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“No, I just don’t feel a need to respond.” His voice grew closer, and he took a drink of something, the ice in his glass clinking before he set it down on a table. “You can say and make whatever declarations you like, Winter, but ultimately you’ll do what you’re told. You, your mother, and your sister,” he pointed out. “You don’t run this house anymore.”

“I’m an adult. I can go where I like and leave when I wish.”

“Then why are you still here?”

My lip twitched in a snarl, but I hid it quickly. His meaning was clear. Yeah, I could’ve tried to leave the other night. If I were willing to see my friend get arrested for something he didn’t do. He and his father had advanced on me, and I’d retreated, so the truth was, I couldn’t go and do as I pleased, could I? Not without consequences.

“I do love your anger,” he said. “I’m glad it’s still there.”

Yes, it is. My anger seemed to be all I had anymore, and I missed laughing and smiling and the freedom of who I used to be. Before he happened, and the threat of his inevitable return didn’t always linger. Would I have things of my own again? Could I even fall in love anymore? After him?

“Ethan Belmont is the mediocre third son of a CEO of a failing coffee shop chain and a second-grade school teacher,” Damon said. “He spends his entire day locked in his parents’ house playing video games—”

“Designing them, you mean—”

“And sucking on an inhaler, because of pollen, or clutching an EpiPen, because peanut butter touched his bagel,” he went on. “He wouldn’t be able to haul his own body weight out of a burning car, let alone save his wife and kid.”

And you would? Please.

Damon Torrance didn’t save anyone but himself. Not that Ethan and I were seeing each other, but I’d choose him any day over Damon.

“You need a proper man,” Damon taunted, his voice getting slowly closer. “Someone who walks upright and can run a tight ship. Someone who’s a team player in Thunder Bay. Someone who can make you listen. And someone,” his tone turned darker as he stopped right in front of me, “who’s not going to question too hard when not all of his children look like him.”

I exhaled, hoping he didn’t see how my breath was shaking.

I tightened my lips, now aware of his intentions. He intended to marry me off at some point like this was the nineteenth century.

But he still intended to have his fun.

“So, let’s go, then,” I challenged him. “What are you waiting for?”

He leaned into my body, reached behind me, and wrestled the pen out of my hand. “For you to bring bigger dogs to this fight,” he gritted out through his teeth. “You can do better.”

My face flushed hot, and my legs went weak. He tore the pen away from me and retreated. A moment later, I heard him light another cigarette as I fought to tighten every muscle in my body.

“I will,” I told him. “And no matter what you do, I will never obey you.”

“Please don’t,” he shot back, dropping the lighter on the table and blowing out smoke. “I have Arion for that.”

His footsteps approached again, and I braced myself.

“She’ll be useful,” he said. “On mornings when I wake up, and I’m hard, and I just need to get inside something tight and hot.”

My jaw clenched just a little more. The image of him and my bed and one morning so long ago…

I ignored the sting in my eyes. God, I hated him.

“But at night,” he said, dropping his voice low and stopping right in front of me again, “when I always have too much energy, like you know I do, and I remember my mouth on a stomach, damp with sweat, and my fingers stroking a bare little cunt…”

My heart thumped against my chest, the memory of how he felt making me pause.

“Maybe I’ll find my way three doors down the hallway to her little sister’s room again,” he continued. “Slip her panties down her legs and start eating…”

I shook my head, fighting the memories that raced through my mind. “I won’t let you have anything else from me,” I told him. “You raped me. And it wasn’t statutory rape. It was rape.”

“I can see why you might want to believe that. Maybe you feel ashamed or guilty because you liked it.” He paused and then continued. “But be careful, Winter. I can still put you through quite a lot.”

“Oh, I’m scared,” I shot back.

There was nothing else for him to take.

He stood there for a moment, quiet and still, but then his hard voice pierced the silence.

“Mikhail?” he called.

And I jumped.

“Ke nighg-ya,” he said.

What?

My dog yanked out of my grasp and trotted away on the command.

“What are you doing?” I darted forward. “Give me my dog.” And then I called, “Mikhail!”

