Prescott

I spend my time reading his diary, holding the red notebook at an angle that allows a ray of sun to trickle through a crack in the boarded windows. Yellow light sheds over the pages. I’m getting to know Nate. Getting to like Nate. It’s horrible, to feel positively about your captor. But I do. Can’t help not to. He is broken, just like me. Life has fed him heartbreak, just like it fed me.

DECEMBER 25TH, 2010

“THE HEART WAS MEANT TO BE BROKEN” – OSCAR WILDE

Christmas Day.

Frank heard the news about my mom’s death through the grapevine. He visits me in my cell. Brings in candy bars and Top Ramen. Pedro’s eyeing the sweets like they are fucking Megan Fox. He’s been trying to land himself a spot in ad-seg to get a shot of the good stuff. Again.

“Crack already, boy,” the old man grunts, punching me in the shoulder.

“Yell. Curse. Break shit. Your mother just died. She was a good woman.”

I agree. She was the best. Right after I killed my dad, she threw herself at the police officers’ feet, begging for them to take her and not me.

“Need a shoulder to cry on?”

I sniff an arrogant “No.”

He leaves, but not before he shoves a few stamps into my orange uniform. “Get yourself something nice, Nathan—I mean, Nate.”

I throw the Ramen noodles against the wall and watch the slimy strings crawl downwards like worms. My throat constricts with emotions, and not the good kind. Never the good kind.

“You’re a weird kid.” I hear Pedro rolling over on his bunk bed. “Let me know if you get the shits again. I really need those meds.”

JANUARY 3RD, 2010

“FRIENDS ARE THE SIBLINGS GOD NEVER GAVE US” (MENCIUS)

I arrive back at the exercise yard after being MIA since news broke about Mamá.

Godfrey and his crew sit at a picnic table, eyeing me like a moving target. Seb grins and pats the bench in a silent invitation. I ignore him and go straight to Frank.

The old man’s there with Stockton’s old schoolers. They’re standing in the corner, rolling up cigarettes and swearing at no one in particular. Frank flashes his false teeth with a rusty “Hello.”

“Yeah,” I say, snatching the cigarette from his hand, even though I’m not a smoker. He tilts his chin down. “Yeah?”

“Yeah, I need a shoulder to cry on.”

And that night, I bawl my fucking eyes out for hours on a shoulder I used to think belonged to a veteran pirate.

FEBRUARY 3RD, 2010

“AGE IS A CASE OF MIND OVER MATTER. IF YOU DON’T MIND, IT DON’T MATTER” (SATCHEL PAIGE)

I’m in the cafeteria when Frank shows up, slapping backs as he strides along the lengthy benches. Good mood is playing on his face. When he sits next to me, I find out why. Frank got me a gift for my twenty-second birthday. A paperback of On The Road by Jack Kerouac. The irony tickles my lips with unfamiliar laughter. I haven’t laughed in a long time, but getting a prisoner a book about freedom is pretty dope.

The book is bent and you can see it’s been rolled up for hours when it was smuggled in.

No one’s given me a birthday gift since I was eight.

I cry a little on the inside, but on the outside, I let out a yawn.

He hooks my neck in a headlock and my cheek crushes against his saggy chest as he ruffles my messy dark hair.

“Fucking brat. I know you wanted this more than wet pussy.”

“How?” My fingers dig hard into the book. It feels like home in my palm. Like it belongs there. His friend Sergio gives me an odd look, his eyebrows pop in surprise.

“He a fag?” he enquires, jerking his thumb in my direction. Frank shakes his head and pats my back. “He’ll grow up to break bones and hearts in equal measure. Hey, Nathan—Nate,” he says with a cluck of his tongue and gives me his peach. I love peaches, so I take it. “The correctional officer? Officer Bouscher? Beth?”

I stare at him blankly. I know Beth.

“She wants to fuck your brains out. Know how you talk to her about poetry and shit?”

“It’s not poetry, it’s fiction.” My wry voice is clipped. Which only sends Frank into a fit of even crazier hoots.

“Poetry, fiction, the goddamned weather. Don’t matter, pretty boy. She doesn’t give a damn. When you talk, when she watches your lips move, all she thinks about is how they’d feel on her lips. And I ain’t talking about the ones on her face.”

This makes the old schoolers cackle like hyenas.

