Pretty Stolen Dolls (21 page)

“Thanks,” I tell him, snatching the flyer back.

“Benny!” he shouts, stopping me in my tracks and turning my insides to stone.

“What did you say?” My words are almost inaudible.

“Benny,” he says again—a single word that makes me shudder. “That’s his name. He named the stall after his wife he lost. I don’t know, maybe cancer. I didn’t ask.” He shrugs and I feel like I’m free falling without a parachute to stop me from hitting the ground and becoming human pulp.

“Hey, miss, you okay?”

The floor tilts and wobbles as I command my feet to move. Bending down, I bring my gun to my hand and hold it just out of sight inside my blazer.

“Move…move…out the way,” I snarl to the people standing between me and him.

It’s him. It’s him. It’s him.

Macy.

The name comes into view as people part like the sea.

Doll with the Jade Eyes.

Thud…thud…thud…

There’s one table, but nobody’s there. A lone, undressed doll lays upon it and my heart paces to a breakneck speed. It’s dark brown hair is matted and filthy. Smudges are smeared all over the doll’s face. Her cloth body has been torn and stuffing hangs out.

I jerk my head around, scanning the faces and nooks in hopes of seeing him hiding. My hand skitters over the table until my fingers find the doll. Bringing it up to my eyes, I scan over it. A tag hangs around its neck.

DIRTY LITTLE DOLL.

The world expands and then closes in around me as my fingers release the doll. It hits the grass with a
thud
and my eyes close for a moment. When I reopen them, I see him, through the crowd staring at me. It’s him. Benny.

It has to be him.

I yank my arm from my jacket, the gun aiming straight out in front of me, my finger on the trigger, ready to end this—to end him.

“Benny!” I shout, moving toward him. He doesn’t move. Simply stares at me through the throng of people.

It’s him.

His eyes hold mine, the hollow pits of hell blazing from them as I get closer and closer.

He wants to die, because he’s not moving. He’s waiting for me to get closer—he’s waiting for me to shoot him. Screams echo all around me and bodies blur in my peripheral as they move at an abnormal speed.

I’m so close.

He looks feral and determined. There’s a smirk on his lips, like he has a secret and I’m not a part of it. He licks his lips—lips that used to know every single part of my body—as that thick, untamed curly hair of his falls over his face, and then…

“Oomph.”

I’m tackled from the side and my ribs ignite in pain. My face hits the dirt and I inhale a mouthful. My chest heaves and I splutter to choke it from my mouth.

Noise roars all around me, making my ears pop. A heavy weight keeps me pinned to the earth.

“Suspect in custody,” a deep voice rumbles from the chest of whoever is holding me down.

My eyes scan the space to where Benny was standing. It’s now empty. As if he was never there.

A ghost
.

“Get off me. It’s him,” I cough. “I’m a police officer. Get off. It’s him,” I yell, feeling the veins bulge in my temples.

“It’s him.” Why is no one listening to me?

I’m cuffed and dragged to my feet. A young guy in full uniform smiles at me like he just won the big bear at the carnival.
Idiot.
I scan the people, the empty spaces—nothing.

“I’m Detective Phillips and
was
in pursuit of a very dangerous man,” I hiss out, my ribs hindering me as pressure tightens around my abdomen. If he broke a freaking rib, there will be hell to pay for this idiot.

“I had him, goddammit. I had him.”

“Phillips? Uncuff her now,” a familiar voice barks.

Marcus. Thank God.

“The man who killed the woman in the doll shop,” I wisp out. “He was here. Shut this place down. Don’t let anybody leave.” The world around me tilts as his face doubles. His voice distorts as the sky swirls around and…

“I have a new dress for my pretty doll,” he says. “Do you want to see it?”

No, I want to wear it. I’m freezing to death.

“I need a blanket, Benny,” I murmur, my teeth chattering.

He tosses the dress he was fumbling with for Macy onto his table and marches over to my cell.

“Benjamin,” he barks. “How many fucking times do I have to tell you?”

“I’m freezing, Benjamin,” I placate in hopes he will find mercy in his black, dead heart.

“I like it when you’re cold. It turns your skin a shade paler,” he muses as his eyes feast over my naked, vampire-looking skin. “Like porcelain.”

“It’s called death’s door, Benjamin.” I shiver and rub at myself, trying to keep warm.

“I can warm you up.” His growled offer makes me want to die. If a tear were to leak from my eye, it would probably freeze upon my skin. The thought of his warm flesh against mine doesn’t repulse me. Instead, all I can think about is feeling heat. Maybe he would leave me with his sweater after.

“Okay,” I tell him, and his head snaps up to meet my eyes.

“What?”

“Okay,” I repeat, stepping back from the door so he can unlock it and come inside.

Clanking sounds, and then he’s inside my cell, eagerly undressing. I watch as his clothes drop to the floor, wishing I could curl up in them to steal their warmth. Walking toward him, I can already feel the heat radiating from his body. My arms go up around his neck and he stiffens briefly before relaxing. Grabbing my waist, he lifts me and I comply, wrapping my legs around him. So warm. So nice. His temperature against the cold of my flesh burns almost before it seeps into me, giving me relief from the harshness of its bite.

