Page 7 of Redemption (Favorite Malady Duet #2)

ABIGAIL

Now

D ane’s sensual lips twist in a frown, and a furrow creases his brow. He keeps my wrists shackled in one hand, and his weight still pins me.

I drag in a shuddering breath when he releases my breasts to brush away the wetness that sears my cheeks. He lifts his fingers to inspect them, and his frown deepens. His crimson blood is diluted by my tears, and the two mingle into a glistening red stream that rolls down his palm.

He looks…puzzled. Like he can’t fathom why I’m so distressed.

Or maybe he can’t believe that I actually fought back and made him bleed.

I lift my chin and glare up at him with open defiance.

“If you violate me, I will hate you,” I hiss. “My body will respond, but I will hate you.”

His eyes glitter when they fix on mine again. He’s peering at me like I’m some alien creature he doesn’t understand.

“But you like when I make you cry.”

I gape at him even as my stomach turns at the truth in his words.

“Not like this.” I force the denial through my constricted throat. “And never again. I trusted you. I thought I knew you.”

His eyes flash. “You do know me. I’ve let you see me in a way I’ve never shown myself to anyone. You chose me. You love me.”

“Stop saying that!” My words are roughened by desperation. I think I’ll vomit if he says it again. “How can I love a stranger? How can I love the masked man who assaulted me?”

He shakes his head, as though my words irritate him like swarming gnats.

“You weren’t supposed to find out about that.”

“You think that’s the problem here? That I found out, not that you attacked me in my home?” I glower at him, allowing him to see the depth of my disgust. “I know what you really are now. I could never love you after what you did to me.”

He blinks, and his expression smooths to stony, unfeeling planes once again.

“You’re upset. I understand that you didn’t agree to leave Charleston.

But things will be better for you now. You don’t have to scrape by with your barista job anymore.

You don’t have to live in that shitty old apartment.

I’ll provide a life for you that you deserve, Abigail. ”

My jaw goes slack for a moment. The depth of his delusion is truly unfathomable.

“I want the life I built for myself.” I defy him. “I don’t want anything from you. I want to go home and never see you again.”

His eyes narrow. “That’s not happening. You’re mine. Nothing will change that.”

“Saying I’m yours doesn’t make it true,” I shoot back. “I won’t willingly give myself to you.”

“You signed the contract,” he reminds me.

“I signed a contract with the man I met at the café. I signed myself over to the Dane that I knew. The Dane who promised to protect me and honor my consent. You are not that man.”

A shadow flutters at his jaw. “You didn’t meet me at the café.

You don’t even remember the night we met because you drank too much and blacked it out.

Do you know how maddening it was to see you all those mornings, and you looked at me like I was just another customer?

Like we hadn’t shared something unique?”

“What are you talking about?” I demand.

“We met at the bar a few nights after I moved to Charleston. You told me your dark desires, and I let you see a glimpse of the real me. You wanted me then, and I only let you go when I realized you were too drunk. I didn’t want you to regret being with me.

So, I found out where you worked. I approached you the next morning, and you had no idea who I was. What we had shared. What we could have been so much sooner if you hadn’t been so stubbornly evasive.”

My mouth opens and then closes. I’m not sure what to say in response to this new revelation. It’s not completely unbelievable that I might’ve had too much to drink on a night out; I like a cocktail or three to ease my inhibitions when I go dancing.

I think back to that first morning I met him—the first time I remember meeting him.

He’d acted so strange at the café. Intense and familiar in a way that unnerved me.

But then, I convinced myself that I’d just been nervous because he’s so gorgeous. I could barely look at him when he came in for his daily Americano because he’s intimidatingly handsome.

Now I know that he made me nervous because deep down, part of me knew he was a predator.

I have no idea what happened between us at the bar, but it must’ve been dark enough to set my senses on high alert in his presence.

That giddy, fizzy hit of adrenaline had made me enamored with him on our first date.

I didn’t recognize the thrill for what it was: a primal warning of danger.

My mind catches on something odd that he just said. “And how did you know where I worked?”

His gaze cuts away from mine for a heartbeat, and then his eyes narrow with something like defiance.

“I followed you home when you left the bar. You stumbled off before we could truly get to know each other. How else was I supposed to find you again?”

He makes stalking me sound so reasonable.

“You could have simply asked for my number, like a normal man.”

His beautiful face hardens to a grim mask. “I am not a normal man. I thought you knew that. I thought you accepted me, just like I accept everything that you are. You’re perfect for me, Abigail. Why are you denying us now?”

I shake my head. He’s clearly insane, completely deluded. He seems incapable of understanding how stalking and assaulting me was a violation on the deepest level.

“There is no us .” I try to speak as calmly as possible when my heart is hammering against my ribcage. “You’re not the man I thought you were. Your belief that I love you won’t change that.”