I’m not a virgin. I had plenty of sex before coming here, with so many girls I can’t even try to count. Everywhere I go, women ogle me, slip their numbers into my pocket and send their giggling friends to stutter some bullshit about how they never do this. Which is why I’ve never been overly occupied with women in the first place. One never appreciates what he has in spades.

“She told me about that book.” Frank’s face grows serious. “We made it work.”

Later that night, I get my first prison tattoo by a guy called Irvin. He ties an empty pen barrel to a motor from a tape player before the needle kisses my skin. I chose a Kerouac quote. Left shoulder blade.

“My fault, my failure, is not in the passions I have, but in my lack of control of them.”

Since I have no passions, I pray that one day, this’ll make sense to me.

So far, passion failed me. The only thing I ever did fervently was killing the man who broke my Mama’s arms in a drunken fit to prevent him from hurting her again.

For now, though, I’ll make do with this quote. I like the jagged pain that escorts being marked. I like the white noise of the machine, and decide that by the time I get out of here, I’ll hide most of myself with bad ink.

Well, half of me, anyway. The other half I’ll keep clean and pure. Who knows? Maybe parts of me are still redeemable.

I wait impatiently for the night, knowing that I’ve made real progress with Nate.

But when the crickets start to chirp, my heart sinks.

Tonight is different than any other night.

I hear a commotion upstairs, followed by strange noises. Feet that are not Nate’s army boots nor Irvin’s Crocs. (I figured Ink is Irvin—who else could it be?)

I hear cheap heels clicking like the safety of a gun, and sneakers and boots dancing together. I hear music cranking up to full-blast. Chatter. Voices clashing like swords in my ears. Laughter. I hear women shrieking and giggling and awwing and ahhing. Men swearing, spitting and drinking. There’s a party upstairs, while I’m stuck here, rotting on my own stupid plans to break free. I’m terrifyingly upset with Nate, even though we’re not friends. Even though I’m nothing but his victim and, if things go according to my plan, he’ll soon be nothing of mine.

I confided in him, told him everything I’ve been through, and this is what he does?

A jolt of hatred slices through my gut. I despise every single woman who is partying up there, and I don’t even know them. The idea of Nate nuzzling, kissing, straddling—even choking—someone else makes me want to scream. I’m petrified and possessive of him at the same time. Why?

Jesus, what’s happening to me? I should be shouting from the top of my lungs, hoping someone would notice. But I can’t bring myself to do it. The illogical part of me tells me to wait. Maybe he’ll come for me. Maybe I can still make my way out of this place with him in tow.

Nate.

He hasn’t come down to check on me tonight. Haven’t had my meal yet. My shower time. My Nate time. One party and he forgets all about me?

Men. They should never be trusted.

I munch on stale chips, lying on my blanket as anger brews inside me. Tonight was not supposed to go down this way. He was supposed to come over, have dinner with me and crack completely.

I throw the bag of chips on the floor and scream into the darkness, the music swallowing the noise.

Iggy Pop is begging “I Wanna Be Your Dog” upstairs. Downstairs, I feel like a caged up pet. I knew there was going to be a downside to hearing everything through these paper walls, down to the persistent humming of their old fridge.

The music is so loud, I don’t even notice when in the midst of the wild party, the door cracks open. I jump to my feet when I see the light pouring from the inside the house into the basement. Maybe the person who opened the door is a stranger looking for a case of beer and I can ambush them. Alas, I’m greeted with the Guy Fawkes mask, and Nate is standing there, a white and dirty muscle shirt clinging to his body like a slutty fangirl. His black, ripped jeans ride low, offering a glimpse of his stupid V, his full sleeve of monsters spitting fire crawling up his muscled arm. He is holding an open bottle of beer and a plastic plate with junk food piled high. Pizza, coleslaw and greasy fries. I turn around and toss my hair.

“Oh. You.”

“Yeah, me.” He sounds playful, jovial and tanked. He’s been drinking. And by the slur I’ve already picked up, a lot more than one should have. “Who were you expecting? Donald Trump?”

“Honestly? I was wishing for a fucking cop.” I still don’t look at him, for a reason beyond my grasp. It’s not a good time to be sulking. He’s mumbling incoherently, drunk to oblivion and in all probability, breaking some pretty tough parole rules. The party, the alcohol and the stinking weed that’s on his clothes. This is when I should be making him break even more rules. Work harder to dig my way into his heart, not push him away until he’s on the other side of the planet.

Seduce. Take. Destroy. Treat men how they treat you, Prescott.

