Page 52 of Running Feral

Fuck knows.

I just want to go home.

As soon as the thought crawls through my brain, I have to blink and do a double-take, because we’re pulling into the Feral Possum. I wasn’t completely conscious that this was what I meant when I thought about ‘home’, but now that it’s sitting in front of me… it is. This is home.

So why the fuck are we here?

The parking lot is empty, and all the lights are off. It’s well after close, so everyone else is gone, and I’m sure Gunnar is still out looking for me. The thought makes me ache with guilt, but there’s nothing I can do about it now, so I try to shove it aside.

“Come on, pet. It’s time to earn my forgiveness.”

Eamon practically scampers out of the car, slamming the door behind him hard enough that my window vibrates, and I jump in my seat. I stay frozen. It’s too much. Whatever he wants here, he’s going to take it from me. I don’t have the capacity to figure it out first and offer it to him.

My door swings open just as roughly, then those fingers are back in my hair and I’m being dragged out of the car. It’s a struggle to get my feet under me, and Eamon is moving fast to fuck with me. My knees are dragging through the parking lot gravel half the time I’m drag-marched over to the bar, long enough to shred the denim of my jeans and get to the skin underneath.

I’ll never understand why he loves pulling me by my hair so much. Maybe it’s how utterly dehumanizing it is. Either way, by the time we get to the back door, I feel weak and worthless, like I’m about to be slung over his shoulder or traded like a piece of damaged livestock.

“Eamon, please,” I gasp, desperate enough to beg. I don’t like that we’re here, and there’s no way hurting Gunnar isn’t the point. If I can appease him, maybe I can keep Gunnar out of it. “Let’s go home, baby. I missed you. Let me show you how sorry I am.”

The words are ash on my tongue. My hand feels like ice as I reach for his cock, still on my knees in the gravel, but it’s clear he sees right through me. He pushes me toward the door, undeterred by my attempts to distract him.

Eamon fishes around in his pockets for a minute, then my lock pick kit is deposited at my feet with a soft thud.

“Get us inside. If your boyfriend wants to act like he’s hot shit around here, I need to show him who really runs this town. I told you I was going to make an example of someone until the others fell in line and started paying me for protection. It could have been that fucking feed store if you hadn’t bitched out. But now we’re here because of you. And he’s the one who needs to be the example.”

Eamon reaches down, grabbing me by the jaw and pulling me half up to my feet again.

“Break in, destroy everything he loves, and then we’ll show him exactly who you belong to.”

I don’t cry. This would be the perfect moment for one single, cinematic tear to roll down my cheek as Eamon’s fingers crush my throat, and I accept just how much my presence in Gunnar’s life is about to cost him.

But the capacity to feel sadness is well and truly in my rearview mirror. Everything inside me is hollow and numb. This is smart. Eamon is making me destroy the one place I have to run away to.

Now there’s really no point in fighting him. All I can do is wait to die.

It doesn’t even look like the Feral Possum anymore. Normally, Eamon uses me to rob places. Even if it’s a smash and grab, or something a little more destructive. This was a brutal, systematic dismemberment of the building.

I don’t even know how long we’ve been here. An hour, maybe two. The alarm was turned off, so it was easy to get in, probably because we left in such a hurry, which is also my fucking fault. There’s a single blinking security camera that has a wide angle of the bar itself, which has watched me the entire time without moving.

It feels like it’s judging me, even though it’s an inanimate object. Which is ridiculous. I’m judging myself enough for everyone. I know how disgusting I am for this. I felt it with every piece of expensive equipment I damaged or mess I made. The floor is slick with liquor, every surface is disgusting to the touch, and there’s not a wire or line that’s uncut in the entire place.

Eamon, of course, has been wearing a gaiter whenever he’s in view of the camera. Only I’m taking the fall for this one, obviously. He didn’t help, either. He stood there, leaning against the bar, drinking Gunnar’s liquor and smoking more fuckingcigarettes, pointing out every time I missed something and threatening encouragement when he felt my destructive energy was lacking.

Finally, once I feel drained of every drop of energy and the room looks like it was in the wake of a hurricane, I’m exhausted enough to be bold.

“Are we done?” I ask.

Eamon chuckles, before very dramatically snorting a little powder off the declivity between his thumb and forefinger, then lighting another cigarette.

“I don’t know, pet. Do you feel like his life is sufficiently ruined? Do you think this is enough of a price to pay for stealing from me?”

My gaze falls to the floor as my shoulders droop, weighed down by something neither of us can see.

“Yes.”

“I don’t know. I think I need one more thing to make my point.” He crooks a finger at me. His gaiter is pulled down so the cigarette can dangle between his lips, and his back is turned to the camera.

I move toward him even though it feels like I’m dragging my feet through tar. When I get to arm’s reach, he snatches the front of my shirt and pulls me close to him, making my stomach drop out like I just crested the top of a rollercoaster.

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