His (6 page)

“What are you going to do with me?” she asked. Her lip quivered.

“I haven’t figured that out quite yet,” I said, and shut the door.

CHAPTER FIVE

     Kat    

After he left, I scoured the basement for anything I could possibly use to escape. A few empty paint cans were all that lay on the ground near the door. I pissed in one. No way was I asking him if I could use his bathroom. He’d probably want to watch, the creep.

There was nothing in the corners, nothing behind the rack of wine but a stack of cardboard boxes so heavy I couldn’t pull them out. I could probably break one of the wine bottles and use it as a weapon, but I believed him when he said he’d have a gun.

No, fighting him wouldn’t work. There weren’t any other doors in the basement. I didn’t know how I could escape. I was beginning to hyperventilate. I sat down in the middle of the basement and hugged my legs to my chest.

Well, Kat, I told myself, there’s nothing you can do right now. But it doesn’t seem like he’s going to kill you, not yet, anyway.

How could I get him to let me go? It was impossible. I thought of Jules working in the library. What would happen tomorrow morning? She would get to work and I wouldn’t be there. I was never late. She would realize something was wrong. But how would she know what had happened? She wouldn’t.

Terror took hold of me again and I let myself sob.

Let it all out, Kat. Let it out.
Cry and be done crying. Then I could figure something out. It was better than letting myself go into a full-fledged panic attack, anyway.

I must have sat there for an hour before he returned. His hair was wet and dripping, but he was wearing clothes. He had brought a blanket. He put the blanket on the floor.

“I took care of your car,” he said.

I looked up at him, unsure what he meant. He raised his hand and mimed driving a car off of a cliff.

“Down in the canyon. Sorry about that, but you won’t have any use for it here anyway.”

I breathed in sharply. I’d saved for two years to buy that stupid car, and despite the more pressing situation at hand it still hurt me to think about my car being destroyed by this maniac.

“My car...”

“I’m sorry, I truly am. Same with your cell phone. It would be stupid for me to keep them around, though. And I’m not a stupid person.” He looked at me as though hoping for agreement. “Your wallet was in there, too. Kat, is it? I think I’ll keep calling you kitten. Curiosity killed the cat, you know.”

“Please,” I said. I could hear my voice trembling no matter how I tried to steady it. “Please, I won’t say anything if you let me go.”

“See, now that would be stupid,” he said matter-of-factly. He pulled up the extra chair and sat on it, setting the blanket to the side. “And what did I just say about being stupid?”

“You’re not a stupid person,” I whispered.

“I’m not stupid,” he said, nodding.

“What are you going to do with me?”

“For now? I’m going to keep you here.”

I began to cry again. I didn’t want to, I didn’t want to make him mad, but I couldn’t help it.

“No,” I said. “Please don’t. I don’t want to stay here.”

He spread his hands out in front of him.

“There’s nothing I can do.”

“I’ll run away,” I said, choking on my sobs. “I’ll escape and run away.”

He frowned.

“Now that would be very stupid,” he said. “Very stupid, indeed.”

“I’ll scream,” I said. Anger was building up inside of me and I couldn’t keep it from pouring out, just like I couldn’t keep myself from crying.

“Then scream. Do you know how far we are from anybody else out here? Go ahead, try. It won’t work.”

“Please,” I said, desperation creeping through my chest. “Please let me go.”

He shook his head.

“The sooner you realize that you’re here for good, the better,” he said.

He stood up and I scrambled to my feet, limping after him.

“No, please. Please don’t leave me here. Please!”

He kept walking to the door. I grabbed his arm and he whipped me around in a single motion, pinning me to the wall with his own body. I hadn’t realized how tall he was, but he had me lifted inches off of the ground. My toes scraped the floor just barely, and my hurt ankle screamed with pain.

He spoke, and I could feel his hot breath on my face. His dark eyes sparked and he moved one hand over my hair, brushing through it with his fingers. I had fucked up. I had played with fire, and now it was going to burn me.

