Limit

by McAdams, Molly

  My heart skipped a beat before taking off at a torturous pace.

  “So, you don’t have any doubts about what I think . . . I think you’re spoiled and judgmental and your attitude pushes me in a way nothing ever has. I think you’re passionate and loyal and so goddamn charismatic, and all of it combined is fucking addicting.” His stare dipped over me before shifting straight ahead. “But if you don’t go to your room, I’m gonna do something I can’t come back from.”

  I wasn’t sure I could breathe, let alone move.

  I also wasn’t sure I wanted to.

  “Sutton, I need you to go.” The warmth and need in his voice said the opposite.

  I pulled my bottom lip between my teeth as I fought with what I knew I should do and what we both clearly wanted—what couldn’t happen.

  I dragged in a sharp inhale when he reached out and gently pulled my lip free before smoothing it over with his thumb.

  “Go.” It was a rough, dark plea that I felt all the way to my core.

  Curling my hand around his, I slowly pulled it away from my face and shifted to my feet again.

  Before I stood, I confessed, “I was wrong about you in every way. You are kind and caring and everything I could only ever wish to be.”

  With each step away from him, I hoped he would stop me.

  But that hope died a little more the closer I got to my room.

  I could feel my disappointment and want echoed back at me from him. Still, I didn’t allow myself to turn. If I did, I would do exactly what Conor had said.

  Something I couldn’t come back from.

  Conor

  “You have to let me do something,” Sutton yelled in exasperation the next day.

  Lexi giggled.

  I just watched as Sutton paced in a tight circle.

  For most of the thirty minutes we’d been working on defense, she had been pacing, irritated that I hadn’t let her get a hit in.

  Once she was facing me with that frustrated and determined look in her eyes, I stretched out my arms. “That isn’t going to help you. You should know this by now. If I let you get away with things now, then you’ll expect it to go right if the real thing happens.”

  “But it will make me feel better,” she grumbled.

  “You done trying your way?”

  Her face fell. “That whole . . . this whole time you’ve only been letting me—” Her mouth opened and shut a few times before a frustrated huff left her.

  “Are you going to charge someone again?”

  “Not after what I went through the other day.”

  I gave her a pointed look. “And I’m betting you won’t try any of the things you’ve been doing today.”

  Her eyes narrowed in a way that held none of her normal attitude and was fucking adorable.

  “Come here.”

  She held her glare for a few moments before relenting with a sigh and trudging over. I closed some of the distance she’d left between us, and immediately felt the charge in the air, just as I noticed the shift in her expression.

  The way her eyes darted to where Lexi was sitting, watching us.

  The way her cheeks stained pink.

  The want and confusion and rejection that splashed across her face before she could hide it.

  She cleared her throat when I grabbed one of her hands in mine.

  “I’m sure you’ve heard things before. Hitting stomachs. Stomping on feet. Punching noses.” I didn’t miss the way she flinched at that last one. “I’ll hit you back if you knee me in the balls, but I doubt you’ll get a shot in since you always give yourself away.”

  She blinked quickly and looked from our joined hands to me. “I do not.”

  “How do you think I pushed you away both times you tried?”

  Her mouth stayed open as her eyes drifted away, remembering that first day. “Because you’re unusually good at this?”

  My chest moved with a silent laugh as I pulled her hand higher up. “Forget most of the things you’ve heard. A hit to the groin, yeah, that’ll stop a guy. But if he’s determined to get you, that’ll only slow him down for about a second. Everything else I mentioned is only going to piss him off because he already has so much adrenaline pumping through him for it to faze him. Got it?”

  Her slender neck moved with her forced swallow. “Then how am I supposed to fight?”

  I tightened my grip on her hand. “With this. And this.” I brushed my thumb against her bottom lip and wondered if she noticed the way I lingered there. Unable to move on.

  “My lips?” she asked breathlessly.

  Yeah, she noticed.

  I was also pretty damn sure she could bring me to my knees with those lips.

  “Your mouth. Your teeth. That’s the easy one, so we’ll do it first. If you can’t get away from someone’s hold, bite. Don’t bite to hurt, bite to tear. Understand?”

  “Oh, that’s disgusting.”

  “It can also save your life.”

  “Got it.” She was nodding, but all the blood had drained from her face. “Be a zombie.”

  “Now, your hands.” I grabbed the other and lifted it so they were at eye level with her, and then tapped her thumbs. “You can dig out eyes.”

  “Christ, why?” Her hands fell, and she rocked back a step. “Why are these all so gross?”

  I pulled her back by her hands and lifted them to where they had been, but I didn’t release her. “Because the chances of someone as small as you choking out someone as big as me are slim. The chances of you outrunning me? Sutton, you won’t.”

  I hated that I’d put the shuttered look in her eyes. There was no doubt her mind had gone to Zachary. But even if she’d grown up in my world, being chased and captured was what she needed to worry about most.

  “If you ever find yourself in a situation where you need to defend yourself, you have to expect that you’ll be caught. And when you are, there are things you can do. These are the last resorts if you can’t get away.”