But I didn’t feel either of them near me now. Where did they go? What was that he said? Was that Russian? Mikhail didn’t know any commands in Russian.

I heard the dog’s collar and tags jingle from a few feet away, and a lump filled my throat.

“That’s a good boy,” I heard Damon coo to him. “He’s smart. He knows who his master is.”

Mikhail went to him?

“Mikhail,” I said. “Mikhail, come here.”

“Now the question is…” Damon continued, and I heard him approach again. “Do I keep him or give him to my father. I haven’t kept a dog as a pet in years. Not sure I have the knack for it.”

My nerves fired. “Give me my dog.”

“You want him back?” he asked, getting closer. “Then beg me.”

“Fuck you!”

He grabbed the back of my neck, fisting my hair. “A dog is a dog and a bitch is a bitch,” he bit out. “Neither of you is very much use to the world, so I don’t care either way.”

I planted my hands on his chest, trying to pull away.

Mikhail.

No.

“Beg me,” Damon taunted. “Beg. Just whisper it. Just say please.”

He couldn’t take my dog from me. What was he going to do to him?

My face started to crack as I thought about Mikhail, and I wouldn’t know where he was or if he was okay. If he was hungry… Would Damon take him away?

Damon kneaded my scalp, still gripping my hair. “Whisper it,” he said, his breathing turning ragged. “Whisper it like I did your name the morning they found me in your bed and arrested me, Winter. That’s all I want to hear. A little whisper.”

His hand shook where he held me, and my stomach knotted so hard, I was in pain. Please stop. Don’t do this.

“Killing him would probably be more merciful than giving him to my father,” Damon added. “He’s not good with dogs—”

“Please,” I burst out, a tear falling. “Please just give me the dog back.”

“On your knees,” he ordered.

I closed my eyes.

Goddamn him. He knew exactly what to do. Every time.

I wanted to rip him apart.

I hate him.

But slowly, I lowered.

I fell to my knees, my teeth clenched but still shaking as his hand stayed in my hair.

“Please,” I whispered, closing my eyes in disgust at myself. “Please.”

“Again.”

“Please,” I begged.

I waited for him to say something—to say I could have my dog back—but he just stood there, holding me by my hair.

He just stood there.

Was this what he wanted to see? Me degraded? Me scared?

He loved me scared. It got him excited.

I actually thought I liked it, too, once.

And as the seconds passed, and he held me there as my heart thumped in my chest, it was like we were teenagers again for a moment.

When I liked the games he played with me. Before I realized I was the toy.

The terror and the dread. But the exhilaration and the safety I felt in his arms.

How I’d never hated anyone as much as I hated him, but how I loved what I felt with him more than I loved anything I felt with anyone else, either. I was so stupid.

His fingers started to move, caressing me so softly as his breathing turned heavy and strained. “Winter…”

My clit throbbed once, and I broke, silently crying as shame heated my cheeks.

What the hell had he done to me?

He pulled me up, pushing my hair behind my shoulder and his voice suddenly normal.

“Good girl,” he told me. “Of course, you can have your dog. Did you think I was a monster?

I jerked away from his hands. “It hardly matters. You already ruined my life. Long ago.”

“In the treehouse when you were eight,” he finished my thought for me. “I remember that party. It’s funny, though. That’s all you do remember, isn’t it?”

“What are you talking about?”

“The fountain,” he pointed out. “Do you remember what happened in the fountain before we went to the treehouse that day?”

The fountain? I searched my brain through my confusion, not coming up with anything that stood out as out of the ordinary. I was eight, so I couldn’t remember every detail after all this time. Just that he was hurt, and I’d tried to help. The events after the fountain were what mattered.

“Nothing happened,” I told him.

I wasn’t letting him take what happened that day and turn it around on me. I was nice to him. Nothing I did or said deserved what happened after. Neither did anything I did or said years later in high school deserve what else he took from me.

Part of me was still curious about what he was getting at, though, and I thought he might elaborate, but he didn’t. He left me in the dark.

