Chapter Twenty-Three #3
Amanda shoves Josh forward until he’s just off to the side—left of the altar.
Josh stumbles, catches himself on the marble. His chest heaves. His eyes flicking between Payton and me. “Please …”
The guy reeks of sweat, piss, dread. My gut twists. Not from the smell. From the fact we all know exactly what’s coming.
Derek drapes an arm around his shoulders. “I had such high hopes for you, Butcher Boy. Big fuckin’ letdown.”
Josh swallows. “Please ... just let me go.”
Derek clicks his tongue, blade grazing Josh’s Adam’s apple. A thready groan spills from the guy.
Fuck. I want to burn that sound from my skull.
“Our girl’s got a problem.” Derek nods at Payton, still bent over, still silent. “We could tear her open, sure. Could even call it art.”
His fingers flex on the knife.
“Or maybe our Leatherface can make himself useful after all. Help her take it like a champ.”
Josh chokes. “Please.”
“What do you think, Thirteen? We can make your job easier by lubing her up first.” He presses the blade into Josh’s neck. A fat bead wells up. Tracks a slow red line down his throat.
“Kade.” Payton. She doesn’t lift her head. “Do it. Just do it.”
Her voice is enough to gut me. A command carved from ice.
I grip her hips with hands I don’t recognize.
The plastic clings to my face, already hot with sweat and shame. My breath fogs the inside. The eyeholes tunnel my vision. But I can still see her.
And that’s the fucking curse.
Josh whimpers. I don’t look at him. Or the others watching from the shadows.
I bend, mask grazing the dip of Payton’s spine. I’m still here.
She doesn’t move.
My fingers slide between her thighs.
She’s not ready. Of course she’s not.
Her breath hitches—just once—and I hate that he hears it.
Derek’s laugh crawls into my ear. “Look at you. Playing gentle.”
I stroke, slow and clinical, like I’m tending ruin.
“Attaboy. Make her cry pretty, and maybe I’ll let Leatherface keep his tongue.”
Payton’s muscles lock. A razor-thin inhale.
I use what little slick I can find, smear it over myself. A coward’s mercy.
“Sorry.” The mask eats the word.
She doesn’t react. Why would she?
I push in.
She gasps. Her fists clench.
And I split down the middle—
The man who wants her.
The monster who’s got her.
My breath saws through the mask. Each motion feels like punishment.
Payton doesn’t make a sound. Just endures. And somehow that’s worse.
Behind me, Josh chokes back another sob. Kristy might be praying, or cursing, or both.
All I see is her.
All I feel is her going quiet under my hands.
Derek murmurs, “Look at that. I think she’s starting to like it.”
My rhythm falters. My hands almost slip on her hips.
Every thrust echoes off the marble, obscene in the hush.
A candle gutters out with a hiss.
Her fingers curl over the altar’s edge, gripping nothing.
Keep going.
Her body jolts under me, but she stays quiet.
And I hope to fuck she’s somewhere else now.
“Beautiful,” Derek purrs. “Even the dead are blushing.”
Candles burn around her in flickering halos. Wax pools. Shadows stretch long across the chapel walls.
It should look holy.
It looks like hell.
She takes me like a wound—hers, mine, ours.
A sound cracks the silence.
Not Payton.
Josh.
Choking back another sob—or maybe gagging.
The mask sucks against my face—tight, suffocating. My gut lurches. But I don’t get to be sick. I don’t get to break.
Derek clicks his tongue. “Tsk, tsk. That’s no way to honor a sacrament.” He paces, boots echoing like judgment through the pews. “Come on, Thirteen. Make her sing.”
The chapel spins around me. I claw for an anchor. Her skin. My shame. The altar’s edge biting into my thigh.
Nothing holds.
Only the mask. The sweat. The stink of rot and wax.
And still, I fucking move.
Her hand shifts—fingertips grazing my thigh. A plea. Maybe a ‘Fuck you.’
I freeze.
She feels me. Not just the pressure but the weight of it all.
The thing I’ve let out of its cage.
The monster she keeps pulling back into the light.
I try to drown it all out. The dead. The watchers. The shitty soundtrack.
Until there’s only her.
That broken sound she can’t quite swallow when my fingers find her.
The way her body moves beneath me—more rhythmic now. Less resistance.
It’s wrong.
It’s fucked.
But we’re so far past that now.
Her fingers dig into my thigh—a silent pact. If we burn, we burn as one.
I don’t hold back. Let the friction carve us both raw.
Her muscles clamp down, hips jerking back instead of away. She arches, curling like she could twist around the wave.
And when she comes—
It’s not for me.
Not for her.
Not even for Derek.
Just biology reducing her to nerve endings and raw tremors.
My eyes burn behind the mask. Every breath scrapes.
I want to stop. Need to.
She drags me under.
A spasm wrings me out from spine to fingertips. My knees hit the altar. My jaw locks so tight I see stars.
Then it’s over.
No relief. Just a sick, hot surrender.
I choke on air. On everything I couldn’t fucking stop. On the ruin I left her in.
Even now—
I still finish.
The worst part?
When her body gave in—I felt like I won.
That’s how I know I’ve lost everything.