Page 12 of Only in the Dark
“Are you saying you’ve preferred the company ofwomenin the sex club?” I nudged her arm with my elbow. “You sly dog.” I put on my best teasing voice, hoping she’d know I would never judge her.
“Sometimes I enjoy my time with couples, too,” she responded.
I was learning more about my best friend. It wasn’t like we talked about our sex lives often. She was there when I complained about Matthew, but she didn’t open up about hers, and I didn’t ask.
We sat down at the bar, and the bartender greeted us with a bright smile. I could tell she loved her job. I’d probably get a kick out of bartending at a sex club, too. “Welcome. What can I get you to drink?” she asked. I wondered whether the guests tipped well. Did an orgasm make them happier, and therefore better tippers?
I handed her our drink cards. Sarah and I had always shared the same taste in alcohol. Fruity drinks or mixed vodka. “Two Titos and cranberries, please,” I ordered. I almost felt like drinking them both on my own with the way my muscles were tense, coiled like tightly wound springs, and my shoulders felt rigid as if they were locked in place. Every breath seemed shallow, barely reaching my lungs, and a persistent, knotted sensation gripped my stomach. My brain told me we needed to be on edge and alert, but maybe that was a good thing. Ishouldn’tfully relax in a private room with a dangerous stalker.
We sat at the bar and sipped our drinks until five minutes before nine. The time had gone by too fast, and now I found myself minutes away from meeting the shadow who haunted my every move.
“Remember that I’ll be right here if you need me, Lovebug. There’s security in the hallway, so don’t be afraid to yell for them. And no worries…they won’t come running for general screaming, only if they’re called.” Sarah attempted to wink at me, but she wasn’t good at it. “I’m ready for my little bird to fly away. I’ll be here waiting for you. And if you decide to jump him in the parking lot, I’ll be ready.”
I pushed my chair back, feeling its legs scrape against the floor, and rose to my feet. I closed my eyes for a moment and inhaled slowly, feeling the air fill my lungs, before exhaling in a steady stream, hoping to calm the fluttering nerves within me. “I’ll never be truly ready to see the mask fall, but I’m as ready as I can be. I promise to tell you if anything happens, and run out here screaming if I need you.”
Sarah pointed me in the direction I needed to be, and I eventually found the sign for the rooms, following the hallway until I saw room four. I passed one security guard and exchanged smiles. My key card had been a tap card that opened the door.
Inside, a bed sat in the center of the room. the headboard against the left well. Behind the bed were two hooks for restraining someone. The bedside table had an array of products, such as condoms, lube, and handcuffs. There was an ottoman at the bottom of the bed with floggers, whips, and impact play items. I wasn’t sure if these were items set up by my stalker, or if these were general items kept in the room. I wasn’t a stranger to impact play, but we hadn’t discussed it. We hadn’t really discussed anything about tonight except me being here.
It was dimly lit, the light mainly focused on the bed, and I couldn’t hear a single sound from another room. The wall across from the bed had a window with nothing visible beyond darkness. There could be a hundred people watching in there, and I wouldn’t have known.Weirdly enough, the idea excited me.
I noticed a coat hook on the back of the door and took off my long cardigan, hanging it up. The lace lingerie we had chosen covered everything important, but I still felt naked.
I sat on the bed and clutched at my body, suddenly insecure. My stalker touched me in the dark. What if he didn’t like me when he could see me better?
The lights dimmed further, and my breath hitched. There was nowhere to run now. I accepted my fate as I remained glued to the bed, listening as the door creaked open, watching as my stalker—donning his Ghostface mask again—stepped inside. Frozen with fear of the unknown, I sat unmoving as he approached, standing before me and looking down with a tilted head.
“So beautiful,” he whispered, the back of his fingers trailing a soft caress down my cheek. I flinched when I realized he wasn’t wearing gloves tonight.
“You told me you’d take off the mask tonight,” I reminded him.
