It’s so cold up here.” My breath comes out in a puff, and I twist my head to look at him. “If it snows, it’s going to freeze over and—”
“Would you shut the fuck up about it? We’re already here now.
” He looks at me and jerks his thumb over his shoulder.
“If you want to hike down the mountain, by all means. But these?” He holds his keys up and jingles them, then stuffs them into his pocket.
“These are mine. Stop being so high-maintenance, Remington. It makes you ugly.”
Right. Of course.
I watch the metal disappear into the faux leather jacket he has on—even though I bought him a nice jacket for our anniversary last year—and he zips up the pocket like he’s putting me in time out or something.
He’s always treated me like a kid. Even when we were actually together.
Now we exist in this weird limbo where I broke up with him two weeks ago because he started yelling at me for volunteering to work extra over the holidays at the library.
When he shoved me into the wall, I finally told him I was done.
I should have left it at that—I’d been so proud of myself for sticking to the breakup for more than a few days—but he told me he really, really wanted me to come up to this cabin with him for Christmas.
Trevor said it would be a night to remember, and I’m starting to wonder if I’m going to remember it until the day I die because that day is going to come soon.
On the wings of a storm cloud.
Above me, snow starts to fall.
I open my mouth, and his hand slaps over my lips hard enough that I feel the slight sting of my teeth cutting into the skin. It makes tears instantly prickle in my eyes.
“I swear to fucking God. Don’t. It’s just snow, Remington. I promise it’s not what you need to worry about.”
“Wefhat onds munos.” I mumble behind his fingers, tugging at his wrist.
He doesn’t even bother to ask what I said, just grabs me by the arm and tugs me inside to the raucous sound of laughter that I immediately recognize as the guys who are usually over at our apartment drunk and drugged out.
Great.
What he’d said really did sound ominous.
It’s obvious after half an hour that I was absolutely right about the situation.
The second he walks in, Trevor grabs a beer from his friend Garth and shoves me into the corner near a tiny Christmas tree.
It’s what he’s always done—made sure I was there to look pretty but not get in the way.
It’s one of the myriad of reasons we’ve broken up.
That and the way I can taste blood on my lower lip. He’s always been rough with me, though he’s only made me bleed these last few times. But now…
Now there’s dread brewing slowly in the pit of my stomach, and I don’t think it has anything to do with the snow outside.
Trevor is acting weird. Or… weirder than usual. The way he keeps leaning in and whispering things to his friends, the looks they keep giving me…
I want to leave.
I want to wait until Trevor gets drunk and take the keys to his car.
The only thing I worry about is the way the snow is falling—it’s coming down in sheets of white that are starting to pile up on the windows.
Even the fire they have going can’t make the storm outside look cozy. Christmas songs are such a lie.
I think back to the bags of snacks and extra blankets I bought at the store that are piled up in the kitchen, and I wonder if I can just grab it all and lock myself in the bedroom. It’s obvious that Trevor doesn’t need me here—he’s partying with his friends.
He brought me because he likes to have something to show off, because he says I’m “almost as pretty as a girl.”
I don’t expect the sudden surge of shame that tears through me, but it’s there.
I came even though I knew better, and I’m being treated exactly the same way I always am.
I have to start telling myself that I’m worth more than this.
That’s what my coworker always tells me.
Quill looks at me with his big green eyes full of empathy and just a little anger, and he demands I “stop letting assholes like Trevor walk all over me.”
He’s the sassiest librarian I’ve ever met in my life.
I finally take a deep breath and nod, trying to summon up the courage that lets Quill seem like he stands seven feet tall when he barely hits five-five, and I walk across the room.
All of my bravery deflates like air leaving a punctured balloon when Trevor turns on me, his eyes narrowed and his expression ugly when he snaps at me. “What?”
You brought me up here because you said you wanted to spend time with me. I thought we were going to reconcile.
“I’m getting cold,” is what comes out of my mouth instead.
“Stop being a bitch. Go stand by the fire.”
You’ve never treated me right, and I think you need to take me back into town before the snow gets so bad that we’re trapped up here with your asshole friends.