“Do you really want me to stay down here with you?” he whispered.

I cringed. His body was pressed against mine, and in spite of everything I could feel myself responding to his touch. He shifted his weight and pushed one of his legs between my thighs. I burned with the pressing ache there.

“You wanted me before, in the elevator,” he said, his eyes searching mine. “Do you want me now?”

A shiver ran down my spine. My lips parted, but all I could do was shake my head slightly from side to side.

“No? Then stop tempting me.”

He stepped back and let me down. I fell to the floor, clutching my hurt ankle. He flicked off the light and the room went dark, but I could still see his silhouette in the doorway, looking back at me.

“Have a good night,” he said, and shut the door.

     Gav    

The girl had given me an idea.

No, not to rape her. I get no pleasure out of harming innocent people. Harming guilty people, on the other hand... that was a delicious prospect to drive away the shadow. But not her.

There’s really only one thing I could do, if I didn’t want to kill her. I could convince her to stay. It would be hard, I know. She seemed different than most of the people I’ve met out there in the world. I’m not sure how. Perhaps it was simply that she’d thrown herself at me the first time we’d met, and the timing was right. Her kiss had woken up a little part of brightness in the world, if only for a second or two.

If I wanted her to live, then I had to break her. To make her think that she would be better off here, where I kept her in chains. I would have to make her love me. It was the only chance I had to keep myself from killing her.

     Kat    

The morning light came through the window.

Window.

I sat up suddenly. The room I was in was dark except for the single small window. Where was I?

Then I remembered. The man on the table. The blood. The knife. All of the sleepiness evaporated in a wave of terror. I was being kept hostage in a basement. He was keeping me here.

But there was a window.

I got up, feeling my ankle ache under the weight of my body. I didn’t know how badly I’d hurt it, but I knew it wasn’t good. Shifting my weight onto it, I thought I could at least walk. Not run, but walk. It was getting better.

Looking around in the dim basement, I saw the empty paint cans. I’d have to stand on them to reach the window, but I doubted they were heavy enough to break through unless I really had leverage to swing at the glass. I tiptoed over to the cans and set them down underneath the window, then stood on top of them. I could just reach the ledge.

It was one of those small cellar windows, so dirty that I couldn’t see anything out of it. All I could see was that there was sunlight coming through, so there must be an opening. If I could get out there, I could run down to the road. I could—

But that would come later. Right now, I needed to get
out
. The window was big enough for me to crawl through, but just barely. And there was no way I was trying to escape out the front door, not with a killer waiting for me with a knife.

A water pipe ran down from the ceiling to the floor of the basement right next to the small window. I pushed my foot against it and it held fast. I could use it as leverage to climb up. Perfect.

First, I tried to push the window open. There wasn’t any lock that I could see, so I shoved my hand against the window pane, hoping it would force it outward. No luck. I braced my good leg against the paint can and tried to push. The paint can tilted with the pressure under my feet, and I lost my balance. I fell and banged my knee against the wall, holding onto the window ledge with both hands. My breath rushed out of me in a painful gasp.

Okay, so that wasn’t a good plan.

I needed to break the window pane. There was nothing down here heavy enough, though. Nothing but...

My head twisted toward the wine bottles. They would certainly be heavy enough to break the window, I thought. I picked one off of the lower rack and hefted it in my hand. He would hear the noise. But by that time, I would hopefully be out of there.

I stood on the paint cans, my breath coming fast. I would have one chance. I’d have to get through as quickly as possible. I took a deep breath, lifted the wine bottle, and swung.

CRASH!

Glass shards from the window came shattering down over my head. I swung the bottle again and the rest of the pane broke through. Sunlight poured through the broken window, and I could see the forest beyond. I grabbed the edge of the sill and tried desperately to pull myself up. My feet slipped against the water pipe but didn’t hold.

