by JA Huss
“He never came back.”
“He did, Sydney. He came back. You disappeared a few times. And those were just while I was watching. Who knows how many times he came and took you away when I wasn’t watching.”
I picture my life after Garrett left. I really wanted him to be dead. But a part of me always knew he wasn’t. “Sometimes I’d stay at the bar so many nights in a row, when I got home I’d just crash out.”
“Did you have insomnia?”
I’m on the couch now, but I don’t remember getting here. Case is sitting on one end and I’m lying down, taking up too much space. My feet are in his lap and he’s tracing a line up my ankle.
“Always.”
I have clothes on too. A man’s t-shirt. Black. And a pair of sweats. Gray. My feet are cold because I have no socks.
“So when you fell asleep, you’d just crash out? Did people at the bar miss you?”
“I have days off.”
He’s silent after that.
I slide my feet out of his lap and pull them up to my chest. I don’t want to be touched. The flames dance along inside the fireplace. I can see through to the other side. I picture my body lying there. This is his view of me. This is my view of me now too.
I close my eyes. Because I’m ugly.
The next time I open them, I’m back in my cell. I’m on a soft rug—not covered in vomit like the last one—so that’s an improvement.
The guitar music floats across the flames and soothes me. His fingers squeak along the strings. He strums and hums and I hear the lyrics in my head. It’s a song about nothing. About being nothing. About wanting nothing. About having nothing.
It’s a pretty good song.
“You hungry yet?” he says, his fingers never missing.
I close my eyes again. I’d like to think I’m Zen enough to want nothing. But I’m not. I want more.
“More what?” Case asks.
“Drugs.”
“I stopped the drugs two days ago, Sydney.”
I realize my hair is damp and I wonder how much I missed this time.
“We need to continue. I have more questions.”
“I have no more answers.”
“You have all the answers, Syd.”
I smile at him. Standing there out on the riverbank, pole in hand. “I thought you left me.” A sob escapes with the final word. “I’m so tired of being alone.”
Chapter Nineteen - Merc
“Words can be poems, or songs, or gifts. Words can also be threats, lies, and broken promises. You should learn the difference.” – Case
“Where would I go?” I ask her. She’s distant, as usual. But she’s talking again, so that’s good.
“It’s me who leaves.”
She’s gone. I’m not sure she’s got anything left to tell, and even if she does, I’m not sure any of it will be reliable.
I was in the army for four years. Just enough time to change the course of everything. I came straight out of South Boston, a strange kid with a mind most men would covet and a body that could be molded and trained to back his shit up.
I’m the first to admit I’m sick and twisted. Kicked out of every school in the neighborhood. Truant for weeks and months at a time. A blight on the schedules of every social worker I ever encountered. And yet here I am. A player.
Did they see that one coming? Did MIT, and Harvard, and Cambridge see that one coming?
Of course they did. That’s why they all wanted me.
And if people want you, your best bet is to turn and walk the other way.
The army was where my feet took me. One enlistment, one army general classification test, and one fucked-up mission later—not in the desert, no. In the US. That’s where I did all my field work. Where I did all my active duty.
That is what led me to this guy I am today.
They made so many mistakes with me. Letting me in the army was the first. But when someone like me shows up for a war and can wield the weapons they know exist, but don’t have enough manpower to use effectively, well, he’s in.
They reclassified me six times in the first six months after basic. Creamed their fucking panties with each promotion. Merric, they said. Merric Case is exactly the kind of man we require.
Garrett McGovern was that man too. We are alike in all the ways that count to career warmongers. But we are different in the only way that matters.
I work alone. I might call on friends for help in certain missions. But I work alone. There is no team in I.
I don’t think it ever occurred to them that I’d leave. Not after the success we had. Not even after the failure. What is failure to them, anyway? Just a temporary setback.
That’s what my leaving was too, I guess. Nothing but a temporary setback. Because they got me on new jobs even though I was a civilian. Time after time after time.
But the last time? That time I was sent to save Sydney and saved Sasha instead? That cut all the ties that bind.
Two girls. One mission. And the absolute worst possible outcome. For them, anyway.
Sydney is collateral damage. She is nothing more than a pawn. She is weak and pathetic in all the ways that Sasha is strong and brave.
I made the right choice that day. Sasha was the right choice. Sydney is just a leftover that needs to be swept under the rug.
But that job never ended. Not when I left her that day. Not when I helped Sasha get her revenge. Not when I stole hundreds of millions of dollars straight out of their deep fucking pockets.
It’s gonna end soon though. This is it. My end. Sydney’s end as well.
She stirs on the bed and I know she’s coming back again. This drifting she does, I have no clue what it means other than they did a good job on her. She’s given up nothing of real importance. Her release word is inconsequential in the long run. It’s a good first step. But is she even worth all the steps between here and victory?
I doubt it.
She turns over and places a hand on my leg. I’m sitting up in bed, smoking, as I let it all play out in my head. There were so many potential outcomes before she ran. But now there are only two.
I let her live. I let her die.
