Chapter 4
I t’s just me in the house tonight as Santino left rather hastily and I’ve decided that this is the night of my final chapter. I’m desperate to put an end to the pain. But just before I can muster up the strength to get out of bed, my plan is interrupted.
I’m so fine-tuned to when Santino sneaks into my room to fuck me or torture me in the middle of the night that I hear the exact moment someone crosses the threshold. Someone who isn’t supposed to be here.
He’s tall, lithe, with broad shoulders. An angel of death before me—I can feel his desire to claim my mortality rolling off his body in heavy waves. And I welcome it.
Before I can blink, he straddles my body, his strong thighs keeping my hips pinned in place while he restrains my hands tightly above my head. The zip ties bite painfully into my skin, but really, I think they’re unnecessary because I’m willing to give my life freely.
I’ve barely taken a breath and already he’s poised with some sort of weapon in his hands, ready to strike. I close my eyes, even though the room is dark, and wait for the inevitable blow. Except… it doesn’t come.
His scent washes over me when he leans down to press the tip of whatever his weapon is to my skin.
He smells like death and sin. The coppery scent of blood on him mixes with the faint scent of ash and bergamot.
His entire being radiates with an aura like that of a cunning devil ready to drag me to hell.
I don’t care where I go in the afterlife. Anywhere is better than here.
He asks me questions but I suddenly can’t focus.
God, his voice is unlike anything I’ve ever heard.
I’m sick for even paying attention to something like that.
He’s all grit and gravel and smoke and venom.
It sounds muffled, like he’s speaking behind a mask.
Alluring. Like an asp just before it strikes.
My thighs instinctively tighten, and it momentarily steals my focus from the ultimate goal here.
Now seems like a really inappropriate time to be turned on by a man who intends to kill me, but when you’ve been trained to get off on pain, you tend to seek pleasure from all the darkest corners of the world.
My lack of answers only serves to piss him off. I can feel the annoyance and frustration thickening the air around us. He shuffles around me and suddenly I’m blinded by the illumination of my bedside light.
He freezes.
I freeze.
The world around us seems to pause as well.
It can’t be him.
We study each other for a long moment. I try not to flinch under the scrutiny of his familiar eyes.
They’re such an icy gray, framed by dark lashes and strong, furrowed brows that I would recognize anywhere.
There’s a scar that runs horizontally across his cheek and another vertically down his forehead.
His inky black hair falls over his brow beneath his hood and the lower half of his face has been covered by some sort of mask.
I don’t need to see the rest of him to know that he’s just as devastating. Beautiful, even.
But his beauty stops there. There’s no emotion behind his gaze.
His eyes harbor no sentiment as his dead stare roams over my face and down my chest, where I’m covered in various shades of bruises and cuts from Santino’s most recent form of brutality.
My entire life, I’ve done my best to be obedient, respectful, and even kind to those around me, regardless of their cruelty.
I’ve kept myself as small as possible to avoid being on the wrong end of a man’s wrath.
But I’ve come to learn that the men of this world don’t harbor such soft emotions.
The only way to escape the fist is death.
My grim reaper picks up an arrow from my side and holds the sharpened tip to my face, cutting my skin. His pupils dilate at the sight of my blood, and the silver is nearly swallowed by black when he uses the very same blade to smear the blood across my lips.
I should be terrified, but I’m… aroused, and that is what scares me. This man, this killer, has stolen my focus for a moment in time. The strange tension we’ve created pulls taut when he positions the arrow directly over my heart, before he leans close and murmurs, “Any last words?”
Hurry up? Don’t threaten me with a good time?
I think, done with this strange brand of foreplay.
My irritation washes away when an odd sense of gratitude and relief at the fact that in a matter of seconds I’ll be pain-free takes over.
My body falls limp and I take a breath, melting into the mattress.
I close my eyes and ignore the pain I feel when my lips tug into a small smile, the cut there splitting open again, and whisper, “Thank you.”
I feel my killer’s body lock up, his breath leaving him on a shudder like a huff of confusion or disbelief. I don’t have time to dissect it as I ready myself for the final strike. The tip of the arrow remains pressed to my skin, but that’s it.
“Thank you?” he parrots, his voice flat but no less lethal.
My lashes flutter and he comes into focus again. I nod. He’s doing my job for me, so why not thank him?
“Why?” Another flat question. I’m not sure if he’s genuinely curious or if it’s just a piece of the puzzle he’s trying to fit together.
“Because I’m done,” I whisper, my eyes welling with tears as the pain of the last decade throbs just beneath the surface of my skin.
My killer rolls his eyes. “Oh, stop with the fucking tears. Somebody out there put a hit out on you. They want you dead. Why the fuck would you thank me for killing you? ”
So this wasn’t random. Someone wanted me dead. But who? Santino? My father? The thought sends a tendril of sadness through my soul and I fight to keep the tears at bay.