  Her head moved in a faint nod.

  I turned her around and pulled her into my arms.

  I didn’t miss her soft gasp or the chills that raced up her arms or the electricity buzzing between us, but I knew I had to ignore it.

  “If you’re back to chest, you want to turn. There’s only so much you can do like this, and even if you get out of a hold, the attacker can grab you again.” Wrapping my arms around her chest, I forced myself to breathe and tried like hell not to think of the way she felt.

  Tipping her head back and kissing her wasn’t an option.

  Telling her I regretted asking her to leave last night would only make this worse.

  “She’s it, or she isn’t.”

  “Broaden your stance and brace yourself so I can’t buckle your knees,” I finally said, long after I’d started holding her, and nudged her legs further apart. “If you end up like this and don’t think you can move, use the attacker’s hands. Snap their thumbs or use the nerves in their wrists. It makes them lose control of their hands, and their grip will loosen so you can turn in their arms.”

  Taking her hand in mine, I showed her how to use the pressure point in my wrist.

  With each second, her breaths grew heavier and my head got closer to her skin until my nose was skimming the side of her neck.

  Once she got the hang of it, I whispered, “This is where you turn.”

  A stuttered breath punched from her chest. “Right.”

  As soon as she did, I locked my arms around her back, keeping her close.

  I told myself not to notice the way her breasts pressed against me with each of her rough breaths.

  It was the sweetest agony I’d ever endured.

  “Keep your arms up,” I said, my voice strained. “Make sure they don’t get pinned at your sides or between you and the attacker. Then they’re free to do, or help you do, any of the gross things. Or start punching.”

  Her hands fell to my chest along with her expression. “I thought you said to forget a
bout punching.”

  I released my hold on her to grab her hand and then formed it into a fist before loosening it into an open palm. Each time showing her before doing both again. “If you’re going to hit, know where to hit. Go for the throat, try to break the trachea.”

  “So, all I have to do is turn around and punch you in the throat?”

  A deep laugh burst from my chest. “You can try.”

  I turned her so her back was against me and wrapped my arms tight around her.

  Flashes of her underneath me and against a wall assaulted me as I curled my hands around her slender wrists.

  A groan rumbled in my chest at her soft gasp, at the way she pushed back harder.

  I was stuck in hell and pressed against heaven.

  Dropping my mouth to her ear, I silently cursed everything standing between us when she shivered. “Let’s go.”

  Sutton

  Five Years Ago . . .

  My brow furrowed when I glanced at the nursery room window as I pulled up the driveway.

  It was habit to look at that window.

  The room it looked into had turned into my favorite in the house, and it was filled with tears and love and more joy than I’d ever known was possible. That room made this home.

  But the light should’ve been off at this time of night unless Lexi was fighting sleep or fussing because she was growing.

  But, if that were the case, I was sure Zachary would’ve called.

  He always got so angry when she woke late at night, which was why I couldn’t believe he’d given me an entire night out with my girlfriends without calling to complain or asking a hundred questions.

  Then again, after nearly a year of either being locked up in the house or going everywhere with a newborn, I so deserved this.

  I hurried into the house from the garage, eager to see my Lexi if she was up and having trouble tonight, but I came to an abrupt stop when I rounded the corner of the hall leading into the large entryway and found Zachary standing at the foot of the stairs.

  Tall and broad and commanding, and as if he’d been waiting for me.

  “H-hi.” My eyes flitted to the top of the stairs, to the silence up there, and then back to him. “I thought—”

  A chill crept over me, sliding down my spine like an alarming caress.

  Before that moment, I hadn’t really looked at Zachary. But once I did, I couldn’t stop.

  His smile was cruel and cold, and his eyes had this darkness about them that made him look deranged.

  He looked like a monster.

  “Zachary?” I took a hesitant step back, but my soul reached for the staircase, for the room up it and all the way down the hall.

  “Let’s play a game.”

  “I don’t—I don’t want to. I’m tired. I want to check on Lexi and then go to bed.” When there wasn’t a response of any kind, I risked a step in his direction. And then another.

  Each step had that chill spreading and increasing, but something in me told me I needed to get past him.

  The moment I made it to his side, his arm shot out and wrapped around my waist.

  Firm, possessive, and almost painful. “Zach—” I tripped and fell out of one of my stilettos as he hauled me against his chest.

  His mouth went to my neck, and his other hand went to my breast.

  Kneading and gripping until I was crying out in pain.

  “Zachary, stop.”

  “Let’s play a game.”

  “I said no.” I drove my elbow into his stomach and shoved, but he hardly budged. “What is wrong with you tonight?”

  His teeth raked across my neck so roughly it made the room spin and my stomach churn.

  Before I could attempt to push him away again, he said, “Let’s play a game called Where’s the Baby.”

  Time slowed.

  Panic engulfed me, threatening to take me under.

  Whoever he was, the man holding me was not my husband.

  I swung my attention to him. My plea was nearly inaudible. “Zachary, where is Lexi?”

  That smile grew, brightening his monstrous eyes.

  I turned for the stairs, already screaming her name as he yanked me back.

