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You need not be sorry for her. She was one of the kind that likes to grow up. In the end, she grew up of her own free will a day quicker than the other girls. —J. M. Barrie, Peter Pan
This wasn’t my room. Was I dreaming?
Please, no cannibals. Please, no cannibals.
“Why am I not locked in my room?”
What the hell was he talking about? We’re not allowed around the women.
“The locations change,” he said, and I backed up a step for every step toward me he took. “But the name stays the same. Blackchurch.”
What was Blackchurch?
“You shouldn’t be so close to us. They never let the females close to us.”
They never let the females close to us. My God, why?
“No women, no communication with the world,” he went on. “No drugs, liquor, or smokes, either.” “What is Blackchurch?” I asked. “A prison.”
“Some important people can’t have their sons—their heirs—making news by going to jail or rehab or being caught doing their dirty deeds,” he explained. “When we become liabilities, we’re sent here to cool off. Sometimes for months.” He sighed again. “And some of us for years.”
It was like Lord of the Flies but with dinner jackets.
“What is that?” I asked. Wolves? The sounds were getting closer.
“The hunting party,” he replied. “They must be back early.” The hunting party. Will.
“Please, do run,” he said. “We’re dying for some fun.”
This wasn’t happening. There had to be surveillance. I refused to believe Mommy and Daddy sent their heirs and assets here without some kind of insurance that they’d be safe. What if someone were injured? Or gravely ill?
He didn’t have any tattoos the last time I saw him. The night he was arrested.
“Don’t you want to explain?” “Would it matter?” He shook his head. I gulped. Yeah, didn’t think so. He served two-and-a-half years in prison because of me. And not just him. His best friends, Damon Torrance and Kai Mori, too. I dropped my eyes for a moment, knowing he didn’t deserve it, but I also knew I wouldn’t have done anything differently if I could.
I’d told him to stay away from me. I’d warned him.
“I wish I’d never met you,” I said, almost whispering. He stopped, glass grinding under him. “Believe me, girl,...
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This sucked. I was going to pay for this. It wasn’t over. I knew that. But I had no choice.
He was going to find out. He wouldn’t want me to quit swimming, and pointing out why I had to would only make him angrier.
Great. Emory Scott was a pervert. That’s what he’d say. Just what I needed.
I didn’t have to look up to see their dark hair, and I could always tell who was who without checking because Kai smelled like amber musk and the ocean, while Damon smelled like an ashtray.
Assholes. My brother’s phone rang all damn night last night because of that prank. And when he’s aggravated, he shows it.
Will, Kai, Damon, and Michael. The Four Horsemen. I just loved the nicknames the little wannabe gangsters gave themselves in high school, but someone should really tell them it wasn’t scary when you had to tell everyone how scary you were.
“I know I may seem like the nicest one, and you probably think I regret the shit I give you sometimes, and someday I’ll wake up and reevaluate my life and its purpose, but I won’t. I sleep like a baby at night.” “You wake every two hours and cry?” I asked.
“Don’t you know that you can have anything you want?” His eyes searched mine. “I’ll hurt anyone for you.”
“Who is it?” he asked. “Who do I have to hurt?”
Why did he do this? He’d soften and tempt me with the fantasy that I wasn’t alone and maybe—possibly—there was hope.
“God, please,” I finally said. “Get yourself a life, Will Grayson. You’re pathetic.”
Kai was kind of my favorite Horseman, if I had to pick one.
You broke my life.
“She willingly indulged him,” he argued. “Yeah, it was wrong, but this is an issue today. Women can’t just decide after the fact that they were abused. She was willingly sexual with him.” “Minors can’t consent,” Kai pointed out. “What, so you magically become emotionally and mentally mature when you turn eighteen?” Will replied, suddenly entering the conversation. “Just happens overnight, does it?” “She was a child, Will.” Kai turned in his seat, debating his friend. “In Humbert’s head, he demands sympathy from us, and most readers give it, because he tells them to. Because we’re willing to
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“He doesn’t have a thing for Lo,” Kai continued. “He has a thing for young girls. It’s not an isolated incident. She was abused.”
“And she left him to go shack up with a child pornographer, Kai,” Will spat out. “If she were being abused, why didn’t she have the sense to not put herself back in that situation?”
“Abuse can feel like love.” I blinked, the voice so close that my ears tingled. Slowly, I raised my eyes to look at the side of Damon Torrance’s face, his shirt wrinkled, and his tie draped around his neck. The whole class fell silent, and I glanced at Will next to me, seeing his eyebrows pinched together as he looked at the back of his friend’s head. Mr. Townsend approached. “‘Abuse can feel like love . . .’” he repeated. “Why?” Damon remained so still it didn’t look like he was breathing. He looked at the teacher, unwavering. “Starving people will eat anything.”
Grand-Mère. The one person who meant everything to me. For her, I stayed.
You’re not special, so don’t get confused, girl.
“I promise you . . .” I growled low. “However much you don’t like me, there is still so much more to come if you don’t . . .” I pulled my license and card holder out of his hand, whispering, “ . . .Stop pulling me over.”
I was tired of playing in the catacombs, but Damon didn’t like to play alone. He needed me. I liked someone needing me.
“You wanna fuck me, too?” I said in a low voice, a soft smile tilting the corner of my mouth. He grinned, still not looking at me. But surprisingly, he replied, “Sometimes.”
Aw, what a gesture. Flexing his muscles to prove he had the strength of a playground bully and the moral compass of a tube sock.
When the bus stops, get in my fucking truck. I breathed out a bitter laugh. Aw, someone’s lost his temper. Why? I asked. The next thing I know, the bus stopped, he yanked the earbuds out of my ears, and I sucked in a breath as he leaned into my face. “Because you’re mine,” he growled in a whisper.
“I think that’s why I’ve always liked this time of day best. People hide in the dark. They quench their thirsts in the dark. They build their secrets in the dark. We’re more ourselves here than anywhere else. I get to be me”—he swallowed, staring at me—“when nightfall is coming.”
“Come here,” he said again. I absently shook my head. “Why?” “Because I’m your man.”
“You don’t have to be nice. Not until the end of the movie.”
“Has Will seen the bruises?” I tensed. “Be prepared for what’s going to happen when he does,” he warned. “And what can happen to him if he goes up against a cop.”
“But you’re going to be fucking mine someday,” he growled. “Come hell or high water, Emory Scott. You’re my woman, and you’re going to come home to me every day and sit at my table and warm my fucking bed.” He kissed me. “And you’re going to give me a Will Grayson IV. Mark my words.”
“You’re Lilith,” he whispered against my skin. “You can’t be burned if you’re the flame.”
