chapter 26
“m y dad said it’s totally cool for you guys to stay here.” Smiling, Stephen waves around at the large apartment on the thirtieth-floor of his father’s building.
“I . . .” I’m at a loss for words, struck dumb by his kindness.
My mom’s the same, her gray eyes bouncing throughout the place. The reality is, she made a miscalculated mistake. She didn’t know at the time, but the same day that Stephen and I met up at the park, she had finished paying off my tuition. Our new identities alone cost us 40K. My mom paid off four years of school, plus another two for my masters. $110.000.00, gone. The house hasn’t sold, an expensive process in and out itself since everything has to be dealt with in secret to avoid the very thing we’re now running from.
The Drevlow’s tracking us.
Doesn’t matter that Lily Bennet and her mom, Sophia Bennet, must now disappear off the grid, vanish back into the imaginary ether from whence they came. The school won’t refund us the money. We have only $10,000.00 left and no quick way to make the funds needed to go back into hiding.
Stephen’s our only hope, and even so, I’m flabbergasted at his generosity. “I’ll find a way to pay you back,” I say in a small voice, hands clutched before me. “I swear I will.”
Eyes soft, Stephen comes up to me and cups my shoulders. “Lexi, no. We’re friends. I’m not doing this so you’ll pay me back.”
Tears threaten, but I blink them back.
My friend.
My only real friend in the world, I’m coming to realize.
There hasn’t been a chance for him to show me the proof of his innocence. He was able to get his hands on a copy of Andrew’s plane ticket to Illinois, proving what his hack of the Drevlow System’s servers showed: Andrew Drevlow had located me and was on his way to find me.
I can’t ask for that proof now, either, not on the heels of all he’s done for my mom and I. It would be ungrateful and cruel.
And . . . I kind of believe with him without it. I mean, why would he spend all this money to help us if he was truly my enemy?
“Thank you so much, Stephen,” I say for the umpteenth time. “I’ll never forget this.”
“Oh Lexi.” He rubs his thumb down my jaw in a ghost of a caress. Then, eyes bouncing towards mom, he puts distance between us. “Come. I’ll show you guys where the bedrooms are and you can decide who takes which one.”
Fifteen minutes later, he’s given us an entire tour of the apartment, which is more the size of a freaking penthouse. Neither my mom nor I have ever lived in something this opulent, and it shows in our faces once the tour is over.
“Stephen, please,” my mom urges once we’re back in the foyer. “Allow me to pay something towards us staying here. It won’t be much, but I plan on starting my search for a new job once we get our new identities in place.”
Stephen waves her away, smiling. “Mrs. Berkman, please. It’s not necessary, really. And I’ve also already hired someone to start getting those set up for you. As for the money, my father has seen Lexi’s grades. He’s enamored with her skill already.” He runs a hand through his thick hair, grimacing good-naturedly. “I think he wants to adopt you and replace you as his heir.”
“You showed him my grades?” I don’t know how I feel about that.
Stephen shrugs, expression apologetic. “His only requirement for my friends is that they’re overachievers as he wants me to be. I kind of had to in order to get him to agree to help you guys. I’m really sorry.”
He looks so crestfallen at the thought of my anger that I can’t help but drop it immediately. “It’s fine. I get it.”
“And about that . . . if you want to start over in school somewhere else once your new identity is set up, I can help you with that, but you should know my father is ready to hire you right away. I’m not even kidding. He mentioned a crazy high salary, too.” His chuckle at the end of that is endearing and when I look over at mom, I can tell she’s feeling it, too.
Giggling, I reach for my coat and begin unbuttoning it. “It’s definitely something I can think about, I guess, but I always wanted my degree.” Although what’s the point of achieving that when I can’t even do it in my own name.
Stephen’s gaze drops to where my fingers are working the coat open before meeting my stare again. “It’s not a big deal and you don’t have to decide now. How about you two get settled in for the night? The moving crew left your bags over there”—he points towards the living room, which is more the size of a freaking loft— “and they’ll be back tomorrow to help with any unpacking you guys need.”