He sighed. “I’m out of my own control, Winter,” he said, not explaining any further. “There are no choices. We are who we are, and we do what we do. It’s nature. Like game pieces, I will play my part, because I can’t resist. I can’t be what I’m not.”

I frowned. He sounded resolute. Like this was the end for me.

“I hope you won’t disappoint,” he finished.

So, this was it, then? He was going forward with whatever ugly desires that simmered inside his twisted brain, because he was determined to not understand the pain he caused and that crimes have consequences? He’d gotten what he deserved.

I won once. I’d do it again.

“Just pick new tactics,” I told him. “I don’t appreciate you ambushing me in the bathroom like some pervert.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Bridge Bay Theater,” I prompted. “I was alone in the bathroom today. You came in and messed with me. I thought you would’ve learned how to up your game in prison.”

He laughed once, took a drag of his cigarette, and exhaled.

“I have no idea what fantasy you were concocting in your dreams, but I was in New York all day,” he said. “I just got back an hour ago.”

“Yeah, of course you were.”

“Why would I lie?”

I paused, realizing he might have a point. He had no motive to deny it. It was no secret he had it out for me and my family. And there was probably no proof he was there, and even if he was, an alibi could be forged to say he was elsewhere.

With just us, here in this room alone, he’d take pleasure in doing and saying whatever he wanted with no one else to hear.

He stepped up to me, and I could smell the tobacco on him, as well as the fragrance of his clothes, the expensive fabric and the leather of his shoes.

“I’m better than that,” he nearly whispered down on me, and I could feel the ice on his cool breath from the drink he’d just had. “Why would I corner someone in a public space when anyone could walk in and interrupt me? I would need privacy.”

His fingers brushed my hair off my cheek, and I jerked away.

“Like a big house?” he told me. “With miles of empty forest outside and no neighbors. No traffic. Nothing.” I heard the sick smile in his voice and didn’t miss his meaning at all.

He already had it all planned out.

“Everyone else is gone, leaving her alone,” he continued. “No one to help. No one to hear her. No one to stop me. A whole night. Just the two of us.” He whispered now, his breath on my lips. “In the house together. So much space to run, and only so many places to hide.”

I curled my fingers into fists, and if I didn’t know it before, I knew it now. He had changed, after all.

He’d gotten worse.

And in his head, he did the time, so may as well do the crime.

Dread curdled my stomach as he brushed past me.

“Goodnight, Winter,” he said.

And I didn’t mistake the hint of excitement in his voice.

 

 

 

Damon

 

Seven Years Ago

 

So according to Mr. Kincaid, given what happened so many years ago, Winter Ashby’s parents deemed it necessary to request that I attempt no interaction with their daughter—or either daughter, for that matter—while they were enrolled at Thunder Bay Prep. And failure to abide by that request would force them to seek a restraining order against me.

Unless I wanted something like that on my record, then I should obey.

Or you would think I would obey. Anyone else would.

But hearing that only got the wheels in my head turning, and I dove into the alluring possibility of the danger and all the trouble I could cause.

I nearly laughed, remembering the conversation. A restraining order? Gimme a fucking break. What a pussy. We were children back then. Griffin Ashby was just pissed his wife had been screwing my father once upon a time, and if he couldn’t get his puny, pasty little hands on a man like Gabriel Torrance, then he pumped up the size of his dick by taking a jab at me now and then.

Yeah, there was an accident when we were kids, and Ashby had clearly poisoned his daughter over the years to warp her memory of exactly how that all went down, but I hadn’t meant to hurt her. It was a fucking fluke, and kids have accidents.

I stepped out of my car and slammed the door, hitting the button on the key fob and arming the alarm.

“Why didn’t you want me to pick you up?” Michael yelled over at me, getting out of his G-Class.

“Because I might not leave when you do,” I told him.

“Or he’ll be done before everyone else,” Will added with a chuckle as he flanked Michael’s side with Kai on the other.

The three of them drove together, and I was usually with them, but sometimes we came on our own. If we anticipated separating at some point during the night, that was.