“Brought you food and booze,” he offers, his muscular arm dangles the beer bottle. I don’t budge from my place at the corner of the room, still moping like a two-year-old who just found out that the world doesn’t spin around her.

“Leave it there.” I nod my head to the table. “Now, don’t let me stand in the way of your fun. Go back to your party.”

Okay, who is this girl speaking from my mouth and what has she done to the ballbusting Prescott? This jealous girlfriend nonsense is not me. Ever since Camden, I’ve been very careful about not getting attached. Other than a handful of disastrous one-night stands I engaged in, just to prove myself that I could still do it, I haven’t really paid any attention to the male population for the past few years.

Nate takes a step into the room. A sliver of a chill breaks down my skull, moving down my spine and tickling my toes.

“Turn around. I’m blindfolding you.”

“What have I done now?” I throw out my arms in despair, huffing a blonde lock away from my eyes.

“Sassed around way too much for my liking,” he answers with a teasing bite, clarifying. “I wanna hang out with you, Country Club. That means I’m taking off this mask. You can’t see my face. I wish you fucking could, but God has a plan for me, and I don’t want it to be cutting my dick off and giving it to Seb as a souvenir,” he snickers. I’ve never seen Nate so buzzed. So intoxicated. So agreeable.

He hovers closer, grabs my hand and jerks me to his body. Then he spins me around and wraps the black cloth around my eyes tightly. I smell the beer and salty BBQ snacks as he exhales a charged breath on my skin, his lips brushing the nape of my back fleetingly. I roll my head backward as the sound of the plastic mask hitting the floor fills my ears.

“Better?” I purr, losing myself.

He leans into my body, his skin sticking to mine. “Much. I like you blindfolded.”

“You like me regardless.” I bite my lip, not sure if I’m trying to convince him or myself. I need him to crack if I want to be out of here soon. The good news is that whatever temptations Nate has upstairs, his focus is solely on the girl underground. “Help me take a sip?”

He grabs me by the waist and turns me around so that I face him. Nate leads us both to the corner of the room, where we sit down. The party is still alive, but I’ve learned a thing or two about Nate, and he doesn’t need people around him. He needs silence, and maybe a good story to listen to. Parties were meant for people who run away from their minds, not soak in them until drowned by their thoughts.

“Ink’s party, huh?” I elbow him, and the beer he placed in my hand sloshes over the rim of the bottle. A dash of cold liquid spills on my bare thighs, and I can’t see it, but I can feel his eyes drop to my wet skin, heating my flesh with desire.

“How’d you figure it out?”

“Beware of those who seek constant crowds, they’re nothing alone,” I quote Bukowski, and hear his breaths pick up speed. He gets hot on poetry. A freak who takes comfort in other people’s words. Just like me. “You don’t need cheap entertainment.”

“I told him he’s stupid as fuck. You could be pounding this door down screaming bloody murder,” he says, testing me. I run my tongue over my front teeth.

“Well, I didn’t. Because, Beat, I know that I’m walking out of here before Camden and Godfrey get to me. Remember my offer yesterday?” My heart pounds faster. I’m still embarrassed about being victimized. I don’t want him to see me as weak. I want us to be equal.

“Are you a mother?” he slurs. I frown.

“What?”

“Are. You. A. Fucking. Mother?”

It feels like a punch straight to my chest, a painful memory that he’s slapped me with, and I’m glad he can’t see my eyes through the black fabric of my blindfold.

“I’m not. Why do you ask?”

“No reason.” Hiccup. “So you don’t have a kid?”

“No.” I grit, trying not to fume. “Already told you, Beat. It’s just me in this world.”

“What they did to you. . .Jesus, Prescott. That’s so fucked up.”

Nate is drunk. Oh-so drunk. A huge blessing, wrapped in a red sateen bow. I take a sip of my beer, the liquid washing over my throat and offering the kind of comfort only booze can, and lick my lips, knowing his predatory eyes are on me.

“That’s the ugly truth,” I nod.

“Then tell me something beautiful,” he croaks. “I have enough uglies for a lifetime.”

“There is nothing to fear except the power you give to your own demons. Sally Gardner said that.”

“Good quote.” His voice smiles. I smile back at it.

“Can I feel your face?”

He snorts another laugh from the shit-drunk variety. “No.”

“Pretty please with a cherry on top?”

“Nope.”

“I’ll scream.”

