Page 283 of Lessons in Cruelty

Haven flinches, whimpers, tries to kick.

But then Kai grabs her thigh just below my hand, pressing her leg down into the mattress. I slide closer on my knees, my eyes on Haven as she throws her hips side to side, but keeping Kai in my peripheral view, watching him as much as I watch her.

He’s stroking his dick through his sweatpants like an afterthought, but he seems far from hard.

Shit out of luck, boy.

You sold your heart—and dick—to Molly tonight.

With him holding down her one leg, it frees up one of my hands to show him how it’s done. But first, we have to get rid of that fucking hoodie. I gather the hem and shove it up her belly, over her tits, until it’s gathered over her collarbones.

Exposing all of her to us.

There’s a faint scar from her collarbone to her sternum, like she survived her own autopsy. An even fainter bruise on one tit that almost looks like a bite mark.

When I glance up at Kai, he’s biting down on his lip, the flat of his hand rubbing harder over his limp dick. He looks so fucking mournful, I want to feel pity for him.

But I’m not capable of emotions like that. Not anymore.

My brain is hot-wired for pleasure. Because what do you crave more than anything in the world? Something you’ve never had. Something you can’t seem to experience. Something that’s as forbidden and taboo as what we’re doing right here, right now.

My fingertips skate down Haven’s fluttering stomach.

Kai watches as I drag a knuckle between her legs, dipping into her just enough to feel how ready she is.

Christ, we’ve been played.

All that fussing and screaming when she’s this wet? This is as much a game to her as it is to me.

Kai’s the only one who’s still fighting this.

Fighting me.

But not for much longer.

Chapter 12

Haven

This can’t be happening. This can’t be happening. This can’t fucking be happening. The mantra plays on repeat through my head, pinging off the inside of my skull like a fucking pinball in an arcade machine.

But part of me has been waiting for this moment since the maple tree.

Rain drums on the roof, against the windows, and it feels like it’s bearing down, trying to get inside, trying to drown me.

It was Kai who grabbed my throat. There’s no way Bastian has the same grip, the same relentless shake in his hands as he tightened his fingers. It was like the worst déjà vu I’d ever felt.

I didn’t imagine Kai. It wasn’t the drugs making me hallucinate.

Kai is here in the flesh…and for some reason, they both thought it would be hilarious as hell to pretend he wasn’t.

My worst enemy is here, when I’m at my weakest. My most vulnerable.

The boy who’s told me point blank he hates me, that he’ll do anything to force me to leave Agony Hollow, is right beside me…and I’m bound and at his fucking mercy.

If I could yell at him ‘I’m sorry’, I would. For loving him too much, for wanting too much, for being the girl who destroyed our friendship. But he put a gag in my mouth for a reason, and I refuse to spit it out and ruin this.

He doesn’t want to hear my pathetic apologies. He wants me to suffer.