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Mercy has nothing. No way to escape.

Just the way I wanted her.

Mine.

Mine to corrupt. Mine to consume. Mine to sacrifice.

I guide Mercy down the hallway with a firm hand against the small of her back, feeling the warmth of her through the silk, the blood rushing beneath her flushed skin. The flickering hallway light casts our shadows in distorted shapes against the wall. Mine seems to stretch, to swallow hers completely, while hers flickers and then disintegrates, becoming nothing.

It’s a sign, an omen, and for a second, I wonder if she sees it, too.

I gently force her down the stairs, and when we pass it, I watch as she tries to avoid looking towards her apartment door. I feel her shiver, and why shouldn’t she?

Her waking nightmare happened there.

Ihappened there.

Outside, the air is thick with the scent of coming rain. We step down the sidewalk and towards the parking lot. My car sits waiting in the shadows of the building—black, low to the ground, with windows tinted far beyond what’s technically legal.

I’m gonna fuck her in it one day, in plain view of strangers walking by on the street. They won’t be able to see us, but we will see them.

Maybe I’ll do it today?

I open the passenger door, watching as Mercy hesitates for just a moment before sliding inside.

“Seatbelt,” I instruct, closing her door with a click before stepping around to the driver’s side.

By the time I’ve pulled open the driver’s side door, she has already done what I told her. I start the engine, and when it growls to life, she jumps, just like she always does.

Jumpy little church mouse.

That sound has always satisfied something primal in me. It says power, control. I could hit 120 MPH and slam this fucker into a tree and end my existence if I wanted to. I could splatter my grey matter across the windshield just like dear old dad.

It was really too bad that I liked myself way too much to do something stupid like that.

I pull away from the curb, steering us toward the outskirts of town.

“It’s beautiful today,” I say, glancing at her. The sunlight catches across her face, hitting her cheekbones just right, and when she looks over at me, she look’s like a goddess.

Fuck, she’s perfect.

“Yeah,” she says, flashing me a smile.

I can see the way her thighs press tightly together, her knees shaking.

I wonder if she’s still throbbing.

I bet she is.

“Not as beautiful as you are,” I say, purposefully pulling my eyes away from her. The way I looked away, she’ll wonder if I meant it, but the words will hit hard, digging deep into her core.

A push and a pull, to keep her right where she is.

Just a few more days, and I will have her soul, and I can worship her like something inside of me longs to do.

Soon, but not yet.

“Where are we going?” she asks, her fingers picking at the hem of her dress.