Page 14 of These Monstrous Ties
The one thing I couldn’t do that Halloween night.
I leap over his stack of dirty laundry, my bare feet gripping the marble floor as I land. I dart through the living room, into the area that serves as a kitchen. The door isright there, and Kristof isn’t close behind me. He has done up the chain on the door, of course, courtesy of the goddamn hotel builders, but that will take me two seconds, and then the other lock will open automatically when I pull the handle.
I don’t dare look back, but I hear him coming for me.
The knife is still clenched in one hand, covered in blood. With the other hand, I reach for the chain, slide it back. My hands are shaking. Not so much from fear, I don’t think, but excitement.
But this kind of excitement makes me think of Lucifer.
And thinking of Lucifer gets me nowhere.
The chain comes loose. I reach for the silver door handle, smiling like a devil myself. I’m going to be free. Once I get on the hallway, there’s no way Kristof will make it down the stairs before me. I’ll go to Nicolas. He’d never directly disobey my brother’s orders, but he’d also never let someone hurt me, not right in front of his face. Besides, Nicolas doesn’t like Kristof.
I push down on the lever. But my mistake is in not calculating the time it would take to pull the heavy door open.
As I pull, something burns at my scalp, and I’m jerked backward.
“You’re not leaving this room until I’m done with you,” Kristof growls.
I lose my footing, my knees coming down, hard, on the marble floor. Kristof jerks me around by my hair until I’m facing him, a smile on his face. I want to vomit.
Blood is gushing from his thigh, but he doesn’t seem to feel the wound anymore. He isn’t even trying to stop the flow of blood. Instead, one hand still twining in my hair, he reaches the other for my throat, yanking me to my feet and slamming me against the door. The one I had almost escaped from.
Almost.
I angle the knife, ready to plunge it into his stomach. I don’t care if he dies. Kristof means nothing to me. No one means anything to me anymore.
But he grabs my wrist, releasing my hair. My scalp still burns, my head spinning from where he slammed it against the door. And now, my wrist is trembling in his hand, his fingers circling easily around me.
“Put down the knife, Sid, and I’ll go easy on you,” he grunts, his voice faint.
The wound is getting to him after all. His command has lost its usual bite.
“No,” I say, even as he pushes my arm against the door at an unnatural angle. He’s going to break it if I don’t let go.
But he’ll have to do it.
Because I’m not fucking letting go.
“Sid,” he breathes against my cheek, hand still crushing against my throat. I can hardly breathe. “I don’t want to hurt you.”
I choke out a laugh but can’t find the words to say he isalreadyhurting me. I relax for a second, letting him think the fight has gone out of me. Predictably, his grip around my wrist loosens.
I jerk it forward, angling the knife toward him.
He stops me.
I scream as loud as I can, the sound piercing my own ears. He doesn’t let go. He only slams my head back against the door once more, my feet dangling from the floor in his grip.
A sob tears through my throat. But I clamp my teeth together, refusing to let it out. I won’t cry for this idiot. Even as his fingers curl tighter around my throat, I won’t let the tears spring free.
He slowly lets me slide to the floor, his breathing growing more labored from the blood loss, the knife wound. But even still, he pries my fingers off of my knife, and I have to let him. I can barely breathe with his hand around my neck. He drops the knife to the floor. I hear it clatter, hear his breath, hear my heart pounding in my ears.
He reaches for my thigh, his hand clamping down over it. I want to kill him. I haven’t been with anyone in a year. Not since Lucifer. Not since I’d been Lilith.
His hand rises higher, but just before he can touch methere, there’s a knock on the door at my back. Loud, demanding. Seven quick strikes in a row.
He freezes, and I do too.