  Zachary’s hand was on my face, his fingers digging into my cheeks. Seconds disguised as an eternity passed as he studied me, his erection pressing firmly against my stomach. “Run, Sutton. I can’t wait to find you.”

  The second he shoved me away, I turned, running and screaming and kicking off my remaining shoe as I went.

  The stairs felt never ending. Each step creating three more above it, taunting me. And once I reached the top, the hardwood felt as if it were made of quicksand.

  I’d barely made it three steps before Zachary’s voice rang out from the foyer.

  “Sutton.”

  One word.

  My name.

  In a voice I knew but had never heard. A voice as wicked as it was threatening.

  My body betrayed me as I reacted to that sinister tone and fell to my hands and knees. Shaking and shaking with failing limbs and muscles.

  The ominous pressure clinging to the walls made it nearly impossible to breathe.

  I crawled a few steps before finally regaining the strength in my legs and pushing to my feet. Then I ran for Lexi’s room.

  I nearly cried in relief when I reached it, but the victory was short-lived because the room was empty.

  “Lexi!”

  I turned in circles, looking everywhere, before tearing out of that room and heading for the room across the hall.

  Nothing.

  The bathroom. The linen closet.

  Nothing. Nothing.

  “Oh, Sutton.” Closer. Near the top of the stairs.

  My legs trembled and threatened to give again, but I remained standing as I ran for our bedroom.

  I slid through the doorway as Zachary reached one of the last steps.

  My frantic search turned crippling when our room showed no signs of Lexi, and I moved to the bathroom. There was still the main floor of the house, but I would have to go past—

  I jerked when there was a loud thud against one of the walls.

  “Oh, Sutton . . .”

  I turned and nearly jumped when there was another loud thud against the wall.

  This one farther from me but closer to the bedroom door.

  I shakily retreated until I was pressed to the vanity, tears pouring down my cheeks, and dropped to a low crouch as I listened to him hit the wall farther and farther away—and yet, closer and closer.

  There was something sinister in the knocking.

  As if he were taunting me with the fact that, no matter how slowly he followed me, he was going to catch up with me.

  A sob ripped from me when he entered my line of sight in the bedroom. “Where’s Lexi, where’s Lexi, where’s my baby?”

  “Found you.”

  “Where’s my daughter?” I screamed.

  Nothing.

  Nothing more than that slow walk that had me fearing for my life.

  I screamed and swung at him when he grabbed me, lifting me and dragging me out of the bathroom. Incoherent pleas for our daughter and for him to stop tore from my lungs as he shoved me onto the bed.

  Even as he tore at my shirt and roughly removed my shorts, my screams never ceased, and I never stopped trying to get away from him.

  Hitting.

  Clawing.

  Kicking.

  That frightening look on his face only seemed to grow, as though my fight were exciting him even more.

  Until I punched him in the nose.

  Blood pooled.

  His eyes narrowed with a nauseating mixture of want and bloodlust.

  “Tell me where my daughter is,” I begged.

  Zachary’s head tilted, as if he couldn’t understand why I was asking. “At your parents’.”

  My mind raced. “Is she . . . is she safe? Is she okay?”

  “Why wouldn’t she be?”

  Relief filled
and overwhelmed me so swiftly that I forgot everything else for that brief moment.

  Brief.

  Then there was pain, and that damn face was staring down at me like he was enjoying that he’d just stolen my breath. That he was hurting me.

  “Stop, stop, stop,” I cried out and tried to shove him away. “Za—that hurts.”

  I tried to scramble away, but he only yanked me closer.

  I tried to claw at his arm, but he only restrained me.

  I tried to kick him, but he only slid his hand around my neck, squeezing and squeezing and squeezing.

  My body tried to rebel against what he was doing, and that only made him go harder.

  Stop, I tried to mouth.

  “You want nothing because I give you everything,” he said in a perfectly clear voice. “You always talk about taking care of your husband and giving for your husband.” Lowering his face to mine, he pressed a deceptively soft kiss to my parted lips. “This is how you take care of me.”

  The hand around my throat disappeared.

  My next inhale sounded like a scream.

  “Zachary p-please. It’s too—”

  He hushed me and brushed a finger over my lips. “Know your place, Sutton.”

  Tears fell relentlessly as he used me over and over again until he left me alone on the bed. Aching. Bruised. Bleeding.

  Long after he was gone, my eyes were still squeezed tight, my lips faintly moving. Please, God, let me disappear. Please, God, let me disappear.

  Conor

  My eyelids opened to a darkened room.

  My arms were folded tightly over my chest.

  My breathing was slow, and my heartbeat soft, so I should have been able to hear what had woken me . . . but there was nothing.

  Nothing was out of place. There were no feelings creeping through the suite, hinting that something was about to go so fucking wrong.

  There was a tugging deep in my gut, telling me I needed to stay awake.

  I pushed to sitting and ran a hand over my face before looking around the room as I reached for my gun. I turned the safety off and chambered a round as I stood. Held it down by my side as I went around the suite, checking the door and my room before heading toward the girls’ room.