“I’ll gag you with the extra pieces of bondage and shove the rest of the cloth down every single hole in your body. Don’t tempt me, ‘cause Ima enjoy it.” His tone is flat, sincere, and not at all pissed off. Peaceful. Why is this a turn-on for me? I never had it too rough. But with Nate? I actually want him to hurt me. In the best, worst, most possible way.

“You’d never hurt me,” I retort.

“Never ever, Country Club,” he promises softly. “Unless it’s fun for you, then all bets are off.”

“And we’ve already established that you like me.”

“No. You said that.”

“Show me yours and I’ll show you mine. Let me touch your face, and I’ll let you touch me. Everywhere.”

“I’m not like them.” His voice turns to steel. “I’m not the taking kind.”

“You’re not taking. I’m giving. Gladly.”

Silence.

Contemplation.

I part my lips and lick them.

Persuasion.

Nate sighs in return.

He’s in.

“Make it fast.” He pulls both my wrists into his huge palm, placing my hands on his warm cheeks before muttering, “Silver Spoon, you little perv.”

The first thing I notice are his cheekbones. They’re so high, they’re level with his ears. Cut, prominent and glorious. He has a Tragus piercing poking out of his left ear, which I almost yank out, because instead of an earring, he has a safety pin.

“That’s rad.” I grin blindly, and by the stretch of his skin, I know there’s a smirk playing on that perfect face too.

“Of course you’d think so, CC.”

“CC?”

“Country Club.”

My hands move down to his square chin, brushing over his lips. Dear God, his lips. So pouty and soft, they feel like two pillows. My hands hurry to his nose. Just as I suspect, it’s straight and narrow. My index finger runs over the smooth bone, and much to my embarrassment, I suck in a ragged breath.

“You’re spectacular, aren’t you, you little bastard?” My voice shakes.

He grins and softly bites one of my fingers. Straight teeth. “You ain’t too bad yourself.”

Heart stuttering in my chest, I knot my legs together, feeling warmth tickling between them. That’s the first time he’s said something nice about my appearance. I bite down a moan as my hands continue roaming his face, drinking in every piece of flesh, thirsty for much more than what he’s offering.

“Kiss me,” I hear myself plead. I’m not sure how much of it is me recruiting Nate to my team, and how much is me lusting after this boy-man.

I feel his throat bobbing with a gulp. “Fuck, Pea. You’re going to get me into so much trouble, and I’m already in deep.”

“Then we’ll climb out of trouble together. Let’s kick trouble in the ass, Beat. Crawl out of the gutter, point the gun at Godfrey, Sebastian and Camden and kill all of our problems at once. Let’s claim our lives back.”

His pulse drums beneath my fingers, wild and hungry and tempted, and I lean closer to his face.

“Kiss me, Beat.”

“You’re insane,” he croaks. He’s not wrong.

My body is sore, aching with want for a man I haven’t seen. Never in my life have I felt like this. Sex with Camden before we broke up was. . .nice. Everything else—painfully numbing. But this. . .it doesn’t even have a name.

“We’ll make a pact to kill those bastards for what they did to us. Instead of shaking on it, we’ll kiss on it. It’ll be our little blood oath, Beat.”

“Pea.”

“Beat. . .”

Beat. . .

Beat. . .

Boom.

He slings me against the wall and his lips crash on mine in a hard, closemouthed, drugging kiss as he pulls me flush against his steel body. I gasp for air, parting my lips, but before I manage to draw in oxygen, he bites my lower lip and drags it into his mouth until the flesh cracks, the healing injury Seb had caused breaking open as he sucks on my blood. Horror twirls with a heady thrill inside me, and I drag my fingers through the hair of my faceless captor, pulling at his perfect locks. He takes my chin in his hand, my lip still in his mouth, sucking hard, drinking away my pain.

Excitement helixes through me, the adrenaline pumping in my veins making my whole body buzz with unfamiliar electricity I’d never felt under a person’s touch. Maybe I’m going insane.

Maybe it’s a place worth going.

“Blood oath,” he growls into my mouth with a charged breath, dragging me up from the floor like the caveman that he is so that we’re both standing up. He pins me to the wall. This gorgeous, raw, broken, sensitive monster of a boy-man hates it when men slap me, but make no mistakes—he loves to hurt me. “Make me bleed, Prescott.”

