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“Yeah,” I went on. “He never gets that look over a girl. I’d say he was damn close to taking you home and popping that little cherry of yours.”

“Kai?” Rika protested, not wanting to deal with me. “We passed my house. What’s going on?”

“You want to know why he didn’t take you home?” I asked her, hitting the locks so she couldn’t jump out. “He doesn’t like virgins. He never wants to be that important to someone, and it’s a lot less complicated to fuck people who know there’s a difference between sex and love.”

She turned her gaze from Will to Kai to me, fear in her eyes.

Sex and love.

Boys will be boys, and she teased you, didn’t she? She wouldn’t let you have it, I heard my mother’s voice in my head.

Sex was power. Degrading, filthy, mean, unclean power.

Love always hurt. Sooner or later.

“Where are we going?” Rika demanded.

But I ignored her. “You saw the girl at the old church today,” I mused, remembering her in the catacombs watching the guy and girl on our first Devil’s Night stop. “You liked it, didn’t you?”

I turned left, down a dark gravel road, and I saw her try to peer out the front windshield to see where we were going.

“You wanted to be her,” I said. “Pushed down on that floor and fucked…”

Because even as unclean and degrading as sex was, the feelings were strong, and they were real. Sex and fear were the only things that made you real.

Little girls just don’t understand what boys need, my mother would say.

It was the one thing she was right about. We didn’t need anything we didn’t take ourselves. No questions, no tears, no touching or soft words… Just fucking sit there and don’t try to be special.

“You know why?” I asked Rika. How I knew she wanted to be that girl, pushed down and fucked? “Because it feels good. And we’ll make you feel so good if you let us.”

Her eyes raced from Kai to me to the locked doors as worry set in.

“You know,” I told her. “When guys let a girl into their gang, there are two ways for her to be initiated.” I pulled the car to a stop in the middle of the woods on the isolated road. “She either gets beat-in.” I shut off the car, killed the lights, and locked eyes with her in the rearview mirror. “Or fucked-in.”

She shook her head. “I want to go home.”

Her voice sounded so fucking pitiful, and she looked like a kid, sinking to the bottom of a river, not wanting death but knowing it was coming.

No, don’t. I don’t want to, I remember myself saying when I was a kid, and I had no power.

But like me, there was nothing Rika could do.

“That’s not one of the choices, Little Monster,” I taunted.

Both Trevor and I turned our heads, starting straight at her.

She lost it, realization dawning. She grabbed the door handle and yanked on it over and over again, frantic to get out.

“We can take what we want from you,” I warned, opening my door. “One after the other, and no one would believe you, Rika.”

I climbed out, moved to her door behind me, and opened it, yanking her out as Will still slept it off in the other back seat.

Slamming the door shut, I pushed her up against it, pressing my body into hers and holding her wrists down at her side.

Was I doing this? For real?

“We’re untouchable,” I told her, looking down at her. “We can do whatever we want.”

She breathed fast, in shallow breaths, squirming against me.

Trevor had gotten out of the car and come around behind me.

“Kai, please?” she begged for his help, still not knowing it was Michael’s brother behind the mask. He’d had the hots for her forever, but she couldn’t stand him. She wanted his older brother, and he was pissed.

“He won’t help you,” I muttered.

And then I pinned her hands over her head, against the car as she cried out.

“I’m going to feel so good,” I whispered against her forehead and closed my eyes, envisioning Winter in my hands.

If I get it through my head and treat her like trash, then I can do the same things to Winter. I can throw her away.

Like nothing.

Reaching behind her, I grabbed her ass. “You know you want to ride this.”

“Damon,” she gasped, turning her head away, “take me home. I know you’re not going to hurt me.”

“Oh, yeah?” I threatened. “Then why have you always been afraid of me?”

Did she really believe I wouldn’t do this? Or did she think she could talk me down?

I had no respect for her. She had no value. She was a warm body.

Yeah, she saved my ass earlier when we torched the gazebo in town. But if I couldn’t have Winter, then Michael wasn’t having Rika. If anyone deserved to come tonight, it was Winter. Who did Rika think she was?

I held her wrists above her head with one hand, pawed her ass with the other, and kissed a trail across her cheek.

I want this.

“Damon, no!” she shouted. “Let me go!”

But then I slammed my mouth down on hers, my teeth cutting into my mouth, and I just tried to see Winter in my head. It was her.

Hurt her. It would be over if I could just hurt her and break her goddamn heart.

“Help!” Rika cried.

“He doesn’t want you,” I whispered, running my hand up her body and cupping her breast, my stomach rolling with nausea as I felt her struggle.

