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The previous night had simply reaffirmed it. When I was alone with the Beast, I changed. I became someone I wasn’t, someone who begged and craved him. I desperately wanted him inside me. Even now, sitting on the bench, I was hollow without him. He’d never come back to the shower, and I’d been left to think how once again he’d taken all of my cards, left me feeling powerless and alone.
And that wasn’t okay.
To my surprise, Nikolai had said no at first. He didn’t think I was “in it” one hundred percent. I remembered stumbling a little bit when he’d said that. Did he know? Could he see the war going on inside of me? The fight against the tiny faction in my brain that told me You don’t just want him, you need him.
But no, he couldn’t.
Nikolai assumed I feared the pain the Beast could inflict, was worried that fear would cripple or paralyze me. Really it was the opposite. I was crippled by a constant state of chaos and lust and pleasure and…and…
Swallowing, I stood up, grabbing my burnt orange Hermès purse off the bench. There was no one else in the park now that Gabby had gone. It was private, the same one where we’d met when she was planning to kill her husband. I waited for her to disappear into the crowd and then looked away, at the park, at the bare trees covered only with snow.
Nikolai told me that Gabby was being sold to some douche in Africa to, I was sure, further manipulate me. On the outside it looked like he was trying to show me that it wasn’t just about my shit, other people had cards in the game too. I saw through that. Now no matter what, I had to go through with it because if I fucked up, Gabby was going to fucking Africa to be married to someone worse than Giovani. Talk about pressure.
Nikolai hadn’t expected me to bring it up with Beast and, by the looks he was giving me, had been angry I’d done so. I’d been so taken aback, though. A part of me thought maybe Beast was going to say it wasn’t true and confirm my suspicions that Nikolai was nothing more than a manipulative liar. All Beast confirmed was that I had to go through with the plan.
The whole thing was so fucking crazy. The plan, Gabby, Vic, Nikolai, it was nuts—but a crazy plan was better than actually going crazy. If I continued as I was, tumbling down the rabbit hole with Beast, I knew I wouldn’t just go crazy. I would disappear.
I looked through the iron slats of the park fence. Nikolai wasn’t back with the car yet, apparently still finagling his side of the job with Vic. I sighed, grabbing my purse.
This…
This was going to change everything.
But that was a good thing.
It was a good thing.
I told myself the things I did in the night were all to further the plan, but even I knew that was a lie.
Shaking my head, I decided to leave the park or at least wait outside. I couldn’t keep standing alone in an empty park—I was starting to feel like a statue. As I exited through the gate, someone stepped in front of me. Fingers curled around both of my arms and tugged me to the side. My first thought was I’ve been caught.
And I was relieved.
How fucking sick is that? To crave to be captured and kept by the person you’re trying to escape? It was so cold out in the real world compared to the Beast’s lair, though. The snow melted through my coat and seeped into my skin. I didn’t realize how numb I was before the Beast. I thought I’d felt before, thought I’d lived before, but I could feel my soul already numbing. It was a familiar numbness, an anesthesia that had once been my sole method of survival, when the only way I’d survived was through someone else’s pictures.
The Beast’s lair was pure fire. It was burning and it ignited things inside of me. Some of those things I wished I didn’t have to feel, like self-loathing and hate and despair, but I knew I couldn’t feel anything without them, like yin and yang. It was so bright. So real. So raw.
And I was utterly addicted.
But to be addicted is to be crippled and powerless.
I’d spent half my life crippled and powerless, at the mercy of doctors and the will of my body.
I wouldn’t ever again.
I glanced down at the hand that gripped me. The hand did not belong to the Beast; his was burned in my memory. The Beast’s hands were like refined virility, big with strong veins that promised a grip that could hold my soul as easily as my body. I did recognize this hand, though, just as I recognized the man it belonged to: Levi, the cop from the funeral and Gabby’s love. He looked at me fervently.
“I can get you out,” he said, dropping his grip from my arm but looking and talking no less fervently. “I can get you safe haven. There are good cops in this city, people who will help.” I looked at him. His long hair was pulled into a messy bun—not the stylish man bun seen all over New York’s hipsters and wannabes, but a desperate look on a desperate man.
“Does Gabby know you’re here?” I asked, deflecting his offer. I already knew the answer. When Gabby discovered Levi’s secret, she cut him off, not out of spite, but love.
Levi’s eyes flashed down a moment. “She isn’t returning my calls.” Good. Noting the black town car pulling up toward the curb, I walked away from Levi toward Nikolai.
“I know you’re planning something,” he yelled at my back. “You and Gabby. There’s a reason she’s icing me out and it isn’t because she’s unhappy with us. We’re good together.” I spun around and walked back, the heels of my shoes making a lonely echo on the pavement. I got up in his face.
“You don’t belong in this world, Levi,” I said—as if I did.
“And you and Gabby do?” Levi asked. I nearly balked, feeling like my mind had been invaded. He grabbed my arm again, and I looked down at his fingers. They only lightly held on to me. They were gentle. His words demanded of me, but his fingers did not. Beneath his hand was an invisible one. It was big, covered with thick veins, and had subverted my very own consciousness and being. It had snaked into my muscular system, had slithered into my blood. It had changed me.
