Page 23 of Peak Cruelty

Marlowe

T he doorknob is cool against my palm.

He didn’t lock it. Of course he didn’t. That would’ve made this too easy. He wants to see what I’ll do.

I open the door and step out barefoot, dripping, naked. Not shivering anymore. Just clean, like something freshly wiped before being used again. The hallway light reflects off the wet tile, the wet skin, the sharp edge of what's about to happen.

He’s at the sink. He doesn’t turn.

But he hears me. I know he does.

I walk across the floor like a standard house cat, like I own the place. Like shame doesn’t stick to wet skin. Let him smell what he almost did. Let him look, or try not to.

He keeps his back to me.

“The towel’s in the bathroom,” he says, voice low.

I let it hang. Then softer—calibrated to make him still—”You were right.”

It’s the sentence men like him spend their whole lives trying to earn.

That’s what makes him turn. Not a crash. Not a scream. Just the tone women use when they’ve finally decided to give up.

He turns slowly, as though he’s afraid this is a trick, as if he knows it is and still can’t help himself.

Perfect.

I blink fast, just enough to make it look like I’m trying not to cry. It’s not a lie, but it’s not grief, either. It’s what he wants.

“I lied,” I say. “About everything.”

He watches, unmoving. Holding a glass, his fingers press too tight around the rim. A single drop runs down the side and vanishes against his knuckle.

“I know I said I didn’t know,” I whisper. “But I did.”

A pause, just long enough to shift from foot to foot.

“I believed what my sister told me. The fevers. The vomiting. The seizures. I should have questioned it—but I didn’t. Even now—a part of me isn’t sure. You’d have to know Rachel, I guess.”

A tear slips. Not forced. Not fake. Just useful.

“I know what I am.”

His fingers tighten around the glass, and for a second I think it might shatter. He says nothing.

“I know what you’re going to do,” I add. “And I deserve it.”

I take a step forward. Then another.

When I drop to my knees, the movement is deliberate—slow, something he’ll remember.

I look up at him as though I’ve made peace with being ruined. Like I’ve come to offer my last favor before the bullet lands.

“But if you’re going to kill me,” I say, voice trembling just enough to sell it, “please… just?—”

I say it like a woman who’s seen it before. The look. The need. The finish line they think they deserve.

I suck in my bottom lip before the rest slips out. Not too fast. Not too polished.

He crouches, slow and cautious, as though he’s watching something wounded decide whether or not to bite.

“Just what?”

I shake my head, let him think the words are hard to find.

His hand finds my jaw. Not rough, but firm.

“Just what, Marlowe?”

“Just fuck me first,” I say. “Please. Make me feel something before you make me nothing.”

I say it like I mean it. Because I do. Just not the way he hopes.

That’s when he starts to slip.

The tell is in his reaction. The quiet chaos behind his eyes. Not lust. Not pity. Just confusion. I’ve handed him a weapon he doesn’t know how to hold.

He releases my face like it burned him.

And it’s clear how this ends. He thought I’d made my point before. I was just getting started.

Because I gave him what he asked for—just not the way he wanted it. I made it real enough to stick and wrong enough to make him question it.

I stand slowly and reach for an apple out of a bowl on the counter. Take a bite without breaking eye contact.

“I’ll be in the other room,” I say. I let the pause stretch—just long enough to taste. “Waiting.”

Then I turn.

No towel. No apology. No mercy.

And I walk away like nothing happened.

Because now?

Now he’s the one who gets to sit with it.