Please, I don’t want to.

Shhh, baby, I heard my mother again.

Oh, God.

“But we do, Rika,” I choked out, clearing my throat and forcing myself on. “We want you so bad. Being with us will be like having a blank check, baby. You can have anything you want.” I bit her bottom lip. “Come on.”

She jerked away, growling, “I’ll never want you!”

Fine. I grabbed her by the collar, hauled her away from the car, and flung her over to Trevor in his waiting arms.

“Kai,” she gasped, a shred of hope left in her voice.

“Maybe you’ll want him, then,” I said.

Trevor wrapped his arms around her, crushing the little monster.

“Stop!” she yelled.

And then she raised her hand, slapping him across the mask.

A pang of admiration hit me and I faltered, seeing more of Winter in her than I wanted to. She was a fighter.

Hit him again. Like I should’ve done to my mother long before I finally did.

Hit him again.

Hit me.

But he threw her onto the ground, her body landing on the cold, wet leaves, and she flipped over, scurrying backward, trying to get away.

Trevor lunged for her, coming down on top of her, and I cocked my head, watching carefully.

He looked like he was whispering something in her ear, but I couldn’t hear.

Then she belted, “Get off me!”

He grabbed her hair, shouting back to me, “Hold her arms!”

“No!” Rika cried, thrashing and kicking. “Get off!”

I didn’t budge.

Trevor held her hands above her head with one hand and her neck with the other, and she tried to get free of his hold but couldn’t.

She couldn’t.

She couldn’t stop what was happening.

I blinked. No. I didn’t want this. I wanted to scare her. Threaten her, frighten her, run to the edge and nearly lose my balance, but…

She fought. Like many of us should have learned how to do so much sooner.

“Enough,” I said.

But he didn’t hear me. He kept struggling with her.

I said it louder, “Enough!”

Trevor froze for a moment, turning his head.

I charged over, grabbed him, and threw him off, reaching down and dragging Rika back up to her feet by her sweatshirt.

“Stop crying,” I gritted out, holding her by collar. “We weren’t going to hurt you, but now you know that we can.”

I grabbed her by the back of her hair, her face flushed, upset, and still scared out of her mind, just like Winter that first night I broke in. “Michael doesn’t want you, and neither do we,” I breathed out. “You get that? I want you to stop watching us and stop following us like a pathetic dog begging for someone to notice her.” And then I shoved her away, seeing Winter stumbling back from me. “Get a fucking life of your own, Rika, and stay the hell away from us. No one wants you.”

Tears welled in her eyes, and she spun around and ran into the forest, toward her home, as fast as she could.

“What the hell was that?” Trevor spat out, whipping off his mask.

His blondish hair was sweaty, and he scowled at me as he shot Kai’s mask to me like a basketball. I caught it and turned away, yanking the car door open and climbing in.

I wanted to fuck with her. Maybe fuck her, too, or anyone just to get my head clear—but goddammit—that wasn’t…

He wasn’t stopping.

She wasn’t having fun.

She believed she was in actual danger, and all I could feel was my mother on top of me like Trevor was on top of her.

It gets hard when I do that. That means you like it.

No, it didn’t.

I dropped the mask in the passenger’s seat and started the car, seeing Trevor shoot off, racing toward his side of the car.

“What the hell are you doing?”

But I didn’t wait. With Will still passed out in the back, I hit the gas and sped off in reverse, ignoring Trevor’s curses and shouts as he chased my headlights.

You can fucking walk home.

I drove to the end of the gravel road, not stopping as I launched back onto the highway without a single pause for any oncoming traffic, and shifted into gear, speeding back down the dark, quiet road.

I gripped the steering wheel, gripping the hair on my head as I rested my elbow on the window.

“What the fuck?” I muttered.

What did I just do?

Was I actually going to hurt her?

But I did hurt her.

She came out tonight, saved my fucking ass in town earlier, and I… I fucking attacked her. She stood up for me, and all I saw was trash and a threat.

All that spirit, and I beat it down. I treated her like garbage, and instead of feeling powerful, I only saw a little boy on the ground, crying and heartsick, because he couldn’t stop what was happening to him.

Rika would hate me. She’d never look at me again.

I pulled into Will’s house and parked right in front, unloading him from the car, and heaving him over my shoulder. Climbing the steps up to his house, I dug his keys out of his back pocket, unlocked his huge iron door, and stepped inside, quickly punching in the security code we all had memorized years ago.

