Chapter 25
Freya
“Aunt Jean! Aunt Jean!” I bucked and fought against Uncle Orren’s crushing weight, twisting away from the ugly smell of old, sour-sweet alcohol and his sweat and greasy, unwashed hair.
I tried to bite him, kick him. Aunt Jean would probably scream at me, but that was better than being down here with Uncle Orren alone.
Anything was better. But I just…couldn’t…
breathe. He was squishing me, but I would fight until I died fighting.
Then, from far away, I heard a voice, repeating my name.
Not Uncle Orren. I knew that voice. My ears reached out to it eagerly.
“…fighting me! Calm down! It’s me. It’s Jed.” His voice was low, gentle, pleading. “Please, baby. You’re hurting your own wrists. You’re bleeding. Stop fighting, please, so I can undo the cuffs. Please, Freya.”
My trembling limbs stopped jerking and flailing. I couldn’t seem to inhale. I dragged in short, sobbing breaths as the weight slowly eased. More air came in, and suddenly, I could smell him. I knew that smell. Not Uncle Orren.
The world came back into focus. My whole life reordered itself. I was an adult.
And this was Jed. Those were Jed’s eyes near my face. That was Jed’s voice.
He lifted himself off me, and a big gulp of air made me start coughing.
He reached up to unlock the handcuffs. My hands were cold and numb, my wrists sore. Sticky with blood. I must have had some bad moments, flashing back to that basement. But I didn’t want to think about them. Please, God. Never again.
“Freya, I’m so sorry.” He grabbed my wrists, looking at the red, raw ligature marks with sharp hiss of dismay. “Jesus. I didn’t know…”
I pushed myself away from him into a sitting position. “Didn’t know? Really?” I stammered out, mouth still trembling. “You thought leaving me handcuffed alone in the dark wouldn’t bother me? Seriously, you’re going to play that dumb?”
“I knew it would piss you off, of course. I’m sorry about the lightbulb burning out. I know it was bad, but I never meant to…” His voice trailed off.
“To what, Jed?” My voice was cracked and thick from screaming.
“To hurt you,” he finished. “That’s the last thing I want. I just wanted to keep you safe. I know how protective Ethan and Shane are about you. How much they worry. It’s the same with me. Particularly since we got together.”
“Together? Hah.” I let out a crack of bitter laughter. “Some togetherness. My brothers always thought I should be confined, just like you do.”
“That’s not true,” Jed said. “No one wants to confine you. They never stop bragging about you. I was always hearing about how Freya just invented a patent for this thing, or Freya just got a robotics engineering award for that thing.”
“They like it that I’m smart, when it’s convenient for them. They want a toy they can show off and then put back into a box for safe storage when they’re busy. But they can’t protect me. Neither can you. The damage is done. It was done a long time ago.”
“What damage?” he demanded. “What are you talking about?”
“Never mind,” I muttered. I tried to stand up, but my legs were having none of that. I ended up just sliding off the bed and onto my knees.
Jed sank right down to the floor with me and tried to help me get up, but I smacked his hands away. “Do not touch me,” I hissed.
“What damage, Freya? What are you talking about?”
“Stuff that doesn’t concern you,” I said.
“But no man could protect me from all the bad things running around in the world, no matter how much he wants to, no matter if he thinks it’s his job or not.
That’s just stupid, macho vanity. We all have to look out for ourselves, and I’m prepared to do that. I am fully prepared.”
“Of course you can—”
“But not when I’m handcuffed to a fucking bed!” I yelled. “You made me helpless! How the fuck could you do that, Jed? How could you do that to me?”
Jed’s hands fastened on my shoulders, squeezing, massaging. “Try to breathe slowly,” he said. “I swear on everything that’s holy, I will never do that again.”
My bitter laughter turned into another coughing fit. “Oh, that’s for damn sure. Fuck off, Jed Clearwater. Forever. Go to hell and stay there.” I launched myself in the direction of the bathroom, and by some miracle, hit the door before my legs gave out.
Once inside, with the lock engaged, I held myself up on the sink. Not the best choice, because that meant I had to see myself in the mirror, which was a shitshow. My eyes had that gaping-windows-into-hell look, and I was still shaking violently.
I splashed my face, then closed the toilet lid and collapsed onto it, pressing my face against my knees and sobbing. Aw, poor Freya, all broken up because some man shoved her around. I should be used to it by now. I should be fighting back.
I should be fighting back.
