Page 136 of Creeping Lily
I’ll make him wish he’d pulled the trigger back at the cabin. I’ll make him beg for the death he should have given me instead of keeping me breathing in this hole.
Bentley leans one shoulder against the wall as he watches me; it’s a predator’s stance—half in shadow, half in light, measuring the moment, deciding when to strike. He smirks like he owns not only the walls that cage me but the air in my lungs.
“Still pacing, I see,” he says, mock amusement curling hislips. “I would’ve thought you’d be tired of wearing a groove in the floor.”
My steps don’t falter. My voice lashes out, sharp and reckless.
“I’d think you’d be tired of pretending you’re in control.”
Bentley’s smile sharpens, thin as a razor. “Control?” he repeats, as if he’s rolling the word around just to taste it. “Darling, I don’t pretend. Iamin control. Every breath you draw in this pit is because I allow it.”
I stop pacing long enough to pin him with a look that could cut glass. “No, every breath I take is one you haven’t stolen yet. Don’t flatter yourself—you don’t own oxygen. And you sure as hell don’t own me.”
His eyes darken, the lazy twirl of the key still spinning, taunting. “Oh, but I do own you. Your blood, your bones, your stubborn little heart—every part of you belongs to me now. You should’ve learned that when you tried to run.”
I let out a sharp laugh, brittle and cold. “You think keeping me down here makes me yours? That your father’s leash makes you a man? Newsflash, Bentley—cages don’t build kings. And one day, you’re going to learn that the hard way.”
The key halts mid-spin. His jaw ticks. For the first time, the perfect mask cracks. Just a flicker, but I see it.
I press the knife in deeper. “That’s what keeps you up at night, isn’t it? The fact that I won’t shut up. That you can’t gag me with your money, your lies, or your threats. You’re terrified, Bentley. Terrified that one day you’ll push me too far, and I’ll push back.”
His lips curl, but it’s not amusement this time—it’s something sharper, hungrier. “Careful, Lily,” he murmurs. His tone is soft, lethal. “You’re awfully mouthy for a girl with no exits.”
I step closer to the bars, close enough that I can smell the starch and steel of his suit, close enough that he can’t miss thedefiance burning in my eyes. “You’re awfully desperate for a man who claims he’s already won.”
The silence that follows is taut. His hand flexes around the key, and for a moment, I think he’s going to come inside—hurl me across the room like the ragdoll he wants me to be.
Part of me prays he does. Because if Bentley lays a hand on me again, I’ll remember it forever. And when I finally get my chance—Bentley will pay for every single mark he carved into me.
But Bentley doesn’t come inside. He doesn’t need to, because he holds the power of the room without stepping over the threshold, leaning against the frame like a king surveying a prisoner in his dungeon.
His voice comes smooth, deliberate. “You really think you’re going to survive this, don’t you? That somehow your sharp tongue makes you untouchable. It doesn’t. It makes you predictable.”
The words slip under my skin like acid. I want to fire back, to keep the sparks flying, but something in his tone warns me that every retort only feeds him. Still, silence feels like surrender, and surrender is not in my blood.
“You mistake noise for strength,” he continues, the key still twirling idly between his fingers. “But let me ask you this—what happens when the noise stops? When your voice cracks, when the words die in your throat, when the silence finally presses down so hard you can’t breathe? What will you be then, Lily? A fighter? Or just another broken soul?”
My stomach twists. I’ve heard enough to know what Tom Walker did to his wife, how his poison turned her mind into a ruin she never escaped. How madness became her prison long before any cell did. And Bentley—he knows that I know. He wants me thinking about it, wants me picturing what it wouldtake to unspool me thread by thread until nothing of me is left but a hollow shell that laughs at shadows.
He tilts his head, eyes cutting through me like he can see the dialogue in my head, the words that have formed but remain unspoken. “Tom was sloppy,” he says, almost conversational, like we’re chatting over coffee. “Too much brute force, not enough finesse. I prefer patience. Subtlety. A whisper can do more damage than a fist ever could.”
My pulse hammers so hard it hurts. Is he saying it outright—that he’ll do to me what Tom did to his own mother? Strip me of my sanity, inch by inch, until I’m begging for a mercy he’ll never grant?
I force my voice to steady. “If you think I’ll break the way she did, you’re dumber than you look.”
His smile is thin, dangerous. “Oh, Lily. That’s where you’re wrong. I don’t want you to break the same way. I want you to break differently. Personally. So that when you look in the mirror, you won’t recognize the girl staring back. And you’ll remember that I’m the one who remade you.”
For a second, the air feels too thin, like the walls themselves are shrinking closer, sealing me in. My mind claws for escape, for some sliver of light beyond the lock and the key he holds like it’s a vein he can tap whenever he wants.
But I hold his stare, because if I look away, I lose. “You’ll die before you get that chance.”
Bentley chuckles, low and knowing. “Maybe. But if I do, you’ll go mad thinking about me anyway. That’s the beauty of it. Even in death, I win.”
He straightens, slipping the key back into his pocket with a final flick. Then he turns and walks away, the sound of his footsteps echoing through the chamber before the door closes with a sharp click that slams against my ribs like a hammer.
Silence rushes back in, thick and suffocating. I dig my nailsinto my palms until pain grounds me, but the truth coils in the back of my mind, cold and relentless.
How far is he willing to go? Tom Walker destroyed his wife without ever spilling blood. Bentley is worse—smarter, hungrier. And I know one thing with bone-deep certainty: if I don’t find a way out, he won’t just kill me. He’ll erase my very existence.
