Chapter 48
KATE
On Tuesday morning, I take the subway out to Virginia, then a cab to one of the suburban big box stores. I buy a cheap laptop and a burner phone, nearly depleting my cash reserves.
Back in my manky motel room, I connect up to the spotty wi-fi. Online, I apply for three shady credit cards using fake names and addresses, accepting astronomical interest rates in exchange for my non-existent credit ratings.
My financial situation more-or-less secure, I force myself offline. I can’t risk going to any of the sites I usually visit—not just Winter Reckoning, but any other account I used while I was under Wolf’s roof. He can monitor all of them.
He’s the bad guy here. He’s the villain. I have to keep repeating that to myself.
But no matter what Wolf did last night—leashing me, gagging me, binding me—a tiny voice whispers at the back of my brain that I brought this on myself.
I lied.
I cut after promising I’d never take a knife to my thigh again.
I can’t be surprised Wolf punished me.
And just thinking the word punished makes me remember everything we’ve done in the dungeon downstairs. The cross he tied me to on our wedding night… The hook he suspended me from after that… The armoire with all its toys, all the ways Wolf knows to make me come…
I can’t live with him. He’s a vicious control freak who thinks he owns me.
I can’t live without him. In the short time since our wedding, he’s tamed my restless body.
I don’t know what to do. Where to go. How to choose tomorrow.
I’m lost.