Page 110 of The Dearly Departed

"Very good," she praised, smoothing her hand over my bare chest. "You're a very attractive man—do you know that?"

I said nothing.

"I'll let you keep that silly mask on this time, though I don't honestly see the point," she went on, kneeling on the bed beside me. "I know what you look like, Abraham Crowley … or do you prefer Llewellyn?”

My gut churned, my gag reflex worked, but I said nothing. I did nothing.

“I know where you work. I know what you do … I know the things you've done."

She slipped her hand beneath the waistband of my underwear to manipulate me further, touching the part of me I had denied her daughter. Her hand stroked, moving with determination as she leaned over and brushed her lips against my chest, and, oh God, I hated my body for stirring, awakening. But I hated this house even more and everyone I'd met within its walls.

I wanted to burn the whole place to the ground and send it back to Hell, where it belonged.

But not Analise. No matter how hard I tried, I could never hate her.

Virginia must've gone through Gerald's files. I bet he had one on Dean, on every person he had working for him. Blackmail for whenever he needed.

"I will admit," she mumbled, continuing to use her hand as her lips moved across my chest, then down my stomach, "I wasn't so sure about you when Gerry wanted to bring you into our little … circle. But you have certainly become my favorite of his pets."

She sat up, pulled my semi-erect dick from my pants, and untied her robe, allowing it to fall open to reveal her nudity.

I closed my eyes and turned away.

She straddled my waist and situated herself, until I fitted inside her body against my will.

"Yes," she moaned with a sigh. "You are a very good boy."

She used me then, scratching my chest as she lured herself toward orgasm, and I could do nothing but lie there, cursing myself for reacting in ways I didn't want to react.

And I thought about Analise. I thought about what she'd said, and I agreed.

I was so fucking sick of being told what to do.

But what other choice did I have?

Would what I wanted ever matter in this lifetime?

Or would I have to die to finally be free?

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

Age Thirty-Five

Life had a way of becoming routine, even under the worst of circumstances, and no matter how strong your resistance might be against it, even torture could somehow start to feel normal.

And that was what the entirety of my life had become.

Torture.

By day, I worked at the funeral home, preparing bodies and planning arrangements the way Leonard had taught me.

Once upon a time, it had been the one place I was comfortable—my happy place, so to speak. It was where I could be most myself, and the life of a funeral director and mortician was the most natural way of living I’d found.

But Gerald Crowley ruined that for me the day he blackmailed me into killing for him. And after two years of murdering in the name of my father, The Llewellyn Family Funeral Home had become a place of secrecy and dread.

And somehow, without my permission, who I was at night felt more like me than my unmasked counterpart ever did.

I slit throats, broke necks, drowned, beat, poisoned, and burned.