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Joshua drops me, and I lie at his feet, a puddle of weak, mewling terror. I’m staring at the floor, my muscles locked and rigid with fright, too afraid to look at him.
The truly horrifying thing about seeing him stab George was the calm, practiced way that he moved.
I stood by the empty bar, frozen in shock, when I first spotted Joshua crouched over the dying security guard. As he jabbed George in the abdomen, I heard his taunting voice. “Oh, does that hurt? Cheer up, right now you’re in the least pain you’ll ever be in for the rest of your life. I’m very good at this. I can make you last for hours, but they’ll feel like years.”
He was admitting that he’s done this before. And it was clear from his gloating tone that he loved it.
He kills people for fun.
Joshua Smith, billionaire owner and CEO of Smith Acquisitions, the hottest, sexiest, most sought-after bachelor in Manhattan. And add to that list…serial killer.
“Look at me,” he intones.
This part is familiar. Ghosts of my past shiver down my spine. My stepfather’s voice echoes in my ears.“Look at me when I talk to you, you little bitch.”
I hunch my shoulders, bracing for a blow, desperately locking my gaze on the floor. I’m the little girl hiding under the blanket so the boogeyman can’t find me. Looking at him will make this real.
My mind is torturing me. Every serial killer movie I’ve ever seen flashes before my eyes. Blood, spilling intestines, gouged-out eyes. Hours of agony worse than anything I could ever imagine, images of knives and saws and icepicks, sounds of screaming, women gone limp with their dead eyes staring at nothing… I know how this ends.
“Please don’t kill me,” I choke out, my voice trembling. I can’t look up. I can’t watch my own death descending.
Sheer terror sizzles down my nerves. I try to move, but I’ve lost control of my body. I am liquid with fright.
His voice rings out above me, like God speaking from on high, but he’s not God. He’s the Devil in a gray silk suit. “I’m not going to kill you.”
Liar.
“Just let me go. I won’t tell anyone!” It’s a pitiful lie, but my brain is numb and stupid with panic. I am scrabbling for the magic words that will save my life.
He’s silent, so finally I look up at him, tears streaming from my eyes. Joshua looms over me, my terror painting him as a giant. The face looking down at me has graced society magazines and the gossip column of every major paper in the city. The camera loves him—the glossy black hair, the cheekbones you could cut yourself on, those sapphire-blue eyes, the cruel, sensual curve of his upper lip.
He smiles down at me, gently. “Tamara. Of course you would. If I let you go, you’d run right to the police.”
“I won’t, I swear, I swear!” My cry is whiny and shrill. I loathe myself for it.
His voice frosts over. “Don’t keep lying to me, Tamara. It’s boring. Ihateboring.”
I stare over at the security guard, whose chest is heaving with every tortured breath. “Why did you stab him?”
“Because he tried to rape you.”
I look up at him in horror. “You…you did it for me?” I didn’t want that. George was a pig and a vile human being, and I would have been happy to see him jailed, but butchered? On my account? Nausea curdles in my belly.
Joshua’s dark brows draw together, and he shakes his head. “No.” There’s mild remonstrance in his voice. I’ve disappointed him by not understanding. But what is the right question? The right thing to say? Everything rides on this.
I fail to come up with anything that will save me. He stares down at me expectantly, waiting. It’s like this is some kind of cruel game to him. He could end me right now. Why doesn’t he? What other option does he have? Because he’s right—of course I’d go to the police.
Finally, I choke out the question I don’t want to ask but must. “If you’re not going to kill me, what are you going to do with me?”
A smile curls his lips, but it doesn’t reach his eyes. His smiles never reach his eyes. “I’m going to play with you.”
His words hang in the air then explode like bombs, shredding me with terrible possibility. And then I see it in his right hand. A hypodermic needle. That means he’s going to take me somewhere else. Somewhere he can take his time with me. My throat closes with panic. He told the man on the floor that he could make it last for hours.
Not that, not that—please just kill me quickly.
Mad with fright, I strangle on a scream. My muscles start working again, and I scrabble away from him on all fours, scuttling for the doorway. He jabs me in the ass with the hypodermic, and I cry out in pain. It’s like being stabbed with a red-hot knitting needle.
My right butt cheek throbs, and a sensation of great weariness washes over me.
