Page 70 of Vow of Vengeance

Vin stares at me in disgust, his gaze cold and hard.

"You used to beg me to fuck you like a pathetic whore, and now you won't even kiss me back?"

My eyes are full of tears, from being choked or crying, I don't know. When I'm finally able to blink past them, I see him staring at me with anger on his face, hardening his jaw and sharpening his eyes.

"I don't understand." I wheeze, taking a breath to try and stabilize my lungs, stop the choking. "You're dead."

"Of course I'm not.” He sneers. “You just felt me kiss you. That was real.I'mreal."

It doesn't make sense. I saw him, dead.

I watched his body be removed from the house.

I have his ashes.

"You died."

"No." Vin shakes his head. "I almost did. They thought I was gone, I'd bled out so much. But I was laying there, dying, and I thought of you. How you'd be so lost without me, how you'd suffer, how you've never known anything about life without me, and I couldn't let go. I held on so I could get back to you, so they took me to the hospital, and they saved me."

I shake my head.

“Y-your ashes are on the mantle.”

“Not mine.” He smirks. “Knowing the coroner definitely has its perks.”

Nothing makes sense. My husband knows the fucking coroner? How?

Whatever game this is, I'm not playing. I refuse to believe that it's Vin, that I'm looking at my dead husband. I'd believe he had a secret twin all this time before I'd believe that he survived the murder that I was accused of.

"You're lying. You're not real."

Vin laughs and shoves his shorts and boxers down his thighs before stepping out of them. Terror leeches into me as he strips his shirt over his head, too, showing how thin he's gotten. He used to have a decent amount of muscle packed onto his lean frame, but he looks weak now. The scar on his stomach shows me the source of it, but I'm not focusing on that. I'm focusing on trying to get free, trying to make my body move.

But it doesn't obey me, no matter how I try to escape as he draws closer.

"Don't be scared, baby. I told you, it's just me."

"No." I swallow, not because I still refuse to believe it's him, but because I don'twantit to be. The thought is somehow more terrifying. "I don't want you."

"That's rude." He shakes his head. "And it's a fucking lie, because I've been watching you. I know how you've cried for me, how you've sobbed my name in your sleep, just begging me to come to you. I did, a few times."

My head is pounding, thoughts reeling. Nausea churns deep inside of me as I take him in, wondering what he is planning to do. If I can keep him talking, maybe I can fend him off…

But I’m tied to a bed in a room I don’t recognize, and my husband is a fucking monster.

A serial rapist.

A serial murderer.

A sadist.

I didn't recognize it before because he was always so careful with me, but I've seen what he does now. I've seen his torture chamber, his tools. And I know now why the sex always had tobe vanilla, why he acted like it was a chore, why he never seemed interested in me.

He's interested now, though. His dick is half hard in his hand, and he's too close for me to be able to relax.

"What do you mean?" I gasp, trying to force my body to calm down so that my mind can think clearly. "What do you mean, you did a few times?"

Vin smirks. "I mean I gave you what you wanted, baby. You just didn't know."