Page 71

I feel euphoric, high with the pain, the self-inflicted damage. Just like when I was going to offer myself to Van and Ryann, this feels good, too. My own undoing, agony I can control. Like the scissors. The box cutters. Like being passed between Storm and Cortland.

I snatch up the ceramic bowl, and finally Cortland intervenes. He slams the door closed, crosses the room in a blink.

He grabs the bowl from my hand, slamming it down at the table behind me. “Stop acting like a fucking child.”

My pulse skyrockets, loud in my ears. Elation. I try to shove Cortland away, but he pins both of my wrists to the table, keeping me there.

Silence echoes in the room as my chest heaves.

Then I hear the creak of the floor, from the kitchen, and Storm’s voice. “You have teeth after all, huh, little wolf?”

My chest is heaving, hands fisted by my sides, the skin of my knuckles stinging.

Cortland wraps his arms around me, dragging me away from the table, and I feel Storm’s eyes on us from the doorway of the kitchen.

I fight against Cortland, needing to be free. To explode. To rage, just a little more. “Let go of me,” I whisper, struggling in his grip as he pins my arms to my side. “Get off of me!” Those words are louder, but he still doesn’t let go, and I can’t escape him.

“Calm down, Remi,” he says quietly, holding me still, far from the table. In the living room.

My chest is heaving, anger pulsing in my veins, and I keep struggling, but I can’t get away.

I can’t fucking get away from him.

I still fight, though, flexing my fingers by my side, feeling the crack of my skin. “Get off of me, Cortland. Get off.” I twist in his arms, breathing hard, not wanting to come back down from that high.

He doesn’t say anything, just squeezes me tighter. My bare chest heaves beneath his arms.

“Cortland, get the fuck off of me!” I thrash in his hold, feel his muscles flex tighter, almost to the point I can’t breathe.

He doesn’t let up. “You thought I was leaving you?” he asks instead.

I still, frozen, my pulse thudding in my ears. I swallow, feeling suddenly hot and uncomfortable, my knuckles stinging. “I don’t care if you do,” I spit, using anger to mask his stab at my vulnerability.

“Yeah?” he demands, dragging me back with him as he sinks down onto the couch, me on his lap. He still doesn’t let me loose.

I open my eyes, stare down at my legs dangling over the side of the couch, parallel with his.

“Is that why you had a fucking fit?” he asks me.

I squirm when I think about it. The raw feel of my knuckles. The flashback coming to me at the worst time.

His words. “I thought you could handle it.”

“You thought I was going to fucking leave you, Remi?” He sounds angry, and he loosens his grip, picks me up like it’s nothing, pushing me flat on my back on the couch, my shoes still on as his fists come to either side of my head.

He’s on his knees over me, glaring down at me.

“You’ve gotta get over that. I’m not leaving you. ”

I know Storm is watching us, me without my shirt on, but I don’t care.

I fist the leather of the couch, my knuckles screaming as they bend, my mind spinning. “But you were going to take me home?—”

“Fuck,” he says, grabbing my hand and bringing it to his lips as he sinks back on his heels, by my feet.

I see blood on my skin, but he doesn’t care.

He sucks on one knuckle, then the other, the sting bittersweet.

He drops my hand to his lap but doesn’t let go.

“I’m sorry.” He kisses my hand again. “I’m sorry.

Chase got under my skin and I tried to leave you alone tonight but I couldn’t stay away.

I’m fucking sorry, Remi. It’s not your fault. ”

I try to breathe. To relax. To get my pulse to settle. I say nothing, though, hot and uncomfortable and still burning with that fire. It’s worse, thinking of Chase. I don’t want to know what he said. What he did. How he threatens this.

“You had a flashback.” Storm’s words, behind me. I can’t see him, but Cortland glances up at him, my hand still in his. “It’ll probably happen for a long time.”

I can’t breathe with those words. The truth in them as I stare at Cortland. My demon and my angel wrapped up into one. I can’t have one without the other. Being so near him brings out all the trauma, but being away from him hurts, too.

He looks down at me, running his thumb over the back of my sore hand as I stare at the ceiling, trying to breathe. To think.

“It’s normal,” Storm continues. “Part of healing.”

“I don’t want this normal.” Anger rolls through me all over again.

I sit up, yanking my hand from Cortland.

I shove at him with both hands. “I don’t want this fucking normal!

” I clench my fingers into fists, pounding them on Cortland’s chest. I hate what they did to me.

I hate what he let them do. But most of all, sometimes I can’t stand the thought of myself because I hate me too.

