Chapter 5
SCARLETT
My hands grab his shirt, pulling him down to me, and when his mouth meets mine it’s brutal. His kisses are hard, demanding, taking what he wants without asking permission.
And god, that’s exactly what I need right now.
Something to overwrite the memory of Antonio’s hands on me. Something to make me feel alive instead of terrified.
His hands fist in my hair, yanking my head back so he can deepen the kiss, and the sharp pain with pleasure makes me gasp. He swallows the sound, his tongue invading my mouth with zero gentleness.
Yes, yes, yes.
He shoves me against the wall hard enough that my head cracks against it. Stars burst across my vision, but before I can recover his mouth is on my neck—biting, not kissing. Teeth scraping skin hard enough to leave marks.
My hands claw at his shirt, ripping buttons in my desperation to get it off him. He doesn’t help, just lets me struggle while his hands roam my body possessively. Rough and claiming, like I’m something he’s decided belongs to him.
When I finally get his shirt open and push it off his shoulders, I see what I’m dealing with. A body built for pleasure. Hard muscle, golden tanned skin, and such kissable nipples.
I moan softly at the sight, heat pool low in my belly.
His hands find my torn scrubs, and instead of carefully removing them, he finishes ripping them. The fabric tears with a sound that’s obscenely loud in the small room, and then I’m exposed in just my bra and underwear.
“Wait—”
“No.” The single word is hard and final. His grey eyes behind the mask are cold, empty of anything resembling tenderness. “You wanted this. You asked for this. You’re getting it.”
He’s right. I did ask for this. I pulled him in here. I made this choice. And I’m not going back.
His mouth crashes back to mine, brutal and demanding, while his hands grab my breasts with surprising tenderness through the thin lace of my bra. No teasing.
When he unhooks my bra with one hand and tosses it aside, there’s such a dark hunger that looks almost predatory in his eyes. Like I’m prey he’s finally cornered.
His mouth closes over my nipple and he suckles hard enough to make me yelp. The pleasure shoots straight between my legs and I arch into him wanting more, begging for more. “Oh! Please… I need…”
He moves to the other breast, the same intense treatment, tongue, teeth and pressure that makes me go mad with want. My nails dig into his shoulders, drawing blood probably. He doesn’t seem to notice or care.
His hands slide down to my hips, he hooks his fingers into my underwear and rips them down my legs with zero ceremony, the elastic snapping against my skin.
I’m completely naked now except for the mask still covering half my face, and he’s still mostly dressed. The power imbalance should terrify me. Should send every alarm bell in my head ringing. But it doesn’t.
I’m basking in the pleasure of the way his eyes darken even further as he takes his time to stare at me.
He backs me toward the bed and I stumble, falling onto the mattress. Before I can sit up or orient myself, he’s on me. His weight pinning me down, his mouth moving down my body with kisses, licks and soft bites that will definitely leave marks.
When he reaches my stomach, his teeth scrape across sensitive skin and I cry out. His hands grab my thighs and spread them apart with softly. I tense, suddenly aware of how exposed I am. How vulnerable.
“Fuck…so fucking wet… Is this for me, little cat?” He purrs and I nod, my lips between my teeth.
He groans as his fingers slide between my legs and two fingers push inside me at the same time, making me gasp at the intrusion.
He pumps his fingers a few times, stretching me wide. Pleasure zings through my core and I go crazy, whining, mewling, moaning and writhing in pleasure while he makes sure I can take what he’s about to give me.
When he pulls his hand back, his fingers glisten in the dim light. He makes a sound that might be approval or satisfaction, then stands and starts unbuckling his belt while I watch with hooded, hungry eyes.
My heart pounds hard and my breaths are coming too fast. My body is already aching for more, more, more.
He strips—no show, no seduction. Just removing obstacles between him and what he wants. When he’s finally naked, I see all of him.
Big. Hard. And so ready.
For a second, my senses speak up.
