Page 55 of The Road to Ruined

I blink, sending a silent tear rolling down my good cheek. She wipes it away with her thumb and then sucks it into her mouth.

"I'm going to help you with something." Her hand dips into the waistband of my pants and inside my underwear. Her fingers run over my clit before she pushes them inside me, and I gasp. Before I can push her away, she grabs me by the handcuffs and pulls me in tighter.

"Don't fight it," she warns. "You'll like it if you relax, and if you don't, I'll use the gun. Got it?"

I don't reply, but I relax a little. I don't want her to get her hands on the gun.

"I'm going to help you get nice and wet—that'll make it easier for you. And then…maybe you can help me, too," she says, moving her fingers in and out of me. "You won't tell him, right? I'll make sure they take good care of you. I can do that, you know."

She's lying. But I almost feel sorry for her…and her fingers feel good. Feeling my body give in, she releases the grip on my shoulder and kicks my feet further apart. "There you go…feels good, doesn't it? You're getting nice and wet now. I am, too." She moves her wet fingers out of me and onto my clit, rubbing it back and forth, and I moan, gripping the side of the sink. "This is how I want you to touch me," she says, increasing the speed. She sets the gun on the toilet behind her, pushes her shorts down over her hips, and moves my hand between her legs. "Touch me just like I'm touching you. I'll come fast. My clit is so sensitive, and you're really fucking pretty."

She is soaking wet—maybe she will come fast. I take two fingers and rub her clit the same way she's touching me and watch her knees almost instantly buckle.

"Oh, f-fuck," she whispers. She places her free hand against the wall on the other side of my head for leverage. "Just like that. Oh, that's good."

She leans in, kissing me, her tongue running over my lips and dipping into my mouth while we work each other's pussies, and I can't stop myself from thinking of how much prettier she'll look once she's covered in blood. I bury a moan into her mouth at the thought.

"Don't make any noise," she whispers. "Don't make any noise when you come."

I bite my lip and explode, thighs flexing, gritting my teeth as I bury my heaving breath into her shoulder. Once it rolls through me, she grasps my wrist with her hand and rocks her hips against my fingers.

"Oh, yes…" she moans, leaning into me and shuddering with her own release.

"See?" she says. "That wasn't so bad. I'll ask the guards not to rape you tonight, and I'll come down and bring you some water later, and we can do it again. They never let them have water. It's the easiest way to keep them weak. Matilda made strawberry pie, and if you eat me, I'll bring you some."

She takes a couple of steps backward, grabs some toilet paper from the roll, and then bends down to wipe herself clean.

Both of her hands are occupied. She isn't looking. This is it.

I slip my right hand from the cuffs and then reach back, grip the handle, and pull out the blade while grabbing her hair with the other hand. Before she has a chance to react, I bury it into her throat.

I pull it out, quickly stabbing her a second and third time, hoping to sever her vocal cords to prevent her from calling out while she struggles against my hold. After the third time, she's not really struggling. I drag her by her hair into the shower and stab her just under her clavicle two more times—in that place where Declan almost killed me. She stops fighting and stares ahead at me with cold, almost lifeless eyes.

She really is beautiful like this.

"It's not personal," I whisper, taking her hand in mine. "But…you're not good, either. And I have these friends…they'll kill them if I don't kill you, and theyaregood." I pause, sighing. "And he did call me his angel—Luca De Rossi did." Recognition flashes in her eyes as she takes another gargled breath. "For what it's worth, I don't blame you that much. We didn't choose this, but there's no undoing it now. And I'm going to kill him, too."

I don't know if it brings her any comfort or not, but I stay there with her until the lights go out.

I step out of the shower, close the door behind me, and then slowly and carefully make my way through thick, slick blood back to the sink where I run my blade under the water before putting it back in my hair. Blood paints the front of my black shirt and pants, but you can't tell unless you're looking for it. I grab a white towel from the rack and dry as much of it as I can before cleaning the blood from my face and neck. I slide my right hand back into the cuffs and slip out of my shoes, leaving them behind before returning to the bedroom. Then, I sit at the edge of the bed facing the door, my heart pounding in my chest, and wait.

And wait. The antique clock above the fireplace tells me it's been over twenty minutes. The mansion isn't empty; I can't go looking for him. Just when I'm starting to panic, wondering if something happened and if I should just go flicker the light, the doorknob turns.

Warren steps into the room, and I watch him, trying to steady my breath.

"She cleaned you up, huh?" he says, unbuttoning his shirt. "Did she touch you, too? She thinks I don't know what she is—it's disgusting."

I clench my jaw as he shrugs off his shirt then moves to his belt buckle. His chest is bare; there's no monitor.

Femoral triangle. He says it's easy to miss, but it would be hard to chase me.

Easy to scream, though.

He moves toward the bed, stopping in front of me and lifting my cuffed hands. "It's hard getting old," he says as he unlocks and tosses them aside. He turns his back to me and pulls open a drawer on the bedside table.

Kidneys. It's supposed to be so painful you'll forget to breathe.That'llmake it hard to scream.

I pull the blade one more time and lunge for him, burying it into his back. He manages to flip around before I can stab him a second time, and I panic when he lunges for me but he misses, falling to his knees on the ground at my feet. When I go for him again, stabbing him in the back of his neck, just below his skull, he knocks me off my feet, but it doesn't matter.

---