Kim and Knox find me outside running down the street from Ronan’s house. They decide to call it a night, too.
I’m thankful Kim doesn’t ask questions and just stays by my side in the back seat as Knox drives us home.
Once I’m in front of my house, Kim switches places to the passenger seat and rolls the window down. “Are you sure you don’t want me to stay the night? We can watch some cheesy rom-com?”
“Kir needs you more than me.”
She winces, then smothers it with a smile. “Text me?”
“You bet.” I bend to meet Knox’s gaze. “Thanks for everything, Knox, and I’m sorry.”
“You did nothing wrong.” He winks and the car revs to life.
I stand at the threshold, crossing the coat over my chest until Knox’s Range Rover disappears down the road.
“I’m back,” I say to no one as I step into the door.
The house is empty and… cold.
As usual when Aunt and Uncle aren’t here.
Maybe I should’ve been selfish and asked Kim to stay the night.
For some reason, I don’t want to be alone tonight.
Once in my room, I remove my coat and throw it on the desk’s chair, open the balcony, then drop on my bed headfirst.
Since I left the party, there’s been this crushing weight on my chest. It’s suffocating my air and making me feel claustrophobic in my own skin.
I won tonight.
Not only did I stop Aiden, but I also humiliated him in front of the entire school like no one did before.
He’s the king after all. No one would dare to look him in the eye for more than five seconds, let alone disrespect him while the entire student body is in earshot.
But I did.
I won.
Then how come I feel no sense of victory? If anything, it’s a bit emptier inside.
Rolling on my back, I stare through the balcony at the rain.
It’s barely a drizzle, but I feel it in my bones. The scent of the earth after rain fills my nostrils and a sigh rips from me.
I pull my phone and type in Google’s search bar, Alicia King’s death.
Several articles come by. All of them state that Alicia died in a car accident. Her crashed car was found at the bottom of a cliff. The coroner’s report says that it took her several hours to die. Since the place is desolate and it was raining that day, it took people some time to find her.
I swallow, my fingers hovering on the screen of the phone.
How did she feel during those hours as she slowly and painfully died in her car?
It hurts to even imagine it.
Some reporters speculate that she had suicidal tendencies and King Enterprises is just camouflaging it as an accident.
They also speculate that James King, Jonathan’s eldest brother and Levi’s father, who was reported to have died from an accident four years ago, actually died from an overdose.
If that’s true, then Jonathan does a lot of media play to make his family appear so mighty and without weaknesses.
I flip back to Alicia’s articles and stare at her pictures. She was petite with dark brown hair and pitch-black eyes. Even her features are so tiny, they’re distinguishable.
She’s like those maidens in period films. Sophisticated, elegant, and with a mysterious smile.
“What exactly happened to you, Alicia?” I whisper to her image. “How did you end up with a man like Jonathan?”
Except for the small beauty mole at the side of her right eye, Aiden looks nothing like her. He’s definitely a carbon copy of his father.
Even after seeing her images, it brings nothing to memory.
My eyes skim over the article, and I pause. The date of Alicia’s accident was one day before the fire that took my parents’ lives.
No.
It must be a coincidence.
Alicia died in London. We were in Birmingham.
There’s no way my parents killed her as Jonathan told Silver.
I type my mother and my father’s names in the search bar, John Steel and Abigail Steel.
No photos or articles come out. Even the article I read a few weeks ago about the domestic fire has completely disappeared.
That’s… weird.
Well, my parents weren’t as important as Alicia King or James King.
I scroll through my phone’s gallery and find a picture I took of an old polaroid of Mum and Aunt.
The fire destroyed everything I had of my parents. This old picture is the only thing I have left of her. I stole the shot from Aunt a few years ago.
Aunt doesn’t like to talk about my parents or anything in the past, basically. She always says that I’m better off saving my energy for my future.
In the picture, Aunt Blair grins wide at the camera, her arm surrounding Mum’s shoulder. Mum has a small smile that barely reaches her eyes.
Even though Aunt is the eldest, she was wearing fashionable denim shorts and a tank top. Mum, on the other hand, wore a straight knee-length dress and her golden hair was pulled into a conservative bun.