“Why is it so important to you? Just get it over with and make it quick, please,” I beg, my voice breaking, but he’s right there, gripping my jaw and analyzing my every reaction to his touch.
“What’s the matter, Wraith ?” he drawls, his smoky voice almost a taunt. “What’s got you so eager to die, huh? Why not fight to live?”
If he only knew.
“What’s the point in living when your soul has been shattered beyond repair?
When your heart has been squeezed until it’s black and blue?
Having any power and choice stripped from you until you’re nothing more than an object without a voice.
” I try to speak with strength in my words, but of course, my body betrays me and I sound like nothing more than a timid little mouse.
I stare at him, watching his eyes and his brows for any trace of sympathy—not that I expect it—and my findings are as empty as his blank stare.
“Or,” he counters, cocking his head to the side as if in thought, “you can take those shards that you claim to be so broken and you can make a fucking weapon out of them.” His shoulders lift in a shrug like his words are no big deal.
Like he isn’t a masked murderer offering me sage advice right before he snuffs out my light.
“I can’t live a life knowing I have no power or control over it,” I try to argue, but it’s weak at best.
I know he’s grinning like a psycho with the way his cheeks lift and his eyes crinkle in the corners. He leans down close to me again, his mask inches from my lips as he speaks.
“You talk of power and control as if they are the same thing. As if they will synonymously bring you this sense of peace. But don’t you know, Wraith ,” goddamnit, I hate the way my pussy clenches when the pet name falls from his lips, “that giving up control has the ability to give you all the power you so desperately seek? ”
This… stumps me. My brows knit in confusion. I can’t believe that I’m entertaining this conversation when I ask, “How?”
Another dark chuckle comes from behind my killer’s mask. “What, would you like a demonstration?”
“W-what?”
He glances around the room, then slowly nods, as if he’s come to some decision after having a one-sided conversation with himself. He surprises me, though, when he leans forward with a knife that he’s procured from somewhere, and with a flick of his wrist, my bound hands are free.
I’m yanked and pulled up until my chest comes flush with his. I want to ask him what he’s doing, but he removes himself from where he’s straddling my lap and pulls me to stand. “Wait here. Don’t fucking move,” he emphasizes.
Ah, okay?
He bends to scoop up his bag from beside the bed, and I notice a variety of weapons that send a chill up my spine before he zips the bag shut.
Before he sheaths the arrow, he grips my wrist, and a gasp escapes my lips before I can stop it when he uses the broad head of the arrow to slice open my palm.
Blood instantly floods to the surface as he jerks my hand over the bed.
He milks the cut until blood pools in my hand before he turns my wrist over and lets it spill haphazardly all over the stark white of the comforter.
It’s enough blood, yet not even close to enough at the same time.
He moves and maneuvers my hand all over the bed, truly making the space look like a morbid crime scene.
It’s hard to ignore the way each swipe I’m forced to make over the fabric feels like fire and needles racing across my skin.
It’s also hard to ignore the way my body reacts to his touch, but I manage to keep from clenching my thighs.
This man wants me dead. I’m a means to an end for him. I don’t need to be standing here fantasizing about what particular brand of brutality he could wreak upon my body before giving me the ultimate pleasure.
My God, you’re fucking broken, Odessa.
It’s a result of what Santino has done to me. It’s the only level of affection I remember. The only one I know. He trained my body to find the pleasure in his pain and no matter how much I fight it, my traitorous body always craves more. I wish it didn’t.
My killer drops my wrist and steps back, admiring his handiwork. His eyes legitimately twinkle at the sight of the blood that now coats every inch of my small bed. I wish so badly that the bleeding hadn’t already stopped in my palm.
My world is flipped when he turns to me with a determined set to his brow and says, “Let’s go.”
Let’s go? “Go where?” I eye him warily. “Y-you’re not going to… kill me?” I hate the obvious disappointment that laces my question.
He stalks toward where I stand, stupefied in the middle of the room, until there’s barely an inch of space between us.
I’m forced to look up until my neck is craned to meet his gaze.
I knew he was tall, but standing up against him really puts into perspective that either I am extremely short, or he’s a Goliath.
He lifts his hand and allows a finger to graze over the five crescent moon-shaped scars that rest over my heart.
Goosebumps pebble up beneath his touch and I barely manage to suppress a full-body shiver.
Silver eyes slowly rise to mine. It’s like something clicks when they lock on me again. “Who are you?” I ask before I can stop the question from escaping my mouth, knowing I never even learned his name all those years ago, but it has to be him.
“Don’t you know?” He leans down until his mask brushes my lips.
“I’m the Cupid Killer.” The blood drains from my face at his admission, because I know I’ve heard that name before.
He tenderly brushes a strand of my hair back behind my trembling shoulders before he grabs my throat in a vise grip, stealing my breath. “And I intend to collect.”