Mom shakes her head. “No, it’s okay. We can handle it.”
“Mrs. Berkman, please let me help with this. You don’t understand. The last year all I thought about was Lexi, and if you guys were okay after all that happened. Being able to finally set some of it right? It matters a lot to me.”
“But you didn’t have anything to do with it,” I interject softly, searching his expression. I’m grateful for his assistance, more than he will ever know, but I can’t help but search for signs of dishonesty.
Although, it’s too late now, isn’t it? I’m in too deep already. There’s no telling when we’ll be able to save enough money to get out.
Fuck. Just thinking he might be lying, that he might be one of the ones that was involved, that I’m now beholden to him, makes me sick.
Yet Stephen turns to me, expression sincere and apologetic, and I have such a hard time believing that can be true. “I lent him the keys to my uncle’s gym all those months and never bothered to ask him what he was using it for, Lexi. I’ll never forgive myself for that.”
My heart breaks at his admission.
“God bless you, Stephen. Really,” my mom says, her tone heavy with the same gratitude pumping through my veins once more.
“Like I said: it’s nothing. Lexi, you have my cell if you guys need anything. I’ll stop by tomorrow sometime if I have time.” Throwing me one last smile over his shoulder, he opens the door. “Goodnight.” And he’s gone, leaving mom and I to begin sorting out yet another new chapter in a brand-new life.
chapter 27
t his time, I make it to the beginning of my time with Stephen. As I was retelling those early days, where I should’ve known something was off, but I was too lonely and stupid to pry too deep, Drew lifted me in his arms and moved us over to the bed.
His cell ringing interrupts my story.
It must be a special ringtone, because Drew moves me off his lap and kisses my cheek gently. “Give me a second, baby. I’ll make it quick.” He moves off the bed.
I can’t lie and say I’m not relieved. There isn’t much to tell after those early days, except how I settled into a routine of working for Stephen and his father, believing they were both my saviors. Buying into their charming and—what I now know to be—sociopathic act.
So much so that asking Stephen for the proof of his innocence seemed a crime after a while. Every time the words tried to rise, they would get stuck in my throat, guilt eating away at me.
I watch Drew as he approaches the spot by the closet where he left his dress pants. When he bends to reach for his shirt, I call out, “Stop. You don’t need to hide them from me.” They don’t make him any less gorgeous to me. They never could. He’s always had a flawless, chiseled physique, and it’s even hotter now that he’s older.
Clearly, his recuperation led him back to his fitness addiction. Judging by his increased size, it might’ve become one of his only ways to exercise his demons.
The other . . . I can’t even think about it. I’m a hypocrite for my rage after what I put him through by leaving him but thinking of him giving himself to other women makes me want to claw his eyes out.
Makes me want to hunt them all down and ruin them for touching what’s mine.
You left him, you lowlife. You left him for them to have.
I’ll never get over it, never forgive myself. Don’t even know how he’s forgiven m
e this easily.
Drew gets his phone from his pants and answers the call. “Hey Mom. What’s up?”
My heart pounds hard at that. I’d totally forgotten about his mother and I wonder how she is now that her demon of a husband is finally out of her life.
Then, I imagine what seeing her son self-destruct must’ve been like for her and my skin goes cold. If she knows it was because of me . . . fuck. She must loathe me.
As much as I loathe myself.
“Yeah, of course I’m okay. But how the hell—fucking uncle Richard just had to tell you, didn’t he? No, mom. Of course, I get it . . . stop. Please.” Shoulders tense, Drew peeks over at me and I’m convinced his mom knows I’m back in his life.
Based on the one side of the conversation, I can be she’s not happy about it.
I do my best to hide how that makes me feel, but Andrew sees it regardless.
“I know what I’m doing,” he snaps, tone hardening.
“Drew,” I whisper, shaking my head. Maybe it’s just me jumping to conclusions, but I suspect that I’ve been a sore spot between them for a while. That this isn’t the first argument revolving around me. I don’t want to come between them. It isn’t her fault she hates me, if she does. As a mother, I’d probably hate me, too.
