Chapter 13 Dread #3
Even on her eighteenth birthday, when her mother killed herself, I was there, watching from afar as paramedics pushed her mother out of the house on a gurney, a sheet covering her lifeless body while she sat on her front steps, face blank and eyes distant as silent tears rolled down her cheeks.
I’ve always been her fucking ghost, and she’s always been my skeptic.
“Were you in on it? Is that it?” The mere possibility of it makes my hands flex with fury. “Did you help him murder her?”
My mind instantly flips over various scenarios in which she somehow played a part in my mother’s death. The thought sends me spiraling, and in a blink, I’m whipping her around and pushing her back toward the edge of the pool.
She squeals, desperately digging her heels in to resist me, but she’s helpless. As helpless as my mom was in her last moments.
“No!” she shouts, terror rounding her eyes.
Her chest heaves, and what little color remained in her face now completely diminishes.
“Don’t lie to me!” I shout, shaking her with each word.
That’s all she’s ever done. Just fucking lie.
“I wasn’t, Kellan, I swear.” Her plea is breathless, but my name coming out of her mouth is enough to pull me out of the black, insidious hole swallowing me. Enough for rationality to sink back in, and the blinding rage to ease a fraction.
For a moment, I study her features carefully, taking in each detail.
The aqua blue reflecting off the pool colors her otherwise pale skin.
Her dark blonde hair is in disarray, the thin, wispy bangs that hang down her forehead damp with perspiration.
Her dainty nose with the little gold hoops in her nostril and septum.
And then her plush, pink lips that have distracted me more often than I care to admit.
All details that make up a face that, thankfully, looks very little like her father’s.
I’ve always loathed how fucking beautiful she is. I’ve often daydreamed about ruining it just so it holds no power over me any longer. So many times, she’s turned toward me when I wasn’t prepared, and I damn near swallowed my tongue.
And now is no different.
She’s a mix between ethereal and sultry. An angel and a demon.
“I swear,” she repeats shakily, barely above a whisper. “I didn’t help him kill her. I would never do that. I swear, Kellan.”
I hate that I believe her, and I really fucking hate when she says my name like that. It gets under my goddamn skin, and I both want to make her repeat it and rip out her fucking tongue so I never have to hear it again.
“Does Barry know this secret?”
Surprise creases her brows as her panicked brain trips over what I said. “How do you know I still talk to Barry?”
“I know a lot more about you than you think,” I answer coldly. “And what I don’t know, I’ll find out. Don’t expect to hold on to your secret forever.”
She might not have helped Lionel kill my mom, but she knows something. Something that’s clearly fucking important enough to scare her into silence. And she will fucking tell me, even if not tonight.
“Does he know?” I push. “Is that why he can love someone who doesn’t even have the decency to support him when the world discredits him as an investigator?”
Reverie swallows nervously, and I can tell she’s struggling to concentrate on my words.
“H-he knows everything, and he knows I believe him, too.”
Too. There she goes again, claiming to believe me.
But as deeply as I longed to hear those words, I realize now that it changes nothing.
“People suffer because of your silence,” I say quietly.
Her face twists, as if I just ripped out her heart, but it only serves to anger me more.
At least I left hers intact. She fucking stomped on mine until there was nothing left.
I narrow my eyes. “You know, killing you would only be fair,” I muse, pushing her back another inch.
She panics, her foot slipping off the edge, nearly sending her backward into the water, but my grip around her jaw keeps her from falling.
Her fingers dig into my wrist harder, anchoring herself to me as if it’ll keep her safe.
Bloody crescent moons form beneath her nails, but the sharp pricks don’t register.
“Kellan,” she begs, my name breaking at the seams and coming out in skewed syllables.
I scowl, my upper lip pulling up from the sound of my name wrapped around her serpent tongue.
“He took my mother from me. Shouldn’t I take you from him now?” I propose. She attempts to shake her head, but my tight grip doesn’t allow her much movement.