I didn’t really have a plan, but who knew?

After Winter’s and my conversation in the cafeteria earlier this week, and her clear fear of me when we ran into each other in the locker room, I was intrigued. What did she remember about that day in the fountain? She was young when it happened—like me—so her memory might not be as sharp.

When she’d wandered into the locker room—or was pushed in, I later discovered—seeing the scared but stubbornly defiant look on her face reminded me of Banks. She looked about two seconds from cracking, the blush of embarrassment all over her cheeks and her eyes glistening a little. But her jaw was flexed hard and her fists were balled up tight. She was freaking out on the inside, but definitely pissed, too.

It was kind of cute.

And I liked the hint of helplessness. It made me feel…

I don’t know. Powerful, I guess.

The same way I felt with Banks and the basketball team, because there were things that only I could do for them.

Call it arrogance. All I knew was that I didn’t like the taunts directed at her when the guys noticed her.

No, scratch that.

I didn’t like anyone else taunting her.

And I really didn’t like another man coming to her rescue, even if it was Will.

And fuck her dad. He wouldn’t take out a restraining order on me. The alumni liked winning games, didn’t they? Michael, Kai, Will, and me…We were given very long leashes as long we kept doing our jobs. He didn’t have the guts.

We headed around the circular driveway, “Bad Company” by Five Finger Death Punch drifting up from the backyard as we walked past the dumbass marble fountain with four horses spitting water and fat cherubs posing up on the higher tier. It was the type of ugly shit Americans put on their property when they wanted to look European, but it just kind of came off looking like a trailer park bird bath, only bigger.

Griffin Ashby was a poser. And even if he could like me, I still wouldn’t be able to stand him. Luckily, he was in Meridian City for the weekend, his wife having gone with him, and their eldest daughter Arion decided to have a pool party tonight. Hopefully Winter hadn’t gone with her parents. I wanted to talk to her again. See how long it would exactly take to get inside her head and fuck shit up.

“Hey!” I heard Will bark as we walked. “Whoa, whoa, whoa, come here!”

I looked over, seeing him grab a kid by the shirt and stop him as he headed through the driveway, trying to leave.

I instantly recognized him. Misha, his little cousin. Grandson of a state senator but looked more like the prodigy of Sid and Nancy.

“What the hell are you doing here?” Will asked him. “You’re like twelve.”

“And?”

Smart-ass kid.

Will faltered a moment and then laughed under his breath. “Yeah, you’re right. Never mind. Drink responsibly.” And he pushed the kid back toward the party around the back of the house.

But Misha pulled out of his hold and whipped back around, walking toward the road instead. “I’m going home,” he grumbled. “This is boring.”

“You can’t walk from here, you little shit!” Will argued. “It’s miles.”

“So leave the party and gimme a ride.”

“Are you nuts?”

The laugh was lost in my throat as I turned around and started heading for the backyard again.

“That damn kid,” Will said, jogging to catch up to us. “I don’t know how he can be my blood.”

We walked around the house—the text invite stressing that no one was allowed inside the home and to come directly around to the backyard—and stopped just as the sprawling lawn came into view.

People danced and played drinking games, commotion going on in every corner as the music blasted and a football coasted through the air.

I could smell the food laid out on tables as several people played or talked in the pool. Nearly every chair was occupied, and some students took up the chaise lounges by the pool house, steam billowing out of the showers behind the structure. A light layer of mist also lingered just above the surface of the water, making the pool look like a hot tub.

“Hand in your phones,” someone called out.

I looked over to see a JV football player—whose name I didn’t know—sitting at a card table, eyeing us with our names already on Post-Its, ready to confiscate our shit, so no evidence of the party leaked online.

“Fuck your mother,” I muttered and looked back to the party, hearing Kai snort next to me.

All we needed were our phones getting stolen while in someone else’s possession. Pictures, texts, videos, receipts… I didn’t give mine up for anyone. It was safer with me, and if they wanted to kick us out for not following a rule, then good luck with that. People didn’t stay at parties we weren’t at.

