When he took me to the sanctuary a few days ago, it changed something in me. Seeing all those survivors getting better, working on healing, and seeing them shrouded in all kinds of happy vapors, it shifted something in my chest.
It made me realize that’s what I really need. A goal-something to work toward that would genuinely make me happy. And now, I know what that is.
“Add-“
“Don’t tell me I’m not capable, or not ready. I’ve had a lot of fucking time to think. And I don’t want to be this insufferable victim, okay? I don’t want to let them win, and more importantly. I want-no, I need to help.”
He crosses his arms. “Okay. How would you like to help?”
I shrug. “I’ll tell you everything I know. And if you go out on missions, I want to come.”
His brow cocks, and his gaze flickers over me before returning to my eyes.
“Okay,” he acquiesces again. I’m almost suspicious of how agreeable he is. I was expecting him to lock me in my proverbial tower like Rapunzel.
Noting the look on my face, he says, “I’ll never treat you like you’re helpless or incapable. I’ve always known how strong you are. So, if you want to help, fine. I’m more than happy to bring you along for the ride, baby, but that comes with stipulations.”
“What stipulations?” I ask, growing wary.
“We start training again. We’ll pick up where we left off, and I’ll teach you not only how to defend yourself but how to fight, too. You need to learn how to use a weapon properly, and so help me God, Adeline, you will not do stupid shit when we’re working in the field.”
My mouth opens, offended by his accusation. “What makes you think I’d do anything stupid?”
His brow jumps up to his forehead again. “You’re going to tell me that confronting your stalker in the middle of the night wasn’t stupid?”
My teeth click shut. So, maybe he has a point there.
“You’re brave.
Incredibly brave, and a goddamn survivor, and it’s admirable as fuck. You have no idea how proud of you I am. But you’re also impulsive, and reactive, and I refuse to lose you again, do you hear me? I won’t. Which means that you have to listen to me, and you cannot go off and do your own thing because you think you’re helping. We’re a team, baby. Got it?”
I chew my lip, mulling that over. If I’ve learned anything, it’s that I am underwhelmingly out of my league when it comes to this corner of the world.
“I understand,” I agree. “I’m not going to pretend like I’m the big bad wolf… yet.”
His answering smirk suggests that he is the big bad wolf, and honestly, I’d have to agree.
But I won’t admit it. His head will blow up, and then I will need to jab that knife in his face just to pop his oversized ego.
“Aim for the jugular, not the ear, baby,” Zade instructs patiently. It grinds on my nerves anyway, and I’m a hairsbreadth away from turning the knife on him instead. “Adjust your feet-” He gently kicks one of them back. “You’re unbalanced and not holding the knife correctly.”
Since I started training with Zade three weeks ago, I’ve improved, but it doesn’t feel like enough. It never does.
Before me is a gelatin mannequin with countless stab marks in it, most of them far off from where I’m supposed to be hitting.
A reel of people clicks through my head, picturing each one in place of the mannequin. It helps for the most part, but then I freeze up, remembering Sydney’s lifeless body beneath me, or the feel of my knife cutting through Jerry’s throat.
Claws dipped in guilt have me in a chokehold, and I’m growing frustrated with myself. With him. I’m not like him. I can’t just kill someone and… get over it.
I whip around, shooting daggers at him with my eyes instead of my hands.
“You’re so unapologetic for what you’ve done. For how many people you’ve killed. How are you okay with that?”
“Why wouldn’t I be?” he challenges, tilting his head with an amused grin. I’d say he looks like a cute puppy, but that would be a lie. He looks like a vicious beast that’s been locked up too long and is ravenous. For me, in particular.
“I don’t know-morals?” I say, like the answer is obvious. Because it is. “Guilt? Remorse?”
“The very people you want to kill are the founding fathers of society’s morals. I killed their expectations of me, and then I sliced open their throats to show them that they would never control me. They will only ever answer for their crimes, and I have no problem being the executioner. If you don’t want to do this, y-“
I slash my hand in the air, cutting him off. “Don’t do that. Don’t give me an out.”
“It’s not an out, it’s an option. I want you to do whatever you can handle, Addie. If that means staying home, I support you. If that means going on a massive murder spree, I’ll be right by your side, baby. You’re still having nightmares about Sydney and Jerry, and carrying around that guilt for protecting yourself. If you can’t learn to accept that, how will you accept taking anyone else’s life? Because believe me when I say, this won’t be self-defense from here on out.”
“I don’t know how to accept it, Zade. I feel like I’m justifying murder.”
“Just like I ‘justified’ stalking you?” He puts air quotes around the word because we both know Zade was well aware of what he was doing and how wrong it was.
“Forcing a gun into that pussy and making you come all over it? Or all the other times you told me no, and I did it anyway?” he volleys back. The flush in my cheeks deepens, and my face burns from the reminder of that stupid gun. “Did I know it was wrong? Of course, I did. But it clearly didn’t stop me from doing it. You need to figure out your morals, and what you’re okay living with. Not what you’ve been taught, but what you feel in your gut.”
“So, stalking and assaulting me is written in your book of morals?”
“No,” he says, his smile widening. “I was obsessed with you from the moment I saw you. All those dark, twisted emotions I felt were the rawest form of who I am. I made the decision to show you that instead of concealing it. I never claimed to be a good person, little mouse, and that was something I decided I could live with. Just like murdering a bunch of pedophiles and human traffickers.”
“I’m pretty sure the people you kill tell themselves the same thing you do to help them sleep at night,” I comment dryly.
“I’m sure they do,” he agrees easily, taking a step toward me. My breath hitches, but I stand my ground, even as his voice deepens sinfully, “And I’m sure there are many who claim to be good and honest, and that they would be willing to kill me for my crimes against you. But that’s the difference. I’ve never made those claims.”
A flush crawls up my face, warming my cheeks beneath his intense stare.
“You make it sound so easy to just be… bad.”
“I’ve had a lot of practice.”
He has, which raises more questions. I roll my lips, my pulse beating erratically, working up the nerve to ask the question on the tip of my tongue. I’m afraid of what might happen once I do.
I’ve explained to Zade before that it was going to take me time to get used to some things about him. And now that I’ve been through what I’ve been through… all those old feelings are resurfacing. Not the hate or the desire to get away but accepting and understanding his contradictions and skewed morals.
“So, what’s been stopping you then?” I rush out.
Cocking his head, he waits. “From fucking me,” I say bluntly. “You didn’t stop before. What’s stopping you now?”
He’s silent for a few beats. “Because I wouldn’t be able to live with myself,” he murmurs, staring at me thoughtfully. “There would be a very different reaction this time around-you already know that.”
I cross my arms, popping out a hip. “Would there?”
“Yes,” he says firmly. “Do you think if I pinned you to the ground, you’d fight me at first only to end up grinding your pussy into my face because I’ve awakened something in you? Or do you think you’d fight like your life depended on it, only to end up mentally checking out from the trauma?”
New Book: Back Home to Marry Off Myself
Loredana’s father left the family for his mistress, leaving them to fend for themselves abroad. When life was at its toughest, her father showed up with “good news” after 8 years of absence: To marry off Loredana to a paralyzed son of the wealthy Mendelsohn family.