“I can drown you right here,” I continue, my tone as sinister as my threat.
“I know how to delete the footage from the cameras in here. I could throw you into Hollow Lake. They’d rule it as an accident, even a suicide.
But if they suspected foul play, the first person they’d look to is your father. ”
Tears brim her long brown eyelashes, and little whimpers escape from her lips.
“I’d clean my blood and skin from beneath your nails,” I continue, glancing to where she clutches onto me. “Don’t think I don’t know what you’re doing.”
“I don’t think you know how to live without me,” she challenges, her voice trembling. “Authorities would blame Lionel for my death, they’d lock him up again, and then you’d be all alone. If I’m not around to torture, you’d have nothing else to live for.”
I grind my molars together, swatting away her claim, only for it to come right back and needle beneath my skin.
My future is set in stone. I’ll qualify for the Olympics again in a few years, and I guarantee I’ll medal. Endorsements and sponsorships from huge brands already fill my manager’s inbox, offering sizable payments that will keep me more than comfortable for the rest of my life.
I have Rogue and Severen, plus plenty of women to choose from to keep my needs met.
I used to have nothing. No one who believed me. No one who supported me. No one who wanted anything to fucking do with me.
Now, I have everything.
But I won’t have her.
And somehow, someway… she’s all I fucking want.
To torment, to hate, to offer me relief in a way nothing and no one else can. She’s an ice cube to a burn that will never extinguish.
So, she’s right—I don’t know how to live without her.
But that doesn’t mean I can’t learn.
I hum noncommittally. “Maybe once I’m free of you, I can finally start living for my mom, no?”
Her only response is a thick swallow. The gears beyond her eyes are churning at breakneck speed, and it’s quite amusing to watch her flounder for another way to get out of it.
I’m expecting her to take a jab at another angle to convince me otherwise, but she doesn’t.
Instead, her hands fly to my shoulders, and she’s launching herself up into my arms. Instinctively, I release her jaw to grab hold of her waist while she wraps her legs around my hips and arms around my neck.
Her cheek rests heavily against mine, allowing me to feel the pulse thrumming in her throat.
Astonishment renders me speechless for a moment or two while I slowly process that every inch of her is molded tightly against me.
“If I go down in that water, you go down with me,” she rasps, her shaky breath warming my ear. “I can hold my breath for a really long time. Maybe even longer than you.”
A wicked smile curls up the corners of my mouth. My blood heats and instantly redirects straight to my dick. I’ve had her naked in my bed, subjected to the tip of my Sharpie and rage. I’ve explored the inside of her mouth and tasted gold, and I’m struggling to find a reason to resist again.
Even if I’ve always been attracted to her, I still would’ve never fucked her. In fact, it would’ve disgusted me.
I can’t pinpoint exactly why that changed, just that it did the moment I stripped her down and brought her back from the edge of death.
Now, the thought of owning her in every way possible… Fuck, I don’t think I’ve ever been so hard in my life.
I’ve also never felt so much fucking shame. Wanting her means disrespecting my mother’s memory. How can I possibly want her killer’s daughter, who never even had the decency to say her fucking name outside of calling me a liar?
I’m a shit son for looking at her with anything other than contempt.
Whatever this attraction is… it needs to stop, and the only way to make it stop is to get her out of my system.
One time.
That’s all I need.
“You think I can’t drown you while you hold on, baby?” I purr, amusement coloring my tone. Then, I deliver a sharp slap to her supple ass.
She yelps, reflexively squeezing her legs tighter around my hips, despite my hard cock pressing into her pussy. I know she can feel me, but she seems more inclined to focus on her looming fate.
My grin widens as I turn my lips into her ear, and say, “I’ll do you a favor and give you another option. Drown, or I fuck you.”
“Fuck. Off,” she bites out through gritted teeth.
I chuckle, a shiver racking her body in response.
“You’re going to meet God in one of two ways, Reverie,” I whisper. “Either way, I’ll be between your legs when you do.”