Page 126 of Lights Out

Unable to help myself, I reached out and stroked my hand over her shoulder. “As much as I hate the idea of dirty cops, having someone on the inside could benefit us. If they continue leaking the investigation to Junior, we’ll know if they find anything pointing to your family or us. Depending on how dirty they are, they might even hide evidence.”

Aly grimaced. “I don’t like benefiting from this kind of thing. It feels too close to what Brad was doing.”

I squeezed her shoulder. “Would you rather go to jail?”

“No,” she said. “I just don’t like it, and yes, I realize that probably makes me a hypocrite.”

I grinned. “Huge hypocrite.”

She slapped my hand away.

I grabbed her wrist and pulled her close. “But a hot one.”

Her response came out muffled because of the way I’d smooshed her face into my chest.

“I’m going to assume you just called me hot, too.”

She reached behind me and pinched my butt hard enough to make me jerk forward, which pinned my dick between our slick skin. I expected her to pull away and say something snarky, but she writhed against me instead. My need for her returned in a rush, all other thoughts drowned out by the memory of how good it felt to shove my cock inside her tight, wet pussy.

“Aly,” I said, stepping away from her. “I want you so bad right now, but if I don’t eat something soon, I’m going to pass out.”

Her face fell, but she caught it and shook her head. “No, you’re right. And same.”

I lifted a hand and cupped her cheek. “Also, I’m not too proud to admit that I’m in so much pain that I don’t think I can worship you the way you deserve right now.”

She nodded, her expression full of understanding. “I can wait until you feel better. I know it’ll be worth it.” She lifted a handto show me her wrinkly fingertips. “And I’m starting to prune, so I’m good with getting out of here.”

I turned away so she wouldn’t see me smile. Should I have felt bad for lying to my girlfriend? Maybe. But I had a feeling that when I woke her up in a few hours, she’d be more than willing to forgive me for it afterward.

Chapter 25

Aly

Asound woke me in the middle of the night. I’d been having the nicest dream about…something. It was already fading as I cracked my eyes open, but I thought it involved cold beer and a warm, sandy beach. What I wouldn’t give for a mid-winter Caribbean vacation. I had some money saved up. Maybe sometime during the next two weeks, Josh and I could slip away to –

My ceiling was awash with red. Why was my ceiling red?

Oh, fuck, was my house on fire?

I tried to jerk upright, but a yank on my arms had me floundering back onto the mattress. I craned my head up, panicking, and froze. There were black silk cuffs around my wrists, and the ropes binding them led straight to my headboard, where a complex series of knots that looked impossible to unravel secured them.

Fear punched through my lungs, stealing my breath away. Josh wasn’t in the bed beside me. We’d been curled up together when I fell asleep, with Fred perched on top of us. They were both gone now, and I must have been half out of it with sleepbecause all I could think was that Brad wasn’t actually dead, and he’d broken back into my house to finish what he’d started.

“Oh, good,” a deep, modulated voice tolled out. “You’re awake.”

I snapped my gaze up.

There he sat facing the foot of the bed, shirtless and lit with the deep crimson light he often used in his videos: the Faceless Man. His mask looked more threatening than I remembered, the cheekbones sharper, the black eyes deeper. His massive frame dwarfed my small armchair, making it look like something made for a child. Why had I never realized how ominous his tattoos were? Dark, twisted forms crawled up his arms like gothic nightmares emerging from hell.

One hand grasped a wicked-looking knife I’d never seen before, curved and razor-sharp – something made for skinning prey. The way he held it so casually, half dangling from his fingers as he twirled it in an idle circle, made it seem even more dangerous. Only someone well versed with weapons handled them with such little regard, as if they knew the tool so intimately it had become an extension of their arm.

It’s just Josh,I tried to tell myself, but the knowledge did little to calm my racing pulse.

Gone was my kind, funny boyfriend. In his place sat a man who radiated menace. With the mask on, it was like he’d become someone else. Or maybe that wasn’t right. Maybe he was still the same Josh I’d grown to care about so deeply, and wearing the mask allowed him to bring out a darker side of his personality that he kept hidden during the day. One that craved my fear as much as my desire.

He lifted the knife and pointed it at me, head tilting sideways in an unnerving, almost alien way because it was such an un-Josh-like gesture. I checked him over again to reassure myself that it was, in fact, my boyfriend and not a differentmasked stranger who’d broken into my house. The bruised ribs confirmed his identity, but my heart raced on.

“Spread them,” he said.

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