If I let her live and start working her for real, I get less than ideal intel. Less than reliable, I should say.
If I let her die as soon as that’s over, I can take what I want right now and sift through it objectively later.
Her hand slips down my leg and grabs my cock.
I react. I like sexy Sydney a little more than I’d like to admit. I grab her hands and flip her over on her stomach. She whimpers, but not in a bad way.
“I’ll take that hard fuck now, Syd.”
Chapter Twenty - Sydney
“I like the sting of reality. It reminds me I have no control over any of this.” – Sydney
Syd.
“Don’t call me—”
His hand wraps under and around my throat, not squeezing the breath from me, but cutting off my protests. “Let’s review, Sydney. I push your limits. You beg me for more. Got it?”
“Is this how you killed the other girls you were close with,” I squeak past his grip. “Pushing their limits? Is this how you’ll kill me? Begging you for more?”
“You can only hope.” A hand slips under my hips and I automatically lift them up to allow him access. “Because hey, if it’s your time to go, might as well go out screaming with pleasure instead of screaming in pain.”
“Ha. I know you didn’t kill those girls.”
“Then why start a fight?” He plays with my clit as he says the words.
I bite my lip and hold in the moan. “Because that’s what you want, right? The fight? That’s what turns you on? Garrett likes submission. But that’s how the two of you are different. You like the fight.”
He yanks my hair so hard I cry out. I try to look up to gauge his reaction to my words, but he holds the hair close to my scalp, preventing me from seeing his face as he leans into my shoulder and whispers in my e
ar. “Don’t compare me to him. We parted ways for a reason. We’re not the same, wildcat. He kills by accident. I kill with purpose.”
The words tickle my ear and I shudder. Not from his fingers, still doing that very thrilling circular motion over my sweet spot, but from the fact that he didn’t deny killing the other girls even though I know he didn’t. I feel a small surge of power. “So you’re saying you did kill them?”
“What do you know about them?”
“I know they were your girlfriends. I know they went missing. And I know you didn’t kill them. You sent them away.”
He chuckles a little. He sounds almost normal when he does it, too, like it really is funny. “You know nothing.”
“I know you didn’t kill them because I was there when Garrett did.”
Case goes still above me.
“He knew you set it up to make it look like they went missing. But he found them. Long time ago, Case. He found them and brought them up into the mountains where we were staying, and he made me watch.”
“You’re lying.”
“He took a picture of me with a blood-covered knife to the one girl’s throat.”
“Liar.”
“He said he was gonna send it to you if I didn’t do as I was told. And then you’d come take care of me for him. And isn’t that funny? That you threaten to kill Brett if I don’t do what you say? You and Garrett are more alike than you think, Case. You just can’t bring yourself to admit it.”
There is a brief moment of silence and during these microseconds, I tell myself I didn’t actually say that.
Case’s fist crashes against my head, dragging me far away from that delusional wish. I see the blackness before he even starts squeezing my throat. I grab at him, buck my back and try to get him off me, cursing myself for being in such a submissive position in the first place. He flips me over, but instead of more blows, he gets up, spreads my legs and eases himself between them.
I hold my breath.
He licks me. He licks and kisses each of the poke marks he made on my upper thighs with his knife. “Did that hurt?” he asks.
“What do you think?”
“I think you liked it. I think you wanted more.” He grins at me between my legs. “I think you want me to do more right now.”
He does more. His mouth reaches higher, his hands gripping my legs a little bit tighter as his head moves towards my pussy.
I don’t move.
He looks up as he hikes my knees up to my face and sweeps his tongue across my folds. His lips part and then he sucks my clit into his mouth. Not hard and demanding, but with just the right amount of swirling pressure to make me moan out and arch my back. No one has ever licked me there before.
He slips in a finger and teases me in two ways now. This feels so good, I have to close my eyes to block him out.
“You still wanna fight me, wildcat? You still want to have that conversation?”
But I don’t. I said too much. So I bite my lip and tip my head back, enjoying it.
“You got it all wrong, Syd.” I hate that he calls me that. “I already told you. The hard fuck is hard on you because I push your limits. Not because I fuck you hard.”
“So push me,” I whisper. “Throw me over the edge of the cliff, Case. And if you want to kill me in the process, well, I’d love for my end to be filled with so much irony.”
He never responds. Or he does respond, but not with words. The time for talking is over.
He gets up and stands next to the bed. I watch the muscles in his arms move as he drops his pants and steps out of them, giving them a swift kick across the floor.
I never even try to get away. It’s just not in my nature. I’ve been waiting for this moment. And I even take it one step further and lift both arms over my head and grab hold of the rusted iron headboard.
The crooked smile on his face says this was a good move.
We are players. We are playing.
I track his body, watching the fluid moment of what makes him so dangerous, as he walks to the foot of the bed, grabs my ankles, and pulls me so hard my shoulders cry out in pain before I have the good sense to let go of the headboard.
My body is twirled around and positioned until my head is hanging off the end of the mattress. His cock is right in front of my face, but I meet his gaze. His amber eyes are glowing from the dying firelight that leaks in from the other room.