The freshman didn’t say another word—or even move—as we walked into the party. Girls ran around, some in bikini tops, even though it was in the sixties tonight. I knew the pool was heated, but it had to be chilly if you were out of it.

One of them glanced up at me as she scurried by with her friends, a suggestive little smile playing on the corner of her lips that told me she probably wouldn’t take as much work as some if I were interested tonight.

But I like work.

I let my eyes trail around the backyard, shooting from corners to tables to the sporadic clusters of people.

But I knew who I was looking for. Even though I knew I shouldn’t be. This might actually be crossing a line, even for me.

When we were eight and eleven, it didn’t seem complicated to want to know each other, but now it was. People would read it wrong.

Michael let out a sigh, rolling his head and stretching out his neck. “Let’s get a drink.”

We nodded and moved into the party, getting beers and stopping here and there to talk to people.

Eventually, we found a table and I kicked off my shoes, pulling off my hoodie and throwing it down on a chair before grabbing my beer bottle and downing the rest of it.

Spotting one of our own basketball JV guys at the table, I shoved the empty bottle at him, which he took as he halted his conversation, pausing only a moment before he rose to get me another.

“All of us,” I mumbled to him as he left. Will drank faster than I did, so he’d be empty soon if he wasn’t already.

Kai sat down at the table, drinking and laughing at something someone said, while Michael walked off to talk to Diana Forester.

“Whoo-hoo!” Will cupped his hands around his mouth, howling in the middle of the party, over the loud music.

Everyone startled and turned just in time to see him run, shoes and shirt discarded, and leap into the deep end of the pool, somersaulting backward in mid-air before splashing into the water.

People laughed, hooting and hollering after him, and I walked over to the edge and stepped in, dropping into waist-deep water. I wore long, black swim shorts that fell to just above my knees, and I hadn’t brought a change of clothes. Banks had begged to come with me tonight, and I ended up charging out of the house to get away from that pathetic look on her face, a little pissed and a whole lot distracted and forgetting my cigarettes in the process.

Will popped up through the water, laughing and exchanging a few splashes with others before he swam over to me. I planted my elbows on the deck behind me, leaning against the edge of the pool.

“Arion Ashby wants your ass bad, man,” he said, standing up and pushing his hair over the top of his head. He jerked his chin off behind me, amused.

I glanced over my shoulder, seeing Winter’s older sister standing with her friends and eyeing us. My gaze traveled down her body, long, slender limbs in a white, strapless bikini and a long, fluffy ponytail. Both of her legs were adorned with anklets, and a multi-strand gold necklace in varying lengths rested on her chest.

She’d be hotter with just the jewelry on.

I turned back to Will. “I have plans for her. Don’t worry.”

His eyes lit up. “I love your imagination. Do I get to come?”

I tilted my lips in a smile, not missing his double-meaning. “I have plans for you, too.”

And then I let my eyes fall to the two hickeys on his neck, one of them damn nasty looking. I knew exactly where they had come from, too. The girl who’d dealt them probably had twice as many of her own.

“Some girls need to learn that sucking dick like a vacuum is a skill you don’t waste on a man’s neck,” I told him, flicking water with my fingers as aggravation settled in my gut. “Maybe you should watch while I retrain the one who did that to you.”

“Aw, jealous?” he teased.

But then a look passed between us, and I wasn’t fucking laughing. His cocky smile started to fall, and he straightened up.

Will was my best friend, and what was mine was mine. He knew that.

An awkward silence passed, but then he noticed something behind me and jerked his chin. “Uh-oh.”

I looked over, seeing Arion walking toward us through the water. She’d let down her hair and had her hands tucked behind her back. I had geared up all week to be in the mood for something far different tonight, and I wasn’t sure I wanted to stay.

But my plans fell apart, I had nothing better to do, and if she wanted to play, maybe I could get my head in gear, after all. She was pretty enough, even though she had a set to her eyes that made her look a little mean and her jaw was more square, making her look too thin and giving her an air of hardness I didn’t like. She wasn’t sweet.

But whatever. I wasn’t the one who would fuck her.