Page 105 of Danger Close

I’m not an idiot. I knew what she’s doing. Iknewshe was playing with his emotions to buy us time. To buy us another chance at getting the fuck out of here. All of us. Our whole family.

But the caveman in me, my lizard brain, just saw something that was mine being violated by Raymond Clark.

“Do I have your attention now?” Her voice was dripping with sensuality.

Clark smiled. He fucking smiled. He was as enraptured by her as I was. He might, in his own twisted way, even love her. At the very least, he was as obsessed with her as I was.

“You know no one can fuck me the way you can.”

Her words cut me like a fucking knife as she murmured the words against his mouth.

“I knew you were a kinky bitch.” He looked so fucking pleased with himself.

“No one knows me like you do, baby.”

“Yeah? Even when I saw you in Phoenix?”

“You know I liked it.” She was playing her role well. “It showed me that you wanted me.”

“Did he fuck you the way I did?” Clark’s head tilted to me. My eyes on that fucking Beretta. “Did he make you cry? Leave his marks on your skin, just the way you like it?”

“No one else could do that to me the way you do.”

She’d better be playing a role.

She’d better be…

“I’ll fucking tie you to the bed, and use you like the good little slut you are—”

A gunshot rang out.

Plaster rained down from the ceiling.

Trinity fell to the floor.

Teri’s hands were covered in blood.

Teri was covered in blood…

Chapter 48

Flesh and Bone

Teri

I could taste him on my mouth, and I fucking hated it. While his attention was on me, gun to my head, I worked the zip ties, easing them apart. My elbows hurt. My shoulders hurt. But I kept working them, prying them apart until they cut into my skin.

It took everything I had not to let the pain show on my face, but I did it. I fucking did it.

I could thank Ray for that. He taught me how to hide my pain. He taught me how to hide my despair.

The ties cut into my skin, my hands bled. But that was fine. I could skin my hands raw. I would scrape them to the bone. Ifought my tears when the meat of my palms peeled away from bone. The pain was excruciating, making me see stars.

I did it all while pretending to be in love with this arrogant fool.

Blood, sticky and hot, helped me slip out one hand when my flesh hung off the bone.

“I’ll fucking tie you to the bed, and use you like the good little slut you are—”