And I do. I make him bleed. I bite the tip of his tongue, pulling slowly, taking his rough tongue in my mouth and sucking it with a long, husky moan that tickles my chest, tingles my stomach and ends up blowing up between my legs. The intensity of his touch is so intoxicating, it’s almost like he licked me up and down. We’ve already sprinted over so many barriers, and I have one more to tip him over the edge.

Sex.

He needs to take from me, like the rest of them. It’d be the ultimate betrayal against Godfrey.

“Blood oath,” I repeat with abandon, our lips ghosting one another, never leaving, never saying goodbye. Greedy. Ravenous. Desperate. “We’re in this together, Beat, baby. Fuck me.”

Yes. Fuck me. Against orders. Against logic. Against the fucking wall.

His tongue circles around mine frantically, his mouth drops to my neck, dragging downwards. He licks the sensitive spot behind my ear and moves down to bite my breast through the fabric of my dress, leaving goosebumps so powerful I’m quivering like a brittle leaf. He leaves a trail of that sticky blood he drew from my lips with every brush of his tongue. I feel my wetness dripping down my right inner thigh, crawling to my knee, my body begging for some action.

“Aren’t you fucked up after what they did to you?” he growls. “Aren’t you scared of sex?”

I grab one of his wrists and guide his hand to my inner thigh, moving it up and down my soaked flesh. “Can I fake this, Beat? Can you fake lust?”

“Why you?” A groan that sounds a lot like a beg makes his chest tremble while he pins me to the wall, lifting me so my legs are wrapped around his waist, his swollen, angry erection trapping me between his huge arms. Now he’s the one grinding against me, and his willpower to resist me is running on fumes. Every little thrust of his hips hammers another pin on his self-control casket.

“I can have any pussy in the world. . .and the only one that I want is as toxic as poison ivy.”

“Beat.” I place my mouth on his salty skin. I have no idea what I’m licking with the blindfold on. It’s even more of a turn-on. “You can have me. We could have it all. I’ve got the money. We can fuck and run away, start over and leave this mess.”

I guess Nate is too drunk to even comprehend what I just suggested, because he snarls and tugs at the fabric of my gray dress, wanting to strip me naked but too drunk to know how.

“He’ll kill me if I fuck you.” He grabs me by the ass and lifts me upwards, nuzzling his perfect, straight nose into my throat and sucking. Sex is a powerful drive, and for a young man recently out of prison? It just might throw him off a cliff. “But maybe I deserve death. And maybe. . .” His teeth find my earlobe, tugging. “Maybe I don’t even care anymore.”

“Fuck me,” I whisper into his mouth again, both of us shuddering with looming release.

His hands leave my body and disappointment slams into me, but only for a second, because then I hear him patting his back pocket and producing what might be his wallet. I hear him yanking out a condom and ripping the wrapper open.

“No foreplay,” he grunts.

“No problem.” I lick his skin again. He could probably drill a missile into me and I’d be fine with it. Yes, he is business, but oh, how I enjoy working my charm on him.

“It’s been a while since I’ve been with someone.” I hear the sticky rubber as he rolls the condom on and butterflies take over my chest. Am I happy because I’m close to securing my freedom, because I’m about to have sex with an obviously out-of-this-world mysterious ex-felon with a banging body or because I’ve played this scene in my head more times than I’d like to admit ever since I fell into his captivity?

You guessed it. All three.

“Are you telling me this because you’re going to come fast?”

His hands find my waist again and spin me, throwing my body hard against the concrete with a thud. He yanks my underwear down to my knees, pulls my dress over my ass and smacks it lightly. “That too. But mostly, because it’s going to be brutal.”

He takes my ass cheeks in his hands, pulls me up so that my behind is against his erection and plows into me in one go.

Shit. He is huge. And I don’t mean good-huge, either. No. He is this-should-come-with-a-warning-label huge. I cry out in pain, my nails digging into the wall for comfort, but nothing can dull the agony of having him inside me. Nate’s so thick, my thighs spread open automatically even in this position. And he’s so long, he hits my G-spot without even trying, which is good, because he isn’t trying to please me.

And I’m pretty certain having sex with him is the equivalent of experiencing natural birth.

“Jesus,” I moan, not exactly sure if it’s from pleasure or pain. Instead of pumping into me, his fingers dig into the flesh of my ass, moving me in the rhythm of his frantic trance. Brutally. Repeatedly. Urgently.

