Page 163 of Corrupting Camille
Preston steps closer, boxing me in, his eyes empty, detached, utterly void of warmth. His voice is silk and razor blades, grazing my skin like a threat.
“There. No more distractions.” He leans closer, his breath a bitter whisper against my jaw. “I think you’ve had enough fucking air, sweetheart.”
My throat tightens, humiliation flooding through me, anger helplessly simmering beneath my skin. Preston straightens, tugging his cuffs casually, his face shifting back into its mask of bored indifference. As if breaking me was nothing more than a brief inconvenience.
“Stop being rude,” he murmurs, stepping back, cold eyes sweeping over me dismissively. “My parents are waiting.”
He turns sharply, footsteps echoing down the hall as he walks away, leaving me shaking, breathless, and drowning in shame.
I stare numbly at the shattered phone, the fragments glittering mockingly under the soft hallway lights. My vision blurs, the tears hot and heavy, a sickening wave of realization crashing over me.
This is it. This is my life if I stay…shattered phones, cruel whispers, bruises disguised beneath diamonds. A month ago, at dinner, it was the way he grabbed my hand on the table, tight,punishing, silent violence hidden beneath polite smiles. Tonight, it was my phone, smashed viciously to pieces. I swallow back bile, cold dread slicing through my stomach, because if I marry him, I know exactly what’s next. I can feel it in the pit of my stomach, clear and unavoidable.
He’ll hit me, sooner or later.
Maybe it’ll be hidden at first, a bruised wrist, marks beneath long sleeves, carefully crafted excuses. But eventually, his hands will land somewhere I can’t cover, my face, my mouth, my eyes. Somewhere visible. Somewhere shameful.
And I’ll never be able to hide the truth again.
Chapter Fifteen
Kane
The room reeks of rot.
Raw, visceral, human decay. The air is a rancid cocktail of blood, bile, piss, and terror, thick enough to clog the throat, to seep into pores until the skin itself feels saturated with filth. You don't just breathe this air—you choke on it, drown in it, let it seep into your veins until you're as twisted, as corroded, as the acts you're about to commit. Beneath my boots, blood has turned gelatinous, dark as tar, sticking and peeling away from concrete that reeks of ammonia and stale sweat.
Douglas Everhart sits slumped, bound tight to a chair with surgical tape and piano wire that bites into raw, weeping flesh. His skin is no longer skin, it's shredded meat, exposed muscle fibers quivering beneath harsh fluorescent lights. Open wounds weep fluid that trickles like syrup, trails of it dripping onto his lap, forming congealed puddles beneath him. His head hangsforward, spittle and mucus drooling steadily from the gag stuffed in his swollen mouth.
“Hey.” My voice is hollow, distant, the cold echo of a monster buried deep within, desperate for slaughter. I slap his face lightly, forcing his eyes to roll back, glassy and bloodshot, pupils blown wide with agony and terror. “Look at me.”
He shudders violently, wheezing breaths hitching through bloody nostrils, trails of snot and saliva dribbling onto his chest. His lips, shredded from previous lessons, tremble uncontrollably.
"Douglas…" He convulses violently, chest spasming with shallow, ragged gasps, blood and snot bubbling from flared, broken nostrils. His torn lips quiver helplessly, shredded from earlier lessons, dripping saliva and fear onto his battered chest. “Do you want to know who sent me?” My whisper is soft, intimate, a lover's secret murmured against his bloodied ear. “Who wanted you to suffer so exquisitely?”
His eyes widen further, terror etched deep into the shattered fragments of his gaze. A low, strangled noise escapes him, a pitiful, animalistic sob muffled by the soaked gag.
“Camille,” I hiss the name like a prayer and a curse, my voice trembling with barely restrained fury, devotion twisted into violence. “You remember her, don't you?”
Douglas shudders, a fresh wave of panic surging through his ruined body. I take hold of the knife, its blade glinting sinisterly under the harsh lights, stained crimson with past torments. Carefully, almost lovingly, I drag it down the side of his face, splitting open skin with surgical precision, blood pouring free in a hot cascade down his jawline.
"Yeah, of course you remember. And I'm sure you remember all the other little girls you violated. But Camille, Camille's mine... she's always been mine, and you signed your death warrant the very second you laid hands on her." I set the bladeaside, replacing it with an axe, its weight comforting and lethal in my grasp. One brutal swipe severs his hand, the flesh and bone parting with a satisfying crunch.
"I'm her vengeance," I breathe out fiercely, my voice pure darkness, the words etched in violence. "I'm the monster that eats other monsters, Douglas." Another swipe cleaves away his other hand, both dropping heavily to the floor in a spray of blood and gore. His screams vibrate through my bones and I feed off it. "Tell me, did you think she was quiet because she liked it?" I lean closer to savor the agony. “Because she wanted it? So many years later and you probably thought you got away with it. Stole her voice." He groans through the gag, eyes bulging as I reveal a bottle of bleach, unscrewing the cap deliberately, letting the acrid scent bite into the stench of blood. Douglas thrashes wildly, panic overtaking pain. His pleas turn to guttural, animalistic sobs, muffled by soaked fabric.
I grab his jaw roughly, forcing his head back. "Open up."
The bleach pours down his throat in thick, choking waves, bubbling violently against flesh, mimicking the saltwater burn Camille felt, her throat raw, her lungs filling with fire as she drowned in silence. Douglas convulses violently, eyes rolling into his skull, his body seizing uncontrollably as acidic foam gushes from the corners of his mouth, dribbling down his chin.
“You feel that burn?” My whisper is pure venom, dripping poison directly into his psyche. “That's her pain. Taste it, you sick fuck. Taste every fucking second she suffered.”
The knife feels like an extension of my hand, precise and merciless, sinking effortlessly into flesh already tenderized by torment. I start at his chest, peeling him open methodically, inch by careful inch. Skin splits apart like overripe fruit, wet pops echoing as fatty layers detach, revealing muscle, slick and twitching. Blood gushes thick and fast, pooling rapidly, adding fresh crimson to the congealed black.
His screams…fucking music. Pure, visceral agony fills the room, reverberates in my chest. I hum softly, calm amidst the chaos, surgical precision as I strip him layer by excruciating layer. Each cut intentional, designed for maximum suffering, prolonged torment.
The blade sinks deeper, carving into muscle fibers that twitch and quiver violently. Blood spurts from severed veins, arterial spray misting my face, warm and satisfying. My hands slick with gore, I grasp edges of flesh, peeling it back meticulously, savoring the wet suction as layers separate.
Douglas writhes, consciousness flickering, screams dissolving into breathless, wet gurgles. His eyes lose focus, drifting into shock.
