Page 202 of Seizing Control: Part One

Loving her without restriction is the only solution.

Making her choose between us will only make us both losers.

Until Slash understands that we are at a stalemate...

“I’ve added my number to your phone. Call me if you need anything. I’ll keep you looped in as we close in on Brutus.”

He doesn’t answer me.

I sigh.

The man-bunned lost cause mutters angrily to himself.

Since my vehicle is parked on the opposite direction to the exit Slash is using, I head toward it without offering him a goodbye. The prideful idiot can indulge his cowardice for another day. He will either see sense, or I’ll take him out permanently.

It’s that simple.

Lily is all that matters.

Her happiness and her safety are paramount.

As I walk, a ripple of worry takes hold of me, the sound of Lily’s despair bounces around in my head. My heart drops into my boots as I recognise the intuition settling into my gut.

I loathe epiphanies.

But part of my education has been embracing the metaphysical. As a man who prefers solid proof to blind faith, it’s been the hardest lesson to master. I would much rather present concrete evidence than a hyperbolic warning, yet I can’t ignore the twinge in my psyche.

Without slowing my pace, I say his name in a steely tone, “Slash.”

“What?” he snaps.

“Lily’s floundering. The urge to cut will get the better of her if you aren’t diligent?—”

“I know how to take care of her.”

He’s wrong, so I continue on like he hasn’t spoken. “Hear me when I tell you that you need to strip her control from her. Completely. To the point where it feels wrong. Hurt her physically, not mentally. My woman’s head already tortures her more than you and I can ever manage. Pin her down. Fuck her rough. Force her submission. Make her cry. If you don’t, the craving to purge the poison she believes infects her will build up, and up, and up, and she’ll do something crazy once your baby is safely birthed.”

Slash’s response is borderline facetious when he retorts, “Noted.”

Rage whips through me.

I breathe in and out, four, two, six, embracing the cycle that will activate my calm.

Once.

Twice.

Three times.

Four.

It doesn’t work.

I’m a ball of fury and resentment as I allow the weak prick I asked my woman marry to save herself leave with his head still attached to his body. He should be dead. If Venom was alive, he would be. He’s a traitorous arsehole. Coward. A weakling of the worst kind.

Somehow, Slash thinks he has moral supremacy.

He deludes himself.

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