Page 62 of SKIN

“Do we have a future?” I flicked my eyes down, staring at the bruises on my wrists before peering back up at him from beneath my lashes. My expression a mixture of feigned innocence and flat-out sarcasm. “And here I thought killing me was always the end game? Or were all those threats of yours as empty as that socket of yours?”

“The only thing empty in this room, pet, are going to be my balls. When they’re through with you.” He grinned, clearly proud of himself and his not-all-that-clever retort. “But as far as our future goes, I think you already know the answer to that question.”

Cohen leaned forward, and I instinctively leaned back.

“Tell me, Emily. What was your life like without me? When you couldn’t feel me in every room with you—never mind. Let me tell you what life was like for me first and see if it sounds familiar, hm?”

He took my silence as a prompt to continue speaking. And I guess it kinda was. It would kill me to admit aloud. But I was a little curious as to what the psycho had to say.

Cohen tipped his chair against the wall behind him and kicked his legs up on the table, not bothering to look down when the plates were jostled aside before shattering on the floor. “The first thing on my mind when I woke up in that hospital bed was you. Then our kid. Followed by how both of you would react to seeing the same shit I saw in the mirror every morning. But ya see, I also didn’t care. Because you were mine in every way possible. I’d made sure of that when I knocked you up?—”

“On purpose?” The words caught in my throat but I forced them out anyway. “You fucking got me pregnant on purpose? Why? How?”

He landed the chair on all fours with a loud smack, his palm slamming down in front of me. “Shh, you’re ruining the best part of the story.” Then he cleared his throat. “I thought that would be enough to keep my sweet Emily from going astray—we both know how that ended. However, at the time, I was missing some of the…” He paused to wave a hand in the air. Almost like if he fished long enough he might catch whatever he was searching for. “…particulars. Still, I remained faithful while you, my pet, did not.”

“You lef—” Another slap on the tabletop had me biting my tongue.

“I never fucking left, Emily. Not once. Ever. In ten fucking years. But you…” Cohen lifted an accusatory finger while venom practically dripped from every word he directed my way. “I had to watch as you whored yourself out to every prick in the city. But that fucker you lured into your bedroom… that was the last fucking straw. You forced my hand. Forced me to show you all the things I did for you behind the scenes. And then you were the one who fucking left. Not me.”

74

COHEN

The rage was simmering beneath the surface, reaching its tipping point and quickly boiling over as my arm shot out and closed around Emily’s throat. I didn’t remember putting it there. I barely registered my fingers as they clamped down on her pressure points, and I watched her struggle for her next breath of air. Her hands flailing out and her nails clawing at my knuckles. If she broke skin, I didn’t feel it. I couldn’t feel anything beyond the compulsion to destroy. Her and everything that came with her.

Including the things she made me do at every turn. Things like lose my cool. Things like almost kill her without meaning to. Things like this.

When I noticed the color start to drain from her face, her fight waning along with it, I tossed her motionless body over one shoulder. Scanned my thumb over the keypad to the door and took a sharp left. Stalking down the darkened hallway without bothering to flick on the lights. Truth was I didn’t need them. Everything was mapped out in my brain like an extension of myself.

I didn’t know where I was headed. But I had no doubt I’d figure it out when I got there.

I stopped short when I caught sight of the large metal tub pressed up against the far wall in one of my various surgical rooms. I liked to use it to keep body parts on ice before shipping them off for disposal or prepping them for a secondary buyer. But right now, I had a better idea.

I leaned forward and flipped Emily onto the metal surgical table. Her ass wasn’t moving anytime soon so I didn’t bother tying her down as I tugged open the freezer door and grabbed a few fresh bags of ice before tipping them into the tub. Repeating the process until it was filled to the brim. Then I dumped in a few buckets of water, giving the whole thing a quick stir with my arm. The chill penetrating through several layers of skin down to the bone. Exactly how I wanted it.

If she were already pregnant, I couldn’t risk the safety of the fetus. But seeing as that wasn’t an issue right now, I had free rein. Could do with her what I wanted and then patch her up again. Like my own fucked-up little rag doll. A fact that had me scooping her into my arms and tossing her into the ice bath without much thought as to the consequences.

The moment her head went under, I reached in and tugged Emily back to the surface by her hair, watching as she sputtered out a mouthful of water and gulped in a lungful of air. Frozen droplets splashing out and dripping onto the tiled flooring. I leaned over the edge of the tub, grinning wider as her lips turned that familiar shade of blue that told me she was well on her way to hypothermia.

Blue always did suit her best.

“Ya ever heard of hydrotherapy, pet?” I didn’t wait for her to answer before continuing with today’s history lesson. “The thought behind it was that the cold water constricted blood vessels, reducing inflammation and congestion while redirecting the blood from the brain towards the internal organs.”

I lifted a hand to brush the damp hair out of her eyes and Emily snapped her teeth at me. Her expression screaming rabid dog while mine was more the cat who ate the canary.

“It’s why you look so pale right now. They also thought it’d reduce agitation caused by increased brain activity—clearly that theory has been proven incorrect.Then again, some people believe it was all a bunch of snake oil, more about control rather than offering any real therapeutic value. What d’you think, babe?”

Her teeth chattered in her jaw, her muscles expanding and contracting and her body trembling in an attempt to produce energy and warm itself up. “F-f-f-f-fuck y-y-y-y-you,” she hissed, and I counted to ten in my head before finally reaching back into the tub and tugging her out.

Any longer than that and I would be fucking a corpse tonight. Which, believe it or not, wasn’t my thing.

Emily didn’t fight me as I threw her over a shoulder again and made my way back to the bedroom. Though something told me it had more to do with a lack of ability than a lack of will.

I threw a hand up and smacked her across one ass cheek, listening as she cursed me under her breath. “Next I’ll tell you all about what they thought an orgasm could do for female hysteria.”

75

EMILY

---