Chapter 16 #3
“You know more than you’ve been letting on,” he says. “Someone helped you escape, that first time, when you walked right into Angel’s hands. And you knew that person. Who was it?”
I shake my head again, willing the tears to fall, willing anything to happen that might divert his attention, which is so overbearing that it feels like it’s draining the life from me.
“Who?” he insists.
I try to place my head in the nook of his neck again, but he keeps me from him.
I close my eyes, remembering that horrible time, nearly two years ago now, when I had made up my mind to escape.
I had accepted Angel’s offer to run away, not realizing I was falling into a trap.
And the person who’d brought me a key, hidden in a dessert, was…
The quiet woman. The one who’s been with Devil so long she’s practically one of them. The woman no one ever suspected.
I didn’t know her name, then, but I found it out when I started living with Damien. It’s Lucy. That’s the quiet woman’s name. Lucy.
Somehow, I never put two and two together. If I thought of her, it was merely to assume she was trying to help me. Even though some part of me realized something was off, I guess I’ve never thought about her long enough to understand.
A sickening feeling overpowers me. I wonder if Alice died for nothing. Did Damien kill an innocent woman, and is he going to kill Lucy now, if I reveal her identity?
The now familiar lung-crushing sensation pushes down on me. I can’t breathe. I can’t breathe. Goddamnit, I can’t breathe.
Alice’s last moments dance before me, the sudden realization of what was going to happen to her, the absolute horror in her eyes a moment before Damien threw her from the plane. And then, when he casually returned to me, as if nothing were the matter…
The man who’s holding me now is a true killer. The kind who kills first and asks questions later. He wouldn’t need proof before he killed me too.
If he wanted to kill you, you’d be dead, my heart tells me.
But my brain lashes out at me.
You’re so gullible. So fucking gullible. Motherfucking jellyfish.
I’m barely aware of my body, every inch of it freezing and drenched in sweat, my face turning red as I try, and fail, to suck in little spurts of air. Nor do my glazed eyes take in Damien’s concerned face, his hands clasped around my arms, his mouth moving to pronounce words that I can’t hear.
All I’m aware of is the blissful sensation of my vision turning to white, and of the loss of consciousness that creeps up on me.
__
Smack.
I’m awakened by another slap to my face, and the pain of it tells me Damien doesn’t only mean to awaken me.
He’s staring at me, a disconcerting mix of cold fury and anxiety in his eyes.
The minute he sees I’m conscious, he composes a number on his cell phone.
“Alice was not the only rat. We have proof she was, but there’s someone else.
Seraphina knows something. Alice was in the building when she escaped, so everything seemed to line up neatly, but it wasn’t her.
Seraphina doesn’t recognize her. No, she won’t tell me.
Of course, she fucking won’t. So figure it out, and when you’ve got whoever it is, string them up by their toes and flay them alive.
Make sure they say everything they know before you slit their throat. ”
Each word feels like a needle to my chest. I know why he’s furious.
When he’d gotten me back from Angel, during that first period of happiness, I’d lied and said I’d managed to escape on my own.
At the time, I’d thought Lucy was trying to help me.
Though the truth was, I hadn’t thought about it much.
If I had, I probably would have put two and two together.
But it was too painful to dwell on that period of time, and Damien seemed so thankful to get me back that he appeared to accept my feeble explanations. Though now I realize he never did, and had continued, all along, to try to figure it out. I guess his investigation ended up leading him to Alice.
On my end, it was surprisingly easy to cast out all thought of the quiet woman. Lucy. Despite being quiet myself, I fell into the trap. I assumed that since she was quiet, she was harmless. Inexistant even.
I should have realized the silence was her defense. Invisible people always have something to hide.
But, maybe out of some sort of trauma response, my mind did all kinds of mental gymnastics to avoid thinking back to that time. Knowing Vale was dead and Angel defeated were enough to reassure me.
Now, my mind forcefully goes over everything leading up to my escape. Angel was going to kill me. And Lucy knew. She fucking knew.
__
The minute Damien hangs up, he stares at me again, and his anger seems to have won out on his anxiety. He grabs me by the front of my dress and pulls me up so that my feet are dangling a few inches from the ground.
“Are you…” I swallow hard. “Are you going to throw me out of the plane too?”
He laughs, but it’s humorless. “Would you like me to?”
I shake my head, my heart pounding in my chest, but he doesn’t take me toward the plane door. He drags me to the bedroom, shuts the door behind him, and throws me on the bed.
“I’m going to smack those bullshit panic attacks right out of you.”
He drags me over his lap, flips up the hem of my dress, and lets his hand fall on my ass.
But it’s a light sting, nowhere near as hard as he usually hits.
I cringe, waiting for the punishment to start in earnest, but it never does.
Instead, he begins to squeeze and stroke me possessively, raking his hands all over me, then lifts me back up and crushes me to his chest.
“I love you. I fucking love you. Why can’t you believe me?”
His voice sounds choked up. I stare at him in surprise, unable to understand this reaction. He actually sounds emotional. If I didn’t know any better, I’d imagine he was on the verge of crying.
Then he throws me hard on the bed again, this time on my back, and he climbs on top of me. He lets his full weight fall over me, and his hands fist my hair as he presses his lips ferociously to mine, his tongue pushing into me, claiming my mouth.
He tears himself away and breathes me in before trapping some flesh in his teeth, biting me right at the juncture between my neck and my chest. I whimper at the burn, but a second later, he’s sucking away the pain, hard enough that I know I’ll have a mark tomorrow.
He continues to bite and suck all down my side, working his way to the wetness between my thighs.
But just as he reaches it and I moan in anticipation, he raises his hand and hits me there instead.
The smacking sound is so loud and wet that I flush in surprised embarrassment, but soon I’m writhing under him as his hand continues to assault me, each strike feeling like hot iron against my most private parts.
By the time he’s stopped his punishment, I’m panting, my skin slick with sweat, and more aroused than I’ve been in a long time. Aroused in spite of the thought that I have a killer in my bed. Or maybe because of it.
He drags his tongue over my abused folds, and I whimper, the wetness feeling good on my throbbing skin.
At first, I hate myself for the way the walls I’ve erected melt under his touch.
But soon, I’m too needy to do anything but succumb to my desire.
His tongue darts over my clit, pushing into me and licking at the spot deep inside that drives me frantic.
He keeps his mouth latched onto my throbbing bundle of nerves, his tongue thrusting out to tease my clit and then pushing into me again, lapping, thrusting, sucking at me hungrily.
The pressure builds fast and hard until I come, spasming uncontrollably under his firm grip, my burning skin making the pleasure so much better.
He rewards me with one last stinging smack to my clit, and the surprise of the renewed pain, just when my body had sagged backward in a blissful post-orgasm state makes me actually yell.
Then he lies back on top of me, but although his chest is crushing mine, I can breathe surprisingly well.
I haven’t thought a single second of Alice’s terrified scream as she was pushed out of the plane, and the spiraling thoughts that seem to have taken hold of me since Damien first told me about his plans for our future have left me.
I gaze up at him, my heart full with secret love.
That love is buried too deep for him to discover, but he reads the rest of me, as he always does. “Looks like the answer isn’t a therapist after all, is it?” he smirks. “I think you need to be punished more frequently. But I’m up for the task.”
He kisses the tip of my nose, then lifts me up in his lap. “We’re going to land soon. Let’s go.”
He carries me into the main cabin, and as the plane slowly descends, I realize for the first time that I haven’t the least idea where we’re going.