He chuckled. “I did, but I didn’t say when. You’re mine, Olivia. I’m going to show you how you belong to me, then I’ll reveal myself,” he explained, causing me to gulp. His tone was serious.
“I’m not yours, and I never said you could have me.” I crossed my arms against my chest defiantly. We were at a sex club, and I was wearing lingerie, so it was stupid of me to try to deny him like I had a choice. I knew what I was getting into. Maybe this would end his obsession with me. He’d see it was nothing like the encounter he imagined in his head—that I was nothing like the girl he built me up to be in his mind.
“You can’t be trusted not to hurt me. I’m going to put you in the restraints.” He leaned forward, causing his shadow to stretch across the dimly lit room, and I instinctively retreated further onto the bed. My movement only seemed to draw him closer to me, making it easier for him to reach me when he cautiously placed one knee on the edge of the bed, causing the mattress to sink slightly under his weight.
As he moved closer, his hand pressed into the plush comforter, and he leaned in further. Our faces were so close I could feel his breath through the mesh material; smell the cologne radiating off his body. There was no doubting who he was when his cologne matched the same in my room that he had left behind after his visits. I thought I was making it up or imagining Matthew’s smell lingered after his short visits, but it seemed off.
I thought he was going to kiss me somehow, but instead he used our proximity as a weapon to throw me off guard. He leaned in closer, his presence looming over me, pushing me to lay my head back against the headboard. He took the opportunity to grab my right wrist and cuff it, connecting my cuff to the hook in the wall. I wiggled my wrist, but it didn’t budge. The loud clinking sound annoyed me into submission. He grabbed my left wrist quicker than I could pull it away, hooking it up to the other.
“Time to play, darling.”
Kieran Harlowe
The time had come. Olivia’s wrists were bound by the cold metal handcuffs, chained to the sturdy hooks on the wall. Her body writhed beneath me, her skin flushed and gleaming in the dim light, her eyes challenging me with each movement. The sight of her there—vulnerable yet defiant—sent electricity through every nerve in my body. Nothing had ever felt more right.
Tonight was the night everything changed for us, and by the end of the night, she’d choose me. She’d know love and acceptance that she had never experienced, and her pathetic ex-boyfriend would die, by her hands or mine. I knew what she had done, but I still viewed her as precious to me, and couldn’t think of her murdering someone in a brutal way. She poisoned; she didn’t involve blood, but I planned to. I’d carve my brother up piece-by-piece for what he had done to her and younger girls.
“You’re too trusting, letting me handcuff you to hooks. Rookie mistake, Little Killer,” I taunted.
Now that I knew Olivia’s secret life as a serial killer, it made me more attracted to her.She happened to be the person I had become fascinated with last year when my buddy from Texas mentioned a suspected female serial killer. She was wicked smart, on top of being the most beautiful and angelic woman I had ever met. It was no wonder she had gotten away with it before. And based on the pictures Woodson had sent me, no one would find her unless I turned her in. Her appearance changed enough that a regular person wouldn’t notice, but as the man obsessed with her, I did. I noticed everything.
“I’m not a killer. You’ve got the wrong person,” she lied, her face deadpan. I chuckled. The filler altered her nose and lip just slightly, but it was unmistakable to me. I had watched her every available hour, when she was awake and asleep. I would recognize her in any form she took, through any transformation, and my love would remain as constant as her changes were endless. I understood now that her minor cosmetic procedures were to further hide her identity.
“I know who you are, Olivia Mercer. You can’t hide from me, and I don’t want you to. I accept you as you are. I’m going to show you how much,” I promised, my words laced with a threat. She’d never question my feelings after tonight. And if she did, I’d remind her all over again.
I needed my lips all over every beautiful inch of her body. To do that, I needed to be hidden. I couldn’t trust a blindfold, so I had another plan instead. I grabbed the blanket at the edge of the bed and threw it over my head, covering myself while planting myself between her legs.