He backs us up and drops so he’s sitting on my bed. Crushing my body to his, I writhe over him to get as much of his warmth as possible. His cock thickens and grows against the apex of my thighs and he becomes frantic, lifting me and pulling me down onto his length. We both hiss as he enters me—both feeling pleasure from two entirely different sensations. I begin to buck against him and his eyes watch me in wonder. In this moment, I don’t care that I’m whoring myself to my captor to keep from freezing to death. My blood is already pumping through my veins, keeping me alive. I move my hips faster, lifting my ass up and down over him as I do. He bares down on my shoulder with his teeth and draws blood. His rough hands squeeze at my breasts too hard to give pleasure, but I don’t care. He’s warm.

“I’m going to come,” he groans. “I’m going to fucking come.”

He growls aloud and then grips me tight. His arms hold me still as his hips jut up from the bed into me, once, twice…and then his hot cum floods into my body and I know I’ll be left sticky for the night. The pipes are too noisy and he hates using the taps at night.

“That was amazing,” he puffs against my skin, and the nausea that always accompanies the end of a visit from Benny stirs in my gut.

I lift myself from him and crawl over the bed, curling into a ball under the flimsy sheet. His feet stomp toward the cell door and stop. I look up as he swipes up his clothes and something heavy hits the bed.

“You can wear this, but only for sleeping. If you have it on when you’re not in the bed, I’ll shred it and you can freeze your fucking ass off.”

Nodding emphatically, I graciously take his offering. A sweater. “Okay, thank you,” I tell him, sickening myself further for offering him my gratitude for a basic human right. “I promise.”

It smells of him. I now can’t even escape him in my dreamless sleep.

But right now, I don’t care.

I’m warm.

“Benny!”

I jerk upright and hiss in pain as my ribs protest. Dillon is quickly by my side, guiding me back into a lying position.

“Don’t try to sit up,” he instructs, a little too late. “You have a cracked rib. Some fucking rookie took you down.”

“Why didn’t you show up at eleven?” I wheeze. The light in the room is blinding. I’m in a hospital bed. The itchy blanket over my legs brings back memories of my rehabilitation after I escaped Benny. “Where were you?”

His brow furrows, guilt twisting his features. Sitting on the bed, he takes my hand in his.

“We got a call. A man had been brought in, barely breathing. Some woman said he was on the side of the road mumbling about a woman who attacked him with a crowbar.”

“What?”

He nods his head and places his other hand over our joined ones. “He said you by name, Jade. Told them you forced him to pull over, showed him your badge, and made him exit his vehicle, to which you then proceeded to attack him with a crowbar.”

Lines crinkle my forehead as I try to make sense of his words. “He’s lying, obviously,” I protest with a huff, trying to sit up again. Surely Dillon believes me.

“Don’t move,” he grumbles. “You’ll only hurt yourself more.” Dillon gently pushes against my shoulders until I relax into the mattress. “We then got a call about a madwoman waving a gun in the air calling for a Benny.”

A shudder ripples through me at the mention of him. “He was there, Dillon,” I mutter. “He was right there.” I beg at him with my eyes.

“I believe you,” he says softly. “I do…”

“But?” I hiss, studying the worry storming in his chocolate orbs.

“They found the bloody crowbar in your trunk.”

My eyes pop wide open. “What? No, that’s impossible. He’s lying. I want to see him.” I pull at a needle in my hand and ignore the blood pumping from the little hole now there.

“Jade, for fuck’s sake, stop,” he orders with a growl. He attempts to hold my hands still, but I struggle against him, my blood making a mess of the white sheet covering my lap. “We need a nurse in here, goddammit!”

“Let me go, Dillon,” I screech. “I need to know why he’s lying about what happened. Maybe whoever hit him is blackmailing him.”

“You can’t talk to him,” he argues. “He’s in the OR. Critical condition.”

Hot tears well in my eyes. “I want to be left alone.” I pull my arm from his grasp.

“Don’t do this,” he says, his tone beseeching. “Don’t pull away from me. I’m trying to help you.”

“Nurse,” I demand when I locate the call button, and he flinches in response.

A skinny woman appears at the door and looks in at the bloody mess I’ve made of my hand. She groans and then hollers for another nurse to help her.

“I want to be left alone,” I repeat. They both turn to look at Dillon and when he moves from the bed, I instantly mourn the loss of his comfort.

He shakes his head and rubs at the blood from my hand on his. “Don’t push me away, Jade. We will get this monster and I will make you realize you’re not alone in this anymore. Nothing anyone can say or claim can turn me from you or make me believe this is all in your head. And I certainly don’t believe you beat a man twice your size to near death with a fucking crowbar. DNA doesn’t lie which is why this stupid accusation will be thrown out before morning.” He nods once and then I’m staring at his retreating back. The door swings closed behind him as he leaves and a sob rips from my chest. The pain is excruciating in my ribs, but I fight through it, letting myself cry.