“Shut the fuck up, Pea.” He disregards me as his cock hits my G-spot hard again, making my mouth water with an impending orgasm. It’s not pretty. It’s not even sultry. His moves are rusty, feral, manic. He is fucking me like he is trying to kill me, each thrust like a knife that sends my forehead banging against the wall. His desperate growls release something that’s been buried deep inside him. It’s angry sex, but it’s not me he’s angry at. No. I’m just a hole he spills the rage he’s collected over the years into.

He fucks me because he wants to ruin what belongs to Godfrey Archer and his son, and I let him, for the exact same reason.

His hand slams my ass, and I arch my back in response, my head thrown to the wall with a bang. It’s like he poured hot water all over me. He doesn’t rub or kiss it better, and after the first shot of pain. . .bliss. Pure bliss.

“Do it again.”

“Don’t fucking tell me what to do.”

But he spanks me again, and I wail his name.

“Beat,” I say with a shudder, chanting like a prayer to the sex god behind me, knowing that I should keep my mouth shut, but also that I can’t stop. He slams so deep into me, my voice box produces groans and sobs unintentionally.

“Yes. . .oh. . .oh. . .Nate.”

No. No. No.

His body stiffens behind me and goosebumps bloom on his skin down to his fingertips. He’s still inside me, his breathing ragged.

I’m not sure what scares me more, the fact that he hasn’t spoken in a few seconds, the fact that he’s still inside me, expanding my body like someone shoved a chair into me, or the fact that my pussy swells around him, hot and even more turned on by my fear. I gulp.

“Ink?” he asks dryly. I nod, partly telling the truth.

“God fucking dammit,” he hisses, still hard as stone. “How long have you known?”

I squeeze my swollen eyelids together.

“A while.”

“Prescott,” he warns.

“A week.”

Body frozen with fear, I feel his hand as he brushes my hair away and kisses the nape of my neck, his other hand still holding my ass up in the air so that I’m on my tiptoes. He releases a long pained breath. I swallow hard as his silence fills every inch of the room.

“Are you going to kill me or fuck me?” My lips tremble.

He fists my hair, bringing my ear to his hot mouth. “First, the latter,” he whispers sinisterly. He’s killed before. “And then, I’ll decide who deserves to be killed for this.”

He’s at it again. Grabbing my ass in a way that’d surely leave a nasty mark, he slams his hips into my flesh back and forth. I keep my mouth shut by biting into my lower lip hard, but even that doesn’t stop the moans from escaping.

I’m working up a solid orgasm, my legs shaking all over, but Nate doesn’t even warn me. He drives into me one last time and empties inside me, groaning against my sweaty back for what seems to be a full minute. I feel his condom expanding with hot cum. It feels like he broke my body and sliced my legs open with a cleaver.

And I love it.

He releases my hips and I slide down the wall until my feet hit the floor. I shimmy my dress down, my wetness sticking my thighs together. What the hell just happened? Technically, it was sex. But physically and mentally, it felt like butchery. Nate takes a step back. He went against Godfrey’s order and fucked me with everything he’s got and then some. His empty balls are in my cute little palm now.

Everyone knows Godfrey has a lie detector in his office. One sit-down with Nate and the needle will be dancing like a hippie at Woodstock. I’m sure we’re thinking the same thing—everything’s changed now that he stuck his dick in me.

“Shit,” he mutters behind me as the new reality settles over the room. “Fuck, fuck, fuck!”

Even though my back is still to him, I can feel him pacing the room. I’m trying not to dwell on it, because my plans are so much bigger than being semi-rejected by a weird man-boy with a cock the size of a rocket ship. Still, it stings.

But I know his name.

And he fucked something that belongs to Godfrey.

He is screwed.

“Listen, Nate. . .” Before I get the chance to turn around and launch at him with another pep talk, the door slams shut, the walls around me rattling with the impact. I wait a few seconds before taking off my blindfold and looking around.

He left.

I kick the food and beer he brought for me, picking up the Guy Fawkes mask he forgot to take with him before he stormed away and stare at it, willing it to come alive and fight with me.

I can’t believe him. I can’t believe me. I shouldn’t care that he ran off. Just be thrilled that he’s played into my plan, and that I can now manipulate him even more.

Nate Vela will be back. I know he will. A whole party couldn’t distract him. He came for me. He came in me. He has no interest in whatever the outside world has to offer. From the moment he gets to his house every day, his life revolves around me.

The way he fucked me today? It proved one thing: this man needs me just as I need him.

Bad.