“I let you do it,” I gasp, my eyes blurring with tears. I hit Cortland again and again. “I let you all fuck me up!” I can’t breathe and I can’t speak, the sobs coming faster as I hit every inch of his torso I can.

He grabs my wrists. “Remi, stop hitting me.” His voice is low and restrained but his grip is tight.

I try to yank out of his grasp but he only holds me tighter. My pulse is pounding in my ears, my blood screaming in my veins and I start to stand, but he pulls me back down.

“Let go of me!” I lean back, kicking at him and still trying to get my wrists free. “Let me fucking?—”

“Stop. Kicking. Me.” His words are so low I can barely hear them over my own heartbeat.

I don’t stop. I don’t stop because he never stopped. They never stopped.

Just as I go to kick him again, he shifts his grip, lurching over me. He pins my wrists above my head on the couch, his knees on my thighs so I can’t kick. I twist my head from side to side, still crying and screaming.

“Let go of me. Let go of me. Let go of me!”

He leans down close, his body engulfing mine. His chest grazes my bare breasts and his words caress my mouth. “Use your words. Use your fucking words or I swear to God I’m going to fuck them out of you right now.”

At that, I laugh. “You would, wouldn't you?” I twist my head to stare up at him, holding me down. The scent of leather and cedar floods over me in a hot wave. “You would do it all again, you sick. Fuck.”

He laughs, too, then dips his head and pulls my nipple into his mouth.

I’m aware Storm is still watching but the way my blood is so hot beneath my skin, my anger alive in my veins, I don’t give a fuck.

I try to buck my hips beneath Cort but he grabs my hips and holds me down.

He lifts his head, running his tongue over the swell of my breast. “Yeah,” he whispers, his breath on my skin. “I fucking would.”

He shifts his hand lower, just beneath my sweats. “So why don’t you stop me this time, Remi?” He kisses my other nipple gently, sucking it into his mouth. Then he runs his lip ring over my skin. “Use your words, pretty baby.”

His fingers trail up my sides, over my ribs and I shiver underneath him. Some of my anger cools, and my chest heaves between us as he stares down at me.

“Come on, little wolf,” Storm says quietly behind me. “You can get it all out here.”

I close my eyes.

Try to breathe. Cortland’s grip loosens on my wrists. “Are you gonna behave?” he asks me, trailing kisses up my chest until his mouth hovers over mine.

I swallow, taking a deep breath. Trying to relax. I’m so tired of fighting. So tired of holding back.

Finally, I open my eyes. “Yes,” I tell him, meaning it. “I’ll behave.”

He smiles at that and angles his head, kissing me deep. When he pulls away, he says, “Tell me everything.” Then he sits up, pulling me up by my hands and holding one tightly as I wrap one arm around my chest.

“Yeah,” I whisper. “Okay.”

I take a moment to get myself together, feeling shaky with my breakdown.

“I just got stuck,” I finally manage to say.

My voice is hoarse with those words. I try not to think about the fact that two of them, from that night, are in here.

That I willingly gave myself to both of them, too.

What does that mean? What is wrong with me?

I keep staring at the ceiling in the dark, like it’ll ground me.

“Sometimes I just get stuck.” My lower lip trembles, the momentary high from the pain leaving me, but I keep going anyway.

“I know you didn’t… I know you didn’t think you were hurting me… ”

Cortland squeezes my hand again, and somehow, it gives me the courage to keep going.

“But it was all so blurry, and I wish I could do it over and maybe go home after the park instead. And maybe we wouldn’t have fallen apart like we did.

And I wish I hadn’t been so obsessed with you.

” I laugh a little, but it’s a sad sound, one that makes my chest crack in two as I try to catch my breath, but the words leave me in a rush.

“And there are so many things that I wish I could explain, but I don’t really know how to do that. ”

“Remi.” The one word, just my name, but there’s so much in it.

He sounds nervous and for a moment, I wonder if I could scare him away with all my truths.

If I just told him everything—why I didn’t stay and speak to him, why I didn’t say no, why I even called the police and how much he broke my heart when he let them touch me—maybe he’d just kick me out and mean it this time.

Maybe this would end.

I close my eyes as he threads his fingers through mine.

“Try,” he urges me. “Just try to say it all.”

I hear footsteps. The creak of the stairs.

Storm leaving. Giving me this moment. Giving it to Cortland. Because Storm didn’t owe me anything. I didn’t trust him. He scared me.

But Cortland… Cortland was the one that really cut deep.

I take a breath before I start.