“I think I just want to go to bed. Where are we sleeping?” I silently berate myself for not saying what I’m thinking.
He arches a brow at that, and I feel my stomach swoop again when he brings his hand up and carefully threads it through the dark curls brushing my forehead. “Oh, come on, baby. The party’s barely started. What fun will it be if you go to bed now?”
“I’m not even…” I trail off, because there’s something in his expression that I don’t like. “You can party without me.”
He lets out a low laugh, and the sudden feel of a broad chest bumping against my back, fingers running across my shoulder, makes me try to whirl. It’s only Trevor’s hand in my hair that stops me, but I can still see that his friend Blake is the one touching me.
I don’t like Blake.
Honestly, I don’t like any of his friends.
“Stop it,” I let out in a soft voice.
Blake doesn’t step away, and Trevor isn’t acting possessive like he usually does. His fingers in my hair keep me in place as the bigger guy behind me trails his hand across the back of the stupid Christmas sweater I have on, tracing the exposed skin of my neck with a low laugh.
“He really is pretty, Trev. Perfect present.” Blake’s low rumble makes my stomach flip.
“What?” It isn’t him I’m looking at when I ask. It’s Trevor. My eyes are wide and my head is swimming.
This is worse than the storm.
It’s worse.
It’s so much worse.
“Come on, Remington.” Trevor’s voice comes out as a coaxing coo that makes my stomach hurt. My entire face is flushed, and my body feels impossibly warm. This isn’t…
There’s something wrong here.
I can feel it in the way the five guys in the room are looking at me. The way Blake approached me with a smug look on his face, like he’s going to get to unwrap a Christmas present early.
“What are you doing, Trevor?” My voice is shaking with the question and I hate it.
“I promised the guys a good Christmas. I figured if we taught you a lesson, you’d remember that you aren’t worth bigger and better things.
You need to be reminded that you’re nothing but a stupid fucking slut.
” His fingers are mean when they squeeze my face, nails pressing hard enough into my cheeks that I’m sure he’s leaving marks.
“You don’t get to leave me, baby. And by the time we’re through with you, you’re going to be too used up to think you can go anywhere else. ”
Oh.
Oh, shit.
My entire body goes numb as he shoves me toward Blake, and the broad asshole catches me against his chest with a grin, wrapping his hand around the back of my neck so I can’t try to scramble away.
But where would I go? It’s snowing so hard outside that I’m pretty sure I’d get lost if I even tried to run down the mountain.
And there are so many of them. They’d catch me.
They’d hurt me.
At the sound of Trevor’s laugh, the way he pulls out his cellphone and holds it up like he’s planning on recording what’s about to happen, I realize they’re going to hurt me no matter what I do.
Everything around me blurs, spiraling to a pinpoint of the way Blake has one hand around my throat and the other is trying to unfasten my jeans. In the corner, Trevor looks at me with a smug expression.
A satisfied expression.
And I realize this is what he planned all along—this is my penance in his eyes for trying to leave him for good.
He’s going to let all of his friends have fun, like I’m his present to them.
I’m not sure what’s worse… the way tears spring into my eyes until my vision swims, or the fact that Blake backs me up until I’m standing under the stupid mistletoe I watched them hang earlier before he forces his mouth against mine and floods my tongue with the taste of cheap beer.
The sound of glass breaking shouldn’t be a relief, but it is.
The distraction gives me a chance to jerk my knee up, slamming it into Blake’s nuts so I can at least shove him away from me and press my back flatter against the wall.
It’s the best I can do when the gust of wind comes in from the shattered window.
I’m trying to decide what to do—how I’m going to get myself out of this situation—when I twist my head to see what broke the glass to begin with. Maybe if it was a branch, I can pick it up to defend myself.
Or maybe I can go outside, because I’d rather freeze to death than let Trevor and his friends—
I stop mid-thought and stare wide-eyed.
There’s a guy standing outside, gripping an ax in tight hands.
Oh… oh shit. It’s the man from the store, only that handsome, bored expression is gone. He looks furious, like some killer come to life from the page of a book.
I really am going to die in this cabin, and that handsome face really is going to be the last person to see me alive.