What am I doing? I don’t know this man, don’t know what he’s capable of.
But that’s exactly why I’m here. Because I don’t want to know. Don’t want to think. Just want to feel something other than the terror that’s been choking me since I woke up in Antonio’s mansion me hours ago.
He moves between my legs, grabs my hips, and drags me to the edge of the bed with enough force to make me gasp. Positioning me exactly where he wants me, my legs hanging off the side, completely open to him.
His hands run up my thighs, rough palms scraping against soft skin. He grips my knees and pushes them wider apart, spreading me completely for him.
“Look at me, little cat.”
The command in his voice makes me obey without thinking even though my brows furrow at the nickname. I meet his eyes through both our masks.
“I’m going to fuck you, now,” he says, his voice rough. “And I may not be gentle.”
Before I can respond, he lines himself up and drives in.
The penetration is exactly as he said. Too fast, too hard, too deep all at once. I scream at the invasion—pleasure and pain mixing until I can’t tell them apart, until everything is just an overwhelming sensation that wipes out my brain.
He doesn’t pause to let me adjust or give me time to breathe or accommodate his size.
He just starts fucking me like he’s been starving for ages. Hard, punishing thrusts that slam the bed frame against the wall with rhythmic thuds that anyone passing by could probably hear.
His hands grip my hips and holds me onto him with each thrust, going deeper than should be possible, hitting places inside me that make me see stars.
“Oh, yes! Yes! Please, harder, yes!” I have no idea what I’m saying at this point, I meet him thrust for thrust. My body responding even as my mind struggles to process what’s happening.
My nails rake down his back, drawing blood, leaving marks of my own.
He hisses at the pain, but if anything it makes him rougher.
The sounds filling the room are obscene. Skin slapping against skin. My gasps and moans that I can’t control. His breathing, harsh and controlled, like he’s trying hard to restrain himself from being even rougher.
God, could he be rougher than this?
“Harder,” I hear myself say, sounding desperate, like someone I don’t recognize.
He complies without a word. Changes the angle slightly and pounds into me with enough force that I’m genuinely seeing stars now, my vision going white at the edges with each thrust.
One hand releases my hip and moves up my body, over my stomach, between my breasts, until it wraps around my throat and squeezes gently. For a second, I freeze.
This man could kill me right now and I wouldn’t be able to stop him. I’m completely at his mercy.
The thought should terrify me. Should snap me out of whatever insanity has taken over my brain.
Instead it sends me higher, pleasure coiling tighter in my core with each punishing thrust.
His other hand moves between my legs, finding my clit with his thumb, he starts to rub and I go absolutely crazy.
The hand on my throat tightens slightly just enough to make breathing difficult, just enough to make me light-headed, and that’s what does it.
I come hard, harder than I ever have before, clenching around him and crying out despite the hand on my throat restricting airflow. My whole body convulses with the force of it, pleasure so intense it borders on painful ripping through me in waves.
He keeps going through my orgasm, chasing his own release with the same ruthless intensity he’s shown from the start.
His rhythm gets more erratic, less controlled. His fingers dig deeper into my hip and throat. I can barely breathe now, black spots dancing at the edges of my vision, but the lack of oxygen only intensifies everything else.
A few more brutal thrusts and he finishes with a groan that sounds almost angry, driving deep and holding there. I feel him pulsing inside me, feel the warmth of his release, and distantly realize we didn’t use protection, didn’t even discuss it, but I’m too wrecked to care right now.
For a moment we’re both frozen. His hand still on my throat. His body pinning me to the bed. His eyes locked on mine through our masks, and I wonder what he sees when he looks at me.
Then he releases my throat and pulls out and steps back.
I gasp in a full breath, my lungs burning, and curl onto my side. My whole body is trembling, overwhelmed and oversensitive and aching everywhere.
But goodness, my body hums in total satisfaction.