He bares his teeth at me like a cornered predator, and for a moment, I think he’s going to hurt me.

I cringe, and suddenly, his weight is gone.

He’s standing three feet away from where I lie sprawled on the bed, completely disoriented by his abrupt decision to release me.

“You’ll want to get freshened up before I show you around the estate,” he says, the perfectly composed, genteel host. He tips his head in the direction of an ensuite bathroom. “Go on. I’ll wait here for you.”

Now that he’s mentioned it, I become acutely aware of the fact that I’ve neglected my basic needs. How long was I unconscious?

My cheeks heat, and I duck past him into the bathroom.

Once I’m a bit more composed, I splash cold water onto my flushed face. The awful weight of my new reality presses down on my shoulders like a ton of lead, and it’s all I can do to keep my shaking knees from buckling. I grip the sink for support. My knuckles are almost as white as the porcelain.

I’m alone with a madman on a remote estate. He’s already proven that he’s so much stronger than I am. Fighting him had only given him an excuse to pin me down and attempt to coax shameful pleasure from my unwilling body.

I won’t make that mistake again.

Dane doesn’t value my consent. That much has become painfully clear.

He thinks I love him. If I can convince him that I will never feel a shred of affection for him again, he might let me go.

He seems obsessed with his misguided belief that I belong to him.

Once he accepts that I will never surrender my heart, he’ll grow tired of me.

He’ll release me, and I can return home to Charleston.

I straighten my spine and face myself in the mirror. I take several deep breaths and convince myself that my plan will work.

It has to work.

Because the ache in the center of my chest is from more than just the fearful pounding of my heart. I did love Dane, and the loss has shattered something inside me. Being near the monster who wears his face will be agonizing, but I’ll have to bear it.

My freedom depends on it.

His soft knock on the door draws a shocked yelp from my tight chest.

“Let me in, Abigail.”

“I’m coming out.”

I don’t want him to break down the door to get to me.

I slide the lock back, and he towers over me. I swallow hard and edge away from him. He follows my movement, staying resolutely in my personal space.

“What are you doing?” I demand breathlessly.

He gingerly touches two fingers to the bloody cut on his brow. “I need to get cleaned up. Stay.”

He issues the command like I’m a wayward pet. I grit my teeth against the tirade that teases at the tip of my tongue.

I will remain compliant. I won’t give him the excuse to manhandle me again.

My wits will get me out of this. I have to keep them sharp, and I know his unwelcome touch will devastate me.

He hisses softly when he cleans the cut I inflicted, but he doesn’t rebuke me for attacking him. I’m relieved he doesn’t lash out in reprisal for the pain I caused him.

My heart breaks all over again. The Dane I loved would’ve done anything to protect me. He cherished me, and I trusted that he would never harm me.

This monster who kidnapped me is completely unpredictable. He was capable of holding a knife to my throat while he violated me. He could turn violent at any moment, so I have to remain calm and not give him any reason to harm at me.

He doesn’t look at me for the few minutes it takes him to find a pack of bandages in the medicine cabinet.

It’s almost as though he’s ignoring me, if it weren’t for the menace rolling off him in waves.

His every movement is tense with barely leashed aggression, but, mercifully, he doesn’t try to assault me again.

When he turns to face me, the blood has been washed from his face, and the only sign of the wound I gave him is a tiny bandage on his forehead. His midnight hair tumbles over his brow, almost concealing it entirely.

He sweeps the unruly locks back, smoothing them into his usual neat style. He’s completely unruffled and utterly composed when he holds out his hand like a gentleman.

I stare at it, unwilling to place my hand within his grasp. My fists clench at my sides in silent defiance. His sharp gaze flicks over my rigid posture, and he shrugs.

He drops his hand to his side as though the tense exchange doesn’t bother him in the slightest, but his jaw remains tight enough that a shadow flits at his cheek.

“I’ll show you around the house,” he says in a smooth cadence.

I get the bizarre sense that he thinks I’m his honored guest, not his captive.

The man truly is insane. How did I not see it before?

I recall the times his face went cold, and his eyes glinted with green fire.

I’d trembled with fear-drenched desire, but that was when I trusted him implicitly.

Before I found out that he’s the masked man.

Before I knew that he hid behind GentAnon’s screenname to learn all of my most forbidden desires.

He claims that we met the night before he first came into the café. The fact that he stalked me on my way home and then followed me to work the next morning makes a chill pebble my skin.

All those months, he came into the café like clockwork every morning.

Until the day he finally asked me on a date.

The day after the masked man— Dane, I silently correct myself—attacked me.

“Why?” The single word is a razor blade in my throat, dragging its way out of me.

I don’t think I want to know, but I can’t help asking. I can still barely accept what’s happening to me, and I’m desperate to understand.

“Why did you ask me out? Why do any of this?”

His green eyes blaze, burning into me. “Because you’re perfect for me.”