I wait for the questions to start. He must have so many.
But he is silent as he eases his cock into my mouth. It slips to the back of my throat and my hands are instinctively there, telling him to stop.
“Shhh,” he says, reminding me I have no say in the gentlest of ways. He takes each of my hands in his and laces our fingers together, giving me a squeeze of encouragement as he pushes past my limit.
I gag, but breathe through it the way Garrett taught me. And that was my yes.
He fucks my mouth until I am choking on my own spit. But instead of withdrawing when I feel like I will drown on my own saliva, he simply turns my head to the side and lets it fall out of my mouth.
His hands never let go of mine. I never try to stop him again.
He keeps going, my head bobbing back and forth against the side of the mattress until I’m dizzy. And then he releases down my throat and holds me down with my own hands until I swallow.
Only then does he release me and back away, never taking his eyes off mine.
I hold that stare and wait for a signal like Garrett used to give.
“I’m waiting, bobcat,” he says.
I cringe at the name. It’s so degrading. But I’m running on instincts now. The training has taken over and I’m powerless to stop it, even if I wanted to. And I don’t. So, “More, please,” is my response.
“More what?”
“Take it all, Case. You told me eight years ago you owned me. So take it. Take me. Take me the way you promised when you left me behind to die.”
His hands are under my shoulders, urging me to sit up. I comply. Because that’s my job here tonight. And then he grabs my hair and turns me around so my head is at the top of the bed once more. I grab the rusty rails and open my legs, inviting him in.
He slaps my tit, then my face, holding it in a tight squeeze. So hard I bite my tongue and taste blood. “Whore,” he whispers.
“Your whore,” I whisper back.
“Don’t fucking forget it.”
“It’s my purpose in life, Case.”
He slaps my face again, but I like the sting. I like the sting and I like the way his cock drags across my clit now that he’s on top of me.
His tip pushes against my pussy and even though I’m scared out of my mind, I ache for it. He thrusts inside me and I grip the rails harder. I close my eyes, but another slap brings me back to attention. He pumps inside of me, his huge cock stretching me so wide the tears fall down my face.
But then he pauses long enough to lie down next to me and turn me on my side. His hand eases down to my clit and he begins to strum as he fucks me. He plays me like the guitar. And I play him back—like a player.
I swell with feelings. I have never felt such emotion. Such hate and love. Such pain and pleasure.
I come like that. A conflict of emotions. A paradox. Simultaneously filled up and empty at the same time.
He pulls out and comes with me, once again shooting hot semen across my back in long squirts.
He rolls over, breathing heavier than I am. I turn to watch his reaction. His revelation, if you will. And I get something I never expected. A smile. “It’s not a hard fuck if it’s easy, Syd.”
“I’m a good little actress, Case. This is the hardest thing I’ve ever done.” My eyes dart down to his cock, still erect, even after coming twice in the span of twenty minutes.
I look up, quick enough to catch his gaze dropping to where mine went. There’s a hint of confusion on his face as he sees the proof of what I told him.
“What the fuck?” He looks up from the
blood covering his dick and finds my face. “What the fuck?”
“I told you,” I say in a hushed voice. The voice of trickery and lies. The voice of abuse and pain. The voice of the hush. “Garrett saved me for you, Case. He said to tell you to consider me a gift. For making you kill that girl.” I don’t want to add the rest. But I do anyway. I’ve practiced it enough times for it to roll off my tongue like water. “For making you kill her before you got a chance to fuck the virgin out of her.”
He’s quick to respond, I’ll give him that. Because he’s got that syringe out of the bedside table faster than I can turn away. He shoots it into my arm as I gaze up into his eyes. “Don’t feel bad,” I say as the sting of the drugs shoots through my muscle. “It was always you, Case.”
“What the fuck are you talking about?”
“My dream guy. The one who taught me how to save myself. The one who came back after you left me there to die. He was always you.”
Chapter Twenty-One - Sydney
“It’s easy to hide in the dark. But the reckoning always comes in the light.” – Sydney
It’s dark. It’s cold. And I’m alone. Not alone like he’s in the other room. But alone alone. Like he’s gone.
And can I blame him?
My stomach cramps so bad, I force myself to sit up and throw my feet over the side. I need to get to the bathroom. But as soon as I stand up and step forward, the blackness threatens to take over.
Fuck that. I refuse to soil myself one more time. I’ve been drugged for so long, I have no idea how many disgusting acts my body has committed over the course of this ordeal. But it’s over now. So I force myself to shuffle out the door, which is open, and into the bathroom. I don’t bother flicking on the lights, just sit on the toilet and relieve myself.
When I’m done, I run a bath in the dark and then go start a fire in the fireplace. There’s a package on the couch. I rip the brown paper open and take out a pair of white snow pants and a white ski jacket. White gloves, hat, scarf, and boots. There’s also a pair of jeans that is close enough to my size, a long-sleeved shirt, and a set of keys.