Page 63 of In Love with the Devil

“You’re an excellent actress, little bird, but I don’t believe you.”

She falls off the bed and tries to crawl after me, but I close the door behind me and leave. The hysterical screams and the clanking of her chain echo through the entire basement, all the way to the second to last door.

Chapter twenty-seven

Don't Break Down

Astoria

I can still feel his dick pumping into me, filling and breaking me as it sweeps in and out. His come is leaking out of my torn ass. My insides are in scorching, throbbing pain. It was stupid, and now I’m paying for it. Stupid to think anything was changing, that there was a drop of humanity in him. Part of me isn’t surprised at all. I stay on the floor. Maybe he has a camera on me and once he sees I haven’t moved, he’ll come down and I can tie the chain around his neck and kill him.

Don’t break down, don’t break down, don’t break down.It's what I need to do. I need to kill him. God, please help me. I don't want to do this. I'm not a killer. No one is coming for me. Either I kill him, or I kill myself.

Six months. Mindy!I scream in my mind.

I do the next stupidest thing. I break down until a headache with a continuous beeping attacks me, until I’m dizzy, and have to go to the bathroom to vomit. When I think about the fact that I may be pregnant, it gets even worse. I stand, and as I wash my mouth, the water stops running. He closed the pipes again, and I didn’t even have a chance to shower, which means I have to sleep with his come in my pussy and ass.

I don’t recognize myself when I look at the mirror above the sink. The same rage I had this morning when speaking about Dad rolls and explodes in me, and I pound at the mirror while screaming. It cracks and cuts my palm. The blood is significant and again, I couldn’t possibly give a damn. Slowly, take a big piece of mirror and squeeze it in my palm, watching drops of blood fall to the ground while my head throbs from the crying and screaming. I place my cheek on the cold ground beside the bed, facing away from the door and bathroom. As time passes, I slowly gather the chain of the collar closer and closer.

It’s too much, all I went through today, mentally. I can't keep living like this.

I doze off thinking that I don't have a choice.

Chapter twenty-eight

I'm Sorry

Astoria

The iron door howls open and wakes me with a start then his steps pound on the dirt as he walks closer to my cell. I tighten my hold on the chain and on the piece of mirror. This is my one chance. I hold it tight even when I feel a significant piece of it inside my palm. I'm so fucking scared. My heart races as fast as my thoughts. There's only a twenty percent chance I'll get this right.He’s coming. Twenty fucking percent, and if I don't, he'll kill me. Better to be dead than continue like this. I have to do this. He’s given me no choice.When he walks in, I don’t move.

“Astoria?” The concern oozes through the syllables.

“Astoria. No!” He probably saw my blood. He kneels next to my body and pulls me up. “No!” His voice breaks into the beginning of a sob.

I take advantage of his concern, bolt up and wrap the chain around his neck as fast as I can. Then I walk behind him as I choke him with it. Julian is always too strong but this time, when he manages to yank the chain away from his neck, I jam the piece of mirror right where his neck meets his shoulder. His hand immediately grabs for the wound, trying to cover it. Blood trickles through his fingers. I choke him with the chain again. He gasps and tries to pull it down but I use all my strength. His blood wets the chain and trails down his chest.

“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. You gave me no choice, Julian. You gave me no choice,” I sob. “I’m so sorry.” I reach for the key in his pocket and unlock my collar. Julian takes out the mirror from the wound and falls to the ground as I rush out of the room.

Maybe some stronger bitch would torture him, like he has done me but I just want to escape, I want to start a new life. While Julian gasps for breath and struggles on the floor, I push the door closed behind me and run. The other three doors are open. I’m only wearing the nightgown from earlier, no shoes but I don’t care.Luck wins. I open the first lock on the front door but end up having to go through all twenty five of them to find the second one.Three more. Just three more. Almost there.

I’m panting from climbing all those steps, plus the fear of him somehow surviving the stabbing and coming after me. My heart is hammering so hard and fast it hurts. It doesn’t help that my right hand never fully recovered from when he stabbed it. Most of it is numb and it’s now covered in both our blood so it’s also slippery. The key falls from my hands twice.Fuck, come on!

I keep checking behind me, ensuring he’s not coming after me but the only noise in the room is my panting and the jitteringof the keys from my shaking.“Please God. Please let me leave. Please.”

When I open the door, it’s frisky and dusk outside. I run down the steps toward the barn where I hope he keeps his car. The car door is unlocked but the vehicle doesn't turn on. "Come on!" I scream while pounding at the steering wheel. "Fucking turn on!" I try again and nothing. Fuck it, I'll run.

Sprinting on the grass towards the line of trees like earlier, my lungs burn. I’m so thirsty, exhausted and hungry but I don’t stop. When someone is chasing you, never look back. I focus on the the trees ahead and try to take the widest steps ever to cover more ground.

The trees are two feet away. In the same exact second, I hear a snap, I gasp as I fall, and an excruciating pain shoots from my leg to my spine. The ground pounds onto my chest. Blood trails from my inside my mouth. With the fall, I accidentally bit my tongue, but that's not what's causing the most pain. Something has cut through my skin and it’s squeezing with an unimaginable pressure into my femur. God, it hurts so fucking bad.

I gasp again and again and again.

The agony intensifies with the most subtle movement. I can’t even take a full breath. I can't scream. Slowly, I turn to lie on my back then sit upwhile trying not to move my leg. When I see what it is, I want to die.

It's a steel leg-holding trap. That sick son of a bitch!

No. There must be a way to get out of this. There must be. I can’t die like this. The lack of oxygen burns through my every vein. I’m growing dizzy and blotches are filling my vision. The world falls around me. Something hits my head and everything goes black.

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