“I get that. I do . . . okay, that I can do,” Drew says, voice softening. “But only if you promise to behave. I mean it, Mom. Okay. Okay. Love you, too. Goodnight.”
Swallowing the lump in my throat, I bring my knees back to my chest and wrap my arms around them. The same position I was in earlier when he was in the shower.
“Hey.” Tsking affectionately, he walks back to the bed and gently grabs my arms. “None of that.”
“She hates me, doesn’t she?” I hate how small my voice is.
Urging me forward, he resumes his spot behind me and urges me back into his lap. “Mom . . . doesn’t understand a lot of things. Remember, her marriage to my father wasn’t about love. I mean, I’m sure she felt it early on, but it was more a merging of families, you know?”
“It’s not just that, is it?” I turn sideways in his lap, letting my eyes caress his face. “She watched the whole thing, didn’t she, baby?”
He groans softly under his breath, shifting, and his dick twitches under my ass.
As if I’ve been trained, the urge to mount him and ride him until we’re both coming uncontrollably hits hard.
Drew exhales a slow breath, eyes flickering towards the ceiling, like he’s debating whether he should be honest or not.
“Drew . . .”
“Okay, yeah. Fine. Mom was there for most of it. And as I promised, I’ll tell you about it, but you need to finish your story first.”
“It’s bad.” I sound like a five-year-old as I say it. “From that point there isn’t much to tell other than I started working for both him and his dad Morgan. Stupid me was so grateful for a new lease on life, and the way he treated my mom . . . I should’ve pushed for the proof of his innocence he claimed to have, but I felt like it made me an ungrateful bitch—”
“Is that why you’re not pushing for my proof? Because you feel indebted?”
I blink at his question and my chest feels tight at his clear uncertainty. “No, baby. No. I swear. With him, there was something slightly off from the beginning, but not enough to ring any obvious alarms, so yeah I felt indebted and kept the question to myself.” Cupping his jaw, I lean in to kiss the corner of his mouth. “With you . . . it’s weird, because I was convinced you were guilty for so long, but now it’s so different. I can’t shake the certainty that you’re innocent.”
He clutches me to him, tense, vibrating, as if consumed by gratitude as that. “Then go on,” he urges in a sexy, low grumble that almost makes me want to distract him with my body instead.
Or maybe it’s the hunger that keeps growing, demanding that connection with him.
It wasn’t enough earlier. This love demands more, and more, until I’m gorged on it, and even then it probably won’t be enough.
At my hesitation, Drew prompts me, “When’s the first time he hurt you?”
“A year into my working with him. But it began with him flirting with me and at first it wasn’t obvious, just made me uncomfortable.”
He tenses again, this time with repressed violence. “And . . .”
Shaking, I dig inside my core for the resolve I need to do this to him.
To do it to myself.
“Then . . . about a year-in-a-half into my working for him, he snuck into our apartment inside the building and . . . and he injected my mom in her sleep. Drugged her. Right after . . . right after he came into my room.”
chapter 28
t he door to my room opens and the sound yanks me out of my sleep.
Rolling over in the bed, I rub at my eyes, just as the door is immediately closed. “Mom?” No response.
Squinting, I sit up, trying to see past the oppressing darkness. One thing about this place? High-end from top to bottom. The blackout curtains are truly blackout curtains and the walls so thick the entire place might as well be soundproof. “Mom, what’s going on?”
“I made sure she’ll stay asleep, baby,” a rough voice replies from the shadows.
The panic is instant. As instant as the recognition that hits my veins. Struggling to control my breathing, I sit up the whole way. “Stephen, what are you doing here? What do you mean you made sure she’ll stay asleep? What’s going on?”
The bed dips with his weight and his speech is slightly slurring as he replies. “Injected her with something, baby, but don’t worry. It’ll just . . . help her sleep.” His hand lands on my thigh.