Oh, god. I wasn’t going to be able to make it. Last semester Jules had signed us up for a rock climbing class as an elective. I had gone once and never again, and now I was regretting it. My arms were just too weak to hold my weight.

No. I had to do it. A noise from upstairs made my heart jump into my throat. Footsteps.
Oh no!

I crouched down and jumped up as high as I could, clutching at the broken pane. My hand caught on a glass shard and a stabbing pain went through my arm. Blood welled on my skin. I ignored the pain and pulled hard, hard—

“What in the—”

The voice in the doorway behind me made me pull harder. The light in the room flicked on.

No!

My feet kicked at the pipe, scrabbling for purchase. I had my elbow on the ledge, pulling to get through, when I felt an arm come around my waist and hold me tight. Glass tore at my shoulder.

“NO! NO!” I was so close. So close! Blood poured from my arm as I reached out. I had my hand in the dirt outside, but the man was pulling me back in. My fingers clawed at the windowsill, but it was no use. Blood ran down my fingers, made them slippery. I had no hold on the window. He dragged me back inside.

“No! NO! Let me go!”

I flailed in his arms, trying to punch him in the head. He caught my arms and held me in a bear hug, pressing me against his body. No matter how I twisted, I couldn’t get out. My eyes couldn’t stop looking out towards the sunlight, toward freedom. Would I ever get to see the sun again? Or would he kill me now, here, in the dirty basement?

“You’re—Jesus, you’re cut badly,” he said. His grasp loosened. Now was my chance. I took all of my energy and whipped my head around, smashing it into his nose.

He let me go. Go! I ran to the basement door and limped up the stairs. Blood flowed down my arm, but I pushed myself to keep going. I could make it, and if I didn’t then I would die. Die trying to escape. I was halfway across the living room when I felt his hand grab my shoulder. I turned to swing at him again, but then I felt the pinch of a needle in my neck.

Heat washed through me and the room spun. I saw him draw back, the syringe in his hand. Then I fell backwards and the world went black.

CHAPTER SIX

     Gav    

Stitch by stitch, I sewed her arm shut. I did not want her dead, no, not if I could help it. I wasn’t that much of a monster, and there was something in her face that made me want to know more about her. I could always kill her later if I decided I needed to, anyway.

The glass had sliced through the lower part of her arm, almost to the bone. She was lucky it hadn’t severed the artery. Lucky, too, that I was there.

I’m sure she wouldn’t think so.

Was it luck, then, that brought her to me? Dumb, blind chance that set her outside my window? No, I thought there was something more to it than that. Even though I was an abomination in every sense of the word, sinful beyond normal sin, I couldn’t believe in a world that was so cold and unthoughtful. There had to be something behind this girl, this beautiful girl appearing at my doorstep.

The devil planted temptation. Dare I pluck this flower?

I pulled the needle through her skin.

Not for the first time, I wondered what it would be like if I were squeamish about blood. So many people were, after all. It was a normal fear.

I had always loved bodies, the sheer corporeality of their flesh, the hard bone tied together with thick knotted tendons, the sticky tissues.

And her body…

She was asleep and didn’t feel anything, but I still felt a strange nervousness when I ran my hands over the curves of her living breathing person. Her hips rounded into thick thighs, ripe and smooth. Her chest moved in slight gasps of breath. Inhale, exhale. Her hands, pale and delicate, her fingers cut sensibly, her wrists—

Her wrists.

I leaned closer to her body, smelling her scent. Turning her palm up, I ran my hand over hers and stretched out the skin along her wrist.

Scars, running alongside the carpal tunnel. White dimpled lines from a knife’s edge.

I knew those kinds of scars. Old scars. I knew all kinds of scars. But these scars were attached to a body I found myself much intrigued by, and I could not let go of her hand once I saw them. My fingers traced the line of those white subtle seams over and over again, as though trying to stroke the truth of it out of her body.

“Tell me, kitten,” I whispered, although she could not hear me, “
why did you try to kill yourself?
”

     Kat