The thought jolted me so much, it made me stop crying. I grabbed a wad of toilet paper and mopped up my eyes, blew my nose, and looked over at the small pink toiletries bag I’d left on the bathroom counter.
The BBBag, which I had taken out because I had been desperate for a toothbrush.
I hadn’t even considered the lethal spike hidden in the handle.
It functioned perfectly well as a normal toothbrush, and I’d wanted fresh breath and white, squeaky clean teeth.
Because I’d been obsessed with getting laid by that man.
While I should have been thinking about getting even.
Well, halleluiah. I was cured.
I grabbed BBBag and scattered the contents out onto the counter, pawing through them, discarding this one, that one.
I stopped on the pack of tampons, tucked in a pink flowered satin “modesty bag.” I tore open the fluffy absorbent cotton shell of one of the tampons, prying out the tiny spray bottle I had stitched inside.
This design was my friend Rose’s brainchild, my fellow badass bitch.
Poor Rose was a much better human being than me, however, and she would be horrified to learn that I had actually brought this theoretical thing into being.
During our tequila-fueled brainstorming sessions, Rose had told me many fascinating things about mind-bending designer drugs she was researching.
Tamloxid 343 had shown promise as a treatment for chronic depression that did not respond to serotonin boosting anti-depressants, but the researchers had realized that at very high doses, involuntary truth-telling was an unexpected side effect.
A possible interrogation enhancer. Big, fat can of ethical worms, torn wide open.
I’d paid a ton of money to have some Tamloxid 343 concocted for me. Super illegal. Just the thing for a badass bitch to have up her sleeve if lives were at stake.
That bastard was going to tell me the whole truth tonight. Even truths he might be hiding from himself. Chances were, I wasn’t going to like it. My romantic fantasies were much more fun than the most likely truth; that he didn’t give a shit about me.
And the worst possibility of all—that he’d betrayed Shane.
Seduction was the only half-assed plan my stressed out brain would suggest for getting this done. Mostly because it didn’t require a great deal of thought, nor was it ever met with much resistance. But I did not feel seductive. I felt gutted.
Too fucking bad.
The tiny cylinder had a spray nozzle to push. According to my careful research, one quick pump should deliver more than enough for a full dose.
I took a swift look at myself in the mirror, and placed the slender bottle between my index and middle finger, practicing the swift, decisive flip-and-twist necessary to get the nozzle under my finger. Zap. Right in his face.
Then I slid it back and pushed open the bathroom door.
Jed stood there, standing at the window and staring out into the darkness. He turned to look at me, his eyes full of misery. It almost softened my resolve. Almost.
“I’m so sorry, Freya,” he said. “I’ll say it until my throat cracks.”
“Your throat, not mine,” I said.
“You won’t forgive me?”
“Piss off,” I said. “I’ve had a really horrible… how long was it? Four hours?”
“Three hours and twenty-three minutes,” he said. “Never again. I swear.”
I harrumphed. “What a lovely sentiment. Gee, thanks.”
“Hey. Babe. Don’t be that way.”
“Actions have consequences, Jed.”
“I was just trying to protect you,” he said.
“By taking away all my agency and making me helpless? Don’t do me any more favors, Jed. I don’t think I’d survive another one.” I sat down heavily down on the bed.
“It was the only solution I could think of to protect you from danger,” he said.
“Bullshit,” I said. “You were protecting yourself. Not me.”
“Maybe you’re right. But if you give me another chance, I’ll do better.”
I couldn’t let myself look him in the eyes, or I wouldn’t be able to go through with this. I’d have another sobbing, crying meltdown. All my nightmare memories would fly out into his face like a flock of vampire bats. And it would serve him right.
Jed sat next to me on the bed, and rested his arm on my shoulders.
There were two separate, distinct Freyas in that moment. One of them wanted to cuddle into his warmth. Wallow in his tenderness. Lean on his immense strength. A bulwark against all the bad, scary, hateful things running around out there. And there were a fuck-ton of them.
And there was the other Freya. Raging, vengeful, hurt. The pressure building up, up, up inside her, like steam, just about to reach the breaking point.
I flipped up the spray bottle, twisted—
But Jed’s reflexes were lightning fast. His hands clamped down on mine, trapping the nozzle in the down position so it kept on hissing. Spraying everywhere.
Not a little tap. A long, long hiss. The drug came out in a cloud around us as we struggled. Two seconds—three—four, and I gasped in a big, honking chestful of it.