I’m left sprawled on the bed, thoroughly fucked and aching and covered in marks that will take days to fade.
Bite marks on my breasts and neck. Bruises forming on my hips where his fingers dug in.
The ache between my legs that promises I’ll feel this for days.
My throat feels tender where his hand was, and I know there will be marks there too.
He doesn’t say anything. Just stares at me for a while then he grabs his pants off the floor and heads toward the bathroom.
The bathroom door doesn’t close all the way and I hear water running. He’s cleaning up. Washing away the evidence of what we just did.
What did I just do?
The post-orgasm clarity hits like ice water, cold and brutal and unforgiving. I just let a complete stranger—a violent, dangerous stranger—fuck me so hard I saw stars.
And I enjoyed it. I asked for more. I begged him to go harder.
What’s wrong with me?
I need to leave. Get out now before he comes back.
I try to sit up and my whole body protests. Every muscle aches. Bruises forming everywhere he touched me. The ache between my legs that’s more pain than pleasure now. Bite marks that sting when I move. My throat feels raw.
I look like I’ve been in a fight. Which, in a way, I have been. And was before this.
That’s when I see it.
He’s standing in the bathroom doorway, turned slightly away from me as he reaches for a towel or his shirt or something. The light from the bathroom catches his shoulder and illuminates a scar there.
A distinctive scar. Burned into his skin in the unmistakable shape of a saint’s medallion. Old and faded but still clearly visible.
No.
My blood turns to ice because I’ve seen that scar before.
Tonight. In Antonio’s bedroom. When the killer took off his jacket before fighting and the sleeve rode up his arm for just a second.
It’s him.
The man who murdered Antonio. The man who pointed a gun at my face. The man who let me go for reasons I still don’t understand.
The man who just fucked me like he’s been starving for me for ages.
Oh god. Oh god no.
Suddenly everything makes sense in the worst possible way. The roughness. The way he didn’t answer any of my questions. The way it felt like he was really trying hard to restrain himself.
He wasn’t here to fuck me. He was here to kill me. This was just…what? Entertainment first? One last bit of fun before finishing the job he started?
And I gave myself to him willingly. Pulled him into this room. Begged him to be rough.
Move. MOVE NOW.
Terror floods my system, washing away any lingering pleasure and leaving only pure, animal survival instinct.
The water is still running, which means he’s distracted. This is my only chance.
I scramble off the bed as silently as possible, my hands shaking so badly I can barely grip my torn scrubs. I grab it anyway, along with my underwear. My bra. The mask. And dress quickly.
I need to get out and disappear before he realizes I know who he is.
The door. I could run for the door.
But he’s faster than me. Stronger. If he hears me trying to leave that way, I’m dead before I can even make it to the hallway.
Then my eyes darts to the window. There’s a fire escape outside.
My hands fumble with the lock, precious seconds ticking by while the water still runs in the bathroom. Come on, come on, come on.
The lock finally gives and I ease the window open as quietly as possible. The cold night air hits my naked skin and I almost gasp but manage to swallow it.
First, the door. Make him think I left that way.
I unlock it quietly, the soft click barely audible over the running water, then leave it slightly ajar.
Then I move back to the window and climb through onto the freezing metal of the fire escape, my bare feet screaming in protest against the cold.
Behind me, the water shuts off.
I climb down as fast as my shaking limbs will carry me, not caring about the noise now, not caring about anything except getting away. The metal stairs are slippery and cold and my injured feet leave smears of blood, but I don’t stop.
When I hit the alley, I run.
Barefoot, mostly naked from how shredded my scrubs are, I run like the devil himself is chasing me. Because he might be.
He was going to kill you. He fucked you and then he was going to kill you and you handed yourself to him like a gift.
I run until I can’t breathe, until my lungs are burning and my legs are shaking and spots dance in my vision. And even then, I don’t stop.
Because I just escaped death for the second time tonight.
And I’m not stupid enough to think I’ll get a third chance.