A whimper is ripped from me and a devastating premonition screams to life. “Stephen!” I’m in nothing but a tank top and my panties, how I always sleep at night. His hand is hot and clammy along my thigh, fingers digging punishingly into the flesh.
As if he has no plans to let me go.
“It’s time, baby. No more of these games.” Suddenly he’s on the bed, right on top of me!
“Stephen, wh-what—oh God, please! Get off!” It’s dark, I can’t see, but his hands are everywhere. I can’t get him off.
“Stay still, Lexi,” he pants into my ear.
Revulsion nearly suffocates me.
I kick, flail, scream. He doesn’t stop and I know no one will hear me! Not here, in this hidden room, in his massive skyscraper, in the middle of the night.
My panties are ripped off. Teeth chattering from the fear, I start sobbing. “P-please. I’ve never had sex.” Unbidden, Andrew Drevlow’s face flashes through my mind and I start crying harder.
Stephen forces himself between my legs, but I keep fighting, nearly hyperventilating. “Let me have what’s mine, Lexi!”
The blow to my face stuns me.
By the time I come back to, I feel something hot pressing against my entrance—a single hard thrust and I’m screaming at the top of my lungs as my pussy tears around the invasion. “Stop! No! STOP!”
Grunting, he presses into me all the way, shuddering. “God damn, you’re amazing.”
I continue struggling against him, hot tears drenching the sides of my face, and each move unleashes unstoppable waves of fiery agony. “W-why are you doing this to me? Please. Please.” It registers in the back of my head that he must be skin-to-skin with me. I’ve never had sex but it doesn’t feel like he’s wearing a condom. “Stephen, don’t take this from me,” I beg, although it’s too late. The pain of my tearing skin is a reminder he’s already taken it from me.
My virginity.
The one I still yearned to give to Andrew, although I never admitted it to myself.
Thinking his name makes me cry harder. No matter what he did to me, I know, I just know, he would’ve never done this to me. Ever.
Stephen’s hips flex, ripping another shout from me. He leans down, breath hot and smelling of pure liquor along my lips. Lips that he ghosts, an almost loving caress.
Nause
ous, I turn my throbbing face away.
Growling with fury, he cups my chin and forces my face back to him. “You better not be fucking thinking about him right now, Lexi.” He tries to kiss me.
My fear, my despair, the physical anguish of his forced invasion, it all coalesces in me, unleashing the most destructive wrath I’ve ever felt in my life. Rearing up, I bite him as hard as I can, funneling all of it into the act.
With a harsh curse, he snaps away—
And slams his fist into my face again, this time on the left side.
My head jerks on the pillow and I lose the ability to breathe. Despite that, despite the fact he can kill me as he rapes me if so chooses, I find a way to spit out, “Andrew would never do this to me.”
His hand wraps around my throat, squeezing down, robbing the last of my breath. “Don’t you dare mention his fucking name right now.” And he sets in, his hand a vice around my neck, his hips pounding at me until pinpricks of light flash in my vision. “This is mine. You’re mine. He’ll never. Fucking. Have. You. Again.”
Incapable of letting him get away with this, I claw at any part of him I can, even as he adds another hand and chokes me, using the hold to work me back and forth on his dick. He lets up just enough to stop me from passing out, to deny me the sweet oblivion of unconsciousness, but I make him pay for every moment I’m still awake.
I’m slapped a few more times, yet I can’t even process the pain anymore.
Only the hate.
It’s all I’ll ever feel going forward.
Towards him.
Towards myself for trusting him!
Stephen jerks, losing coordination.
Horror hits once more as I realize what’s happening, that this monster is coming inside me and I’m not even on birth control . . .
He’s off me as soon as he’s done.
I feel the fluid drip out of me and something in my mind snaps. I want to rear off this bed, find the nearest weapon and kill him. The urge is more than I can handle. The pain between my legs makes that impossible and all I can manage is curling on my side, heaving through the tears. “Yo-you’ll pay for this, Stephen.”
Mortal Siege Page 10