Page 22 of Soul to Possess

His eyes darkened, so much deeper than before—like water just before it swallows you. A jolt of hot panic flared in my chest. Howdarehe speak to me like I might everwantto stay here?

“I won’t,” I snapped. “I won’t change my mind.”

He clapped his hands together once, casual as anything. “Alrighty then. I’m heading out to the workshop. Feel free to watch TV, do laundry, nap, whatever makes you feel at home.”

Then he stood, pulled on his coat, and was gone—just like that. A gust of cold air followed him in, then the door slammed shut behind him with a final, echoing thud. I sat frozen. What just happened? It wasn’t just a case of being lost. Or snowed in. Or dropped at the wrong ranch. This was the wrong place, at the wrong time, with thewrong man. And I had no idea what to do.

Tears slipped down my cheeks before I could stop them, soaking silently into the front of my shirt. I wiped them away quickly, like someone might be watching. Hecouldbe watching. I was alone. Trapped. Powerless. And I knew, with a certainty that settled deep into my bones, that if he wanted to kill me—no one would ever find me. No one would even know I was missing.

My eyes drifted back to the coffee table. There was something draped across the wood—a piece of pale leather, smooth, pinkish. Too smooth. My throat tightened. The more I looked at it, the more It looked like skin. Human skin. Or, God help me, something designed to look exactly like it. My stomach lurched. Acid crept up the back of my throat, hot and bitter. I swallowed hard, forcing it down, shaking so badly I thought my bones might rattle loose from each other.

Atticus had called itart. I wasn’t sure if that made it better or worse. I bolted for the bathroom.

The second the door shut behind me, I braced my hands on the sink, lungs heaving, bile already climbing up my throat. My stomach twisted with so much force it felt like it was trying to claw its way out.Is that what he meant?Too pretty to make into art. Nottoo human. Nottoo real. Just… toopretty. Too pretty to become a lampshade? Or a skin-wrapped coffee table?

The thought struck like lightning—violent, absurd, and all too possible. My mind fought it off with denial, the way someone might kick at a door in a fire, desperate to get out.You’re spiraling. You’ve watched too many horror films. Read too many books. Let your imagination win.Hecould’vehurt you. Last night. This morning. But he didn’t.

So stop. Breathe. Think.Get. A. Grip.I stared into the mirror. My reflection didn’t look like me anymore—too pale, too wide-eyed. My mouth moved like it was trying to say something to me, some mantra to bring me back. Right.When life throws you lemons, make lemonade.

Some ridiculous quote from a poster in a guidance counselor’s office. But I clung to it like a lifeline. I splashed water on my face, grounding myself to the moment. Cold, sharp. Real. Then I stepped out of the bathroom, legs shaky but functional, and made my way back to the bedroom. I shut the door behind me.Boltedit. Only then did I really exhale.

The silence in the room felt thick. Like it was watching me. I lowered myself to the edge of the bed and pressed both hands to my knees, steadying myself. You’re okay. Just until the snow melts. Just until you canleave.Right. Make lemonade.

I nodded once, more for the act of it than the meaning, and reached for my sweatshirt. The soft fleece brushed against my arms as I pulled it on, and for a brief second, it helped. Not warmth exactly, but weight. Pressure. Like armor for the skin.Maybe if I wrapped myself in comfort, I could buffer the edges of reality a little longer.

Chapter Eleven

The cabin was mine—every inch of it. I didn’t stumble across it, didn’t kill for it. I built it. Board by board. Beam by beam. From the concrete footers to the last pane of hand-blown glass in the back room window. Not because I had to—but because I needed it to be mine. Pure. Unsullied by any other man's hands or history. No fingerprints here but mine.

It stood three hours from the nearest town, surrounded by miles of indifferent pine and prairie, designed for the kind of privacy no nosy neighbor would ever interrupt. I even engineered the land around it—rearranged small ridgelines, cut trails to confuse satellite detection, repurposed a dry creek into something else entirely. Something useful.