The house was quiet and dark, but I could always smell the hydrangeas his mother kept on the foyer table in various colors. Sometimes they were blue, sometimes white. Today, they were purple and always made the house look happy as soon as you entered.

Out of everyone’s houses, I liked Will’s the most. It was newer, more spacious with room to walk and breathe, and it was bright with high ceilings. He had two older brothers who left home a few years ago, off making the world a better place. Will was the youngest. And the most trouble for his parents.

I took him up to his room, plopped him down on the bed, and saw him yawn and pull his comforter over his body. He looked like a burrito, and it was the first time all night I actually felt a smile I wore.

Will and I were cut from the same cloth, both always diving too deep for our own good, he with alcohol and drugs and me with the pain I needed to inflict.

Rain started to patter his window, and I looked up at it, the drops streaming down the glass like being in a fountain and watching the falls spill from the bowl above.

Winter.

That was the only place I wanted to be right now. She was alone in that house, the fountain spilled outside, and she wanted me there.

Grabbing a pair of clean jeans and a T-shirt from Will’s closet, I strolled into his bathroom and showered, washing my hair and body to get Rika off. To get the cigarettes off.

To just get every shitty thing I did tonight off.

After I was clean, I dressed and left, taking Winter’s key, my wallet, and my phone, and quickly jumped back into Michael’s car and headed for her house. It was almost two. I would have a few hours with her, at least, until I ran the risk of her father coming home.

But when I arrived, I saw the gates were open. Did he come home early?

I killed the lights and slowed the engine, noticing no cars parked in front of or on the side of the house, and no lights on in the home. Maybe she left the gates open for me. I almost smiled. I liked that idea.

I pulled the G-Class off the side of the driveway, out of sight in the trees on the lawn, just in case, and got out of the car, taking her key with me.

I darted inside and locked the door again, looking around and alert as I climbed the stairs.

When I cracked her bedroom door open, I immediately spotted her body under a sheet on the bed. The shadows of the rain on the window danced across her form as she lay on her side, and I closed the door quietly, stepping up to the foot of her bed and watching her sleep.

Heat coursed through every inch of my body, seeing her there, looking so warm and peaceful.

She was so small and gentle and delicate.

But there was fire in there.

She never lied or pretended she was someone she wasn’t. She couldn’t see what I was, but she felt it and recognized it in herself, and we were able to find each other and feel that it was right. I didn’t know how it happened, but it was why I was always drawn to her. Since we were kids. She saw everything.

I picked up the bottom of the sheet and pulled it softly from her body, seeing she was in a white, silk night shirt, loose and flowing down her arms but bunched up around her waist. I stared at her. My territory.

If my friends touched her like I touched Rika tonight, I’d kill them. Without pause.

She let out a little whimper, taking in a deep breath. “Is that you?”

She pulled her shirt down and propped herself up on an elbow, her head moving around the room.

“Yeah,” I replied quietly.

She followed my voice and smiled.

I set my knee down on the bed, coming down on her as she settled onto her back, and I rested my body on top of hers as I planted my elbows under me and held both sides of her head. I slid my fingers into her hair and touched my forehead to hers, breathing her in and feeling her body underneath mine.

She scaled her fingers up my back, whispering, “What’s wrong?”

I closed my eyes, having no idea where to start. “I fucked up,” I whispered back.

She rubbed me, and I soaked in her heat, the rain hiding us from the world, and still wondering how she got inside me—inside my head and my…

“Need to hide for a while?” she asked, a lilt of comfort in her voice.

And I nodded. “Yeah.”

For as long as I could.

We kissed, softly at first, but my body became aware of hers, and she wanted to feel everything, her hands going under and inside my clothes.

And as we stripped, and I thrust inside of her, I knew without a doubt that this is who I would’ve been if I hadn’t become me. If I hadn’t learned to cope with pain in all the worst ways growing up in that house and denied taking any responsibility for the man I became.

I would’ve gone to school, played basketball, laughed with my friends, and snuck into my pretty little girlfriend’s house at night to make love to her, delirious in no other need than to be good, because I wasn’t so twisted that I needed anything else to be happy.

This is what I might’ve had forever if I hadn’t lied.

A few hours later, we laid together, the rain lighter now as she rested her head on my chest and ran her hands over my body, memorizing every line and chord.

“The scars on your body…” she said quietly. “Your scalp, under your arm, your groin. Places people don’t see.”

I stroked her arm with my thumb as I held her, already knowing where she was going with it. I stopped cutting when I was fifteen. The night my mother left.

But some of the marks never truly healed. It was a good thing I was smart about where I did it, so my clothes always covered it.