They were about my age at the time the picture was taken, or maybe a year older, but Mum appeared like she was thirty.
It’s uncanny how much I resemble her. The eye colour. The shade of hair colour. And even the facial form. It’s like I’m staring at myself from a different time.
“What happened, Ma?” My voice is brittle. “I wish you were here to tell me.”
I hug the phone to my chest and close my eyes, fighting the tears trying to escape.
I must’ve fallen asleep because when I open my eyes next, the soft lamp I always keep on is off.
Disoriented, I search around me and freeze.
My hands.
A rope surrounds both my hands and is tied to the bedpost. I’m lying on my back with my hands stretching above my head on the bed.
And they’re tied.
What in the…?
I pull at the ropes, but they don’t loosen. If anything, they tighten around my wrists until it’s painful.
Before I can clearly focus on that, something else cuts into the black.
A shadow looms over me.
A dark, familiar shadow.
For a second, I’m too stunned to react. A thousand shivers break over my skin and terror explodes in my spine.
Is this… another nightmare? Are the monsters finally coming for me?
I scream.
A strong hand wraps around my mouth, suffocating the shriek and my breathing.
Goosebumps form over goosebumps as I stare up with wide eyes.
“You fucked up, sweetheart,” a cruel voice whispers near the hand blocking my mouth.
A-Aiden?
I take a long breath through my nose. The male shower gel and his unique scent underneath assaults me.
It is Aiden.
His arm is taut as his free hand slams on the side of my face. His knees straddle my thighs.
He tied me.
Why the hell would he tie me? He never did that before.
Is this another sick game?
Game or not, he won’t get his way anymore.
Renowned energy pushes through my haze. I pull at the ropes and buck off the bed.
He tightens his knees against my thighs, pinning me down. I wince, but I don’t stop.
I pull at the ropes and try to get my knee up to hit him in the balls.
He leaves no moving space as if he knew what I was planning.
I scream again, but like the first time, it’s muted by his hand like I’m a victim in a horror film.
I’m not a victim.
I won’t let Aiden reduce me to a victim.
Adrenaline shoots through my veins, tightening my muscles.
Pulling at the ropes only tightens them around my wrists. I release a muffled groan as I attempt bucking off the bed again.
“Stop,” he grunts. “Or I will make you.”
“Fuck you!” I yell but it comes out like a madwoman’s muffled screaming.
Still blocking my mouth, he wraps his other hand around my neck. His thumb latches on my pulse point as all his fingers squeeze.
My lungs burn, and I stop moving.
Oh. God.
I can’t breathe.
I can’t fucking breathe.
“You know…” His hot breaths tickle my cheek as he speaks in a dark, chilling tone. “If it were anyone else, I would’ve finished you. Is that what you want, Elsa? Hmm?”
I try to squirm free with the remaining energy I have left.
He tsks and squeezes harder, stopping all my movements. “What did I say about acting smarter? Are you choosing to be a pawn?”
“Uh… ungh…” Unintelligible sounds escape my throat as my energy fades away.
“I can still destroy you.” He licks the side of my cheek, leaving goosebumps in his wake. “So don’t fucking tempt me.”
The shadows cast an eerie cloak on his face. He’s like an unmovable stone. Nothing will stop him.
No one.
The fear I ignored all this time crashes into me. I’m like that wave hitting the rock and dying a slow, excruciating death.
How could I ignore this side of Aiden?
He’ll break me. If he chooses to, he’ll crush me and watch as I disintegrate into pieces.
I thought of him as a cliff before, and cliffs are unmovable.
Cliffs are where people go to die.
Tears fill my eyes as I stare at his shadowed face with no breath coming in and out of my lungs. I’m so lightheaded that I think I’ll faint, but I swallow my tears.
I promised myself that he won’t see me cry again.
Not now.
Not ever.
Aiden removes his hand from around my neck, easing the pressure. But he doesn’t release my mouth.
I suck in greedy breaths through my nose, and it comes in like wheezes as if I’m breathing from another place.