The winters were brutal, yes. But the snow made good insulation for the crawlspace. And preservation was easier when the ground was already cold. I’d left the city years ago. Too many clues. Too many patterns. My art, as they called it, had gottenrecognizable. They’d started to see the meaning behind the pieces—the symmetry, the choices. The deeper narrative beneath the flesh and pigment.

It was flattering, really. Even the feds had taken notice. Gave me some asinine alias like “John Freeman.” As if I was some drifter, some wandering nobody. They plastered it across their wanted lists with a composite sketch that looked like it was drawn by a blind chimp. But I wasn’t hiding. I was evolving.

They didn’t know about the eight pieces I left behind in the city. And they’d never know about the twenty-seven buried in the fields behind my cabin. Twenty-seven studies in form and silence. I built this place with the knowledge that some canvases might one day scream. They never did. I watched the coverage sometimes—late at night, with the fire low and the air still. Thereporters called me a ghost. A phantom. They marveled at how I'd vanished so completely. What they didn’t understand was that I hadn’t disappeared at all.

I’d transformed. Out here, I could work. Not just create—refine. My medium required patience. There were rules to keep the rot at bay, to prepare the skin, to preserve the integrity of emotion in tissue. You couldn’t rush it. There’s a rhythm to breaking a human down the right way. A sequence.

Of course, I kept some pieces closer. A leather-bound journal, its cover unnaturally smooth. A chandelier in one room was threaded with braids of human hair—red, black, blonde—looped like garland. It creaked when the wind howled. Sometimes it whispered. Or maybe that was just in my head. Either way, it calmed me. And then there was her.

This new girl… Gennie. She didn’t scream, didn’t fight like the others. There was steel under the softness, fear laced with curiosity. Like she wanted to understand me, or at least like she wasn’t scared of me. It fascinated me. Disturbed me.

She asked questions with her eyes, and every time I didn’t answer, it made her ask better ones. I could feel something crawling under my skin when she looked at me that way. Something ancient. Somethingmine.

She didn’t know it yet, but this place was already hers too. I’d been changing the interior slowly. Removing sharp edges. Leaving books I thought might provoke her. Arranging the furniture for two instead of one. She hadn’t noticed yet, but that was okay. She would. They always did—eventually. I took a slow breath, letting the air freeze my lungs, ground me in the moment. There was time. The storm would keep her here long enough. Long enough to reshape her. To test her limits. To unravel the morality she clung to like a threadbare quilt.

And when she broke—when, notif—I’d be there to pick up the pieces. And use them.

The round trip to town was a pain in the ass—six hours, easy—but necessary. Inconvenient, sure. But it kept me safe. Isolation was the best security system money—or blood—could buy. I used to have more... options. Back in the city, if I needed to blow off steam, there were clubs. Places where I could take a willing woman into a soundproof room and ruin her in ways she’d crave for weeks. No need for pretense. Just ropes. Control. Sweat. Catharsis.

Out here, there was no such luxury. Just me and the walls I built. L was my temporary fix. A three-hour drive from the next state, she'd come when I called, let me tie her down, bruise her just right, then disappear before sunrise. No strings, no questions. But even at her best, she never ignited that thing in me. That raw, burning thing I couldn’t name. And then came Gennie.

She wasn’t supposed to be here. Just showed up on my porch like a gift I hadn’t earned. Wind tearing at her hair, snow clinging to her lashes, and those impossibly blue eyes looking at me like she was praying I wouldn’t eat her alive. I’d never forget it. That image was carved into the back of my skull. I should’ve just let her go. Everything felt different from the moment I saw her.

Instead, I’m here… thinking about the curve of her mouth when she lies, the flush that creeps up her neck when I get too close. She doesn’t know what a Dominant is—hell, she probably blushes during sex ed videos. But there’s something about the way sheflinches, the way sheholds her breathwhen she’s near me. It sets me on fire. She thinks she’s running to Marvin. Thinks that stupid cowboy will save her. Cute.

She doesn’t see it yet, but I’m already under her skin. She just needs a bit of time, and then she will feel the aching burn too. I don’t know what to do with the way I feel—obsessive,possessive. I usually only feel this way about my art, and the intensity of these feelings sets me on edge.

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