“I had a classmate in Montreal who had scars like that,” she went on, “but she didn’t bother to hide it. It was everywhere. She had to leave and go to a hospital.”

I stroked her arm still, my breathing even and calm.

“Where were you for two years?” she asked.

“Not in a hospital.”

I knew what she suspected, but this was all so much more complicated than she knew. Not everyone needed help to stop hurting themselves. Some of us just traded in one coping mechanism for another.

She didn’t see me for two years, because Damon was trying to stay away. And then he was at college.

“Someone taught me a long time ago that pain releases pain,” I explained. “So when I was younger, I cut, poked, scratched, and burned myself, so I wouldn’t feel everything that hurt. And then I realized, it felt even better to hurt everyone else.”

“But not me?”

She had a teasing tone, but if she only knew. None of this was a joke.

I smirked anyway. “I did some damage.”

She just didn’t know how much yet.

“Don’t make me answer questions,” I told her. “You won’t like the answers.”

“But I need them.” She turned her face up to me.

“I know.”

I knew it was coming. Once the sex happened, she didn’t want to be away from me.

And in all honesty, I didn’t want to be away from her.

I just needed to make sure she listened to me. That she heard me out and couldn’t run away. That there was no one around to interfere before she was able to process it.

If I wanted to keep this, it was my only chance.

I tipped her chin up, looking down at her. “My family has a cabin in Maine,” I told her. “There’s already snow. It’s gorgeous up there. One phone call and it’s stocked for us. Get dressed and come with me now.”

“What?”

“Once we’re there,” I explained, “I’ll tell you everything. Just for a few days, and then I’ll bring you home.”

She pulled her head up, a puzzled look on her face. “Taking me to a remote location where I can’t run away?”

“I’ll make sure you won’t want to leave,” I teased, pulling her back on top of me and holding her face. “I promise.”

She’d be unbelievable angry, but it was the only thing I could do to make sure she absorbed it and got a chance to see past it. To make sure she knew the man I was with her was what was real.

“A cabin?” she pondered. “Like for skiing? I don’t have to ski, right?”

“We’re not going to fucking ski.” I kissed her, nibbling and teasing. “We’re going to eat and drink and screw and probably fight a little, but we’re not leaving the cabin.”

A ping sounded from my phone, but I ignored it.

She sat there, straddling me as I kissed and bit, teasing her and luring her, but she stopped moving or responding.

I pulled back, seeing the worried look on her face.

“You don’t want to go,” I guessed.

But she sighed, looking ready to cry. “I do,” she said. “God, I do. I want to be alone with you for days and days. It would make me so happy, but…”

But what?

She paused, more notifications dinged from my phone, but I just held her face, waiting for her answer.

“I am a minor,” she pointed out. “Technically, anyway. If my father overreacts, it could be considered kidnapping, taking me over state lines without my parents’ permission.”

I almost laughed, intrigued by the adventure, but then again, she was right. Even if she got over learning who I was and walked back to this town, her hand in mine, not only would I have to face the reality that I’d just run away for the weekend with the mayor’s underage daughter, but that he would undoubtedly know I’d gotten into her pants.

He might forbid us from seeing each other.

But he wouldn’t press charges. That was drama and gossip and embarrassing for all parties involved. He’d want to keep it as quiet as possible.

I was who I was, and so was my father. Griffin Ashby wouldn’t take it that far.

And nothing would keep me from her. I’d love to see him try. I almost looked forward to it.

Fuck it. We were going.

I snatched up her bottom lip between my teeth, a smile in my voice. “My kind of fun has a price.”

She laughed, looking excited, and nothing mattered more than where we’d be in a few hours. Alone, quiet, just us.

I didn’t even want to stop at my house for clothes.

My phone started ringing, hers beeped, as well, and she reached for it, but I pulled her hand back, starting to get hard again.

Shit. We didn’t have time for this. We had to leave.

My phone dinged again.

And again and again, one right after the other.

What the fuck? If Michael needed his car back that badly, track it and come get it, for Christ’s sake. It was fucking early.

I pulled away from her mouth and growled as I reached over the side of the bed and felt for my phone. Finding it, I picked it up and turned it on, looking at the screen as she kissed my neck.

Instagram notifications, tags, tweets, PMs with article links…

What the fuck was this?

It all hit me at once, my nerves firing as I tried to make sense of what I was seeing. And then I clicked on a tag, a dark video popping up with the sound off, but it didn’t matter. My heart stopped, instantly recognizing what I was seeing.