“You dolled up tonight.”
His words are razor-sharp, meant to cut.
I knew his caveman side wouldn’t like that and I did it on purpose.
Because the best way to win against Aiden is to play his games. I thought I was above them before, but that only kept me as a pawn that he can use and kill off whichever way he chooses to.
Steel blood runs in my veins. I wasn’t born to be trampled on.
My brows furrow. Where did that thought come from?
While I’m lost in my mind, Aiden traces a finger over my breasts and down my belly. He’s not teasing. No. His touch is downright sinister.
“What were you trying to prove, sweetheart?”
Obviously, he’s not expecting an answer since he keeps his hand firmly locked over my mouth.
It’s almost as if he doesn’t want to hear my voice.
My nails dig into my palms the lower his hand travels. My lungs burn, and I realise it’s because I’ve been holding my breath.
Without a warning, Aiden yanks my dress up my waist and thrusts a harsh hand between my legs.
I close my thighs together, but he slaps them apart, making me whimper.
“Did you dress up for him, hmm?”
I meet his stare in the dark with my own. He’s a shadow and it’d be a lie if I said he doesn’t scare me, but there’s no way in hell I’m letting him walk all over me.
Strength would never work with him, but I have another weapon.
I slowly nod. Several times. He didn’t ask that question to get an answer, but I’m giving it to him, anyway.
Yes, I dressed up for him.
I never dolled up for Aiden, but I dolled up for Knox.
It’s a fuck you to Aiden.
He can force me.
He can show me his worse, but he can’t control my feelings.
Or at least the feelings I show.
Because deep down, that damned part that got me into this whole freaking mess still yearns for his touch.
For his wild possessiveness.
For his uncontrollable madness.
His fingers tighten around my sex.
I wince, trying my hardest not to fall for the sensation.
Not to fall for his dark deep hole.
Because the thing about Aiden?
He draws you in and before you know it, there’s no way out.
Before you know it, you feel like a joke.
Like the pawn that’s out of the game.
He yanks down my boy shorts and I cry out against his hand, kicking my feet in a helpless attempt to push him away.
He thrusts a finger inside me, and I close my eyes against the intrusive sensation.
“Hmm, you’re not soaking today.” He thrusts another finger as if punishing me. “Why aren’t you as wet as usual, sweetheart? Do you feel wronged?”
I glare up at him with all the maliciousness I have inside.
“I told you,” he whispers in a chilling tone. “You wronged me first.”
He works his thumb on my clit, and a needy sound claws its way out.
“Maybe I need to remind you who you belong to, huh? You look like you need a reminder.”
He scissors his fingers inside me and flicks my clit over and over.
And over.
My eyes roll to the back of my head. My back arches against the bed, causing the ropes to dig deeper into my wrists.
I want to run, hide, and never return.
But my body doesn’t recognise the need for survival.
It doesn’t even try to see the danger Aiden represents. It’s still enchanted to his touch, to the way he knows all the buttons to push in my body. To the way he works me up like I’m a marionette.
Because that’s all that I’ve ever been to him.
While I was falling and being an idiot, he was playing me like a marionette.
A pawn on his board.
A little insignificant pawn.
He thrusts his fingers inside me harder and faster. The brutality and my chaotic feelings draw a sob from my throat.
It’s like he’s punishing me. He’s making me fall to his will by using my body.
And I do fall.
It doesn’t even take long for the wave to hit me.
My lower abdomen contracts. My back pushes off the bed, only to be pulled down by the ropes.
My nails dig into my palms so hard that I’m sure I’ll draw blood.
I come with a sob, my chest heaving like I’m about to have a heart attack.
I don’t even notice when he removes his hand from my mouth.
“That’s it,” he murmurs near the corner of my lips. “Break for me, sweetheart.”
I do.
I just do.
Tears fall on my cheeks and my heart aches so much that I can’t breathe or speak.
Aiden leans over and like that first day at senior year, he flicks his tongue on my cheek and licks my tears.
He takes his sweet time tasting them before he licks my bottom lip and bites it into his mouth.
“Good girl.”
