Page 6 of CurVy 13

But it’s dark and stormy.

This is a sleepy neighbourhood.

Sleepy people fucking sleep!

So, I cower and brace my hands over my head, but nothing comes. Yet I know he is right behind me.

Hovering over me.

The press of his presence at my back becomes all I can feel. My breath slows for long moments that stretch and engulf me, fear and a strange kind of thrill, too.

Endorphins, like being high.

With a hand pressed to the door on either side of my shoulders, his breath on my spine, his formidable energy is as tangible as any touch.

“Now, I have a filleting knife in my boot. I don’t want to use it. I don’t even want to grab it. It’ll slide so quickly into your soft skin that you’ll probably miss it. Until your blood roars through your veins as it drains from you. So, behave and listen,” he says, his voice close, deep, and somehow capable of purring seductively against my inner ears. “No one has to get hurt. Here is one for your dark romance stories… Did you know they used to lobotomise women in the dark ages, so they had living dolls? See, they would just lay there after that, warm bodies, strong heartbeat, wet cunt, obedient but better still, giddy and fun.”

I start to sob.

“Easy.” He spins me to face him, cupping my cheeks and cradling my weak head. “Calm.” My body wants to drop to the floor, my survival instincts cowering to his vile comment. “I won’t be doing that to you. I want you to know what I’m capable of. What I’ll do if I have to.”

He lifts me effortlessly into his thick, strong arms, and I just let him. I just fucking let him. Let the helplessness render me nothing but compliant in this moment.

“I think you’re going to do as you’re told without the screwdriver through your eye. Am I right?”

I nod.

“Very good, Thirteen.”

Thirteen?

Why did he—

Oh God. I‘ve been called thirteen all day. Dammit; the connection almost slips through without me noticing, almost lost importance, choked by my fear.

Thirteen.

My juror number.

This morning, my first day of compulsory jury service, I was given a number for privacy. A numeral instead of a name; that is the way it works.

I store that information. This is good. It brings me hope. This isn’t a random killing. He’s linked somehow to the case I am part of. Think, Vallie.

Think.

A little girl was kidnapped.

She was found with a thirty-four-year-old man.

He had her for less than three hours.

The mother is pressing charges.

When he lowers me to my reading beanbag—covered in cupcakes like a damn little girl’s—I grip the towel as it slides, but he takes a fist full.

My pulse hits the back of my throat, my previous hope sinking as he rips the towel from my body.

I gasp, tears bursting from my eyes, mingling with my fitful pleas. “No. Please.” I throw my arms across my body.

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