Page 40 of Written in Sin
My words spit from my mouth. “You don’t know anything about me.” He pulls my pants down, the cheap fabric tearing with a sharp rip as I jerk beneath him. I twist my body, but his hold on me is relentless, pulling and pushing as he taunts me. “This is your life now, no escape. Just total servitude for anyone who wants a piece of you.” My body begins thrashing in every direction I can manage when I feel his fingers push into me.
“I like it when you fight, Catarina. I bet you do too. How wet did you get when he had you on the altar? Our cameras are good, but not that good.” His voice is a low whisper now, taunting me. He leans over, licking the side of my face. The memory of ourfirst night together rushes through my mind. His words stop my movements, and the hair on my neck prickles with sweat. “That’s right, I’m everywhere.”
Fenris watched us. Did Zed know about the cameras? I flail beneath him without any method, only trying my hardest to rid my mind, and now my body, of Fenris and his words. In the chaos of the struggle, the long table behind the couch tips over, the clatter of everything hitting the floor echoes over the music.
I squeeze my thighs together, doing everything I can to deny him access to me. I try to pull away, but his hold forces me to stay beneath him. “You’ll like this, Cat.” His words drip with satisfaction. “You’ll beg for it. Just like you did with him.”
My anger is replaced with fear. I’m almost broken and my mind is teetering on the edge of surrender. My body aches under Fenris’ weight and every part of me screams to give up—to let it happen, to let him have his way. Just get it over with.
But then I feel a subtle shift in the air, a sharp glint of something just beyond my reach. My eyes snap to my side, under the couch—the ram’s horn. There’s an energy filling the room and a voice that doesn’t sound like mine calls to me.Do it. Do it now.
I slowly reach out to grab the ram’s horn, the jagged edge of it pressing into my palm. My fingers wrap around it, the brutal weapon now in my grasp. Fenris doesn’t notice. He’s too focused on breaking me, too dead set on making sure that I’m too weak to fight back.
But I’m not weak. I never was.
In a flash I twist my body, getting the leverage needed. The material of my torn pants bites into my skin as I garner every ounce of power and strength I have left to drive the horn into Fenris’ side. The sickening crunch vibrates through my hand as it tears through his flesh.
He roars, letting out a strangled cry. The surprise of being caught off guard causes his grip to loosen for a moment, and it’s just enough time for me to be able to push him off. He stumbles back, his eyes widening with shock as I scramble to my feet. My legs are weak but I won’t let him take me down again. Him or anyone else. I won’t stop. The curved bone in my hands has become an extension of my rage, my despair; everything that has ever been ripped from me and the girl from the screen. A scream erupts as I stab him again.
And again.
And again.
The sound of the horn slicing through him fills the room. Fenris’ hands reach for me, but I’m already straddling his body. Blood pours from his wounds as my mind begins to fray. “I’m not yours or anyone else’s to use, and I never will be.” I don’t think. I don’t feel. I just move.
My chest is tight with the weight of everything that has led me here, and every stab is like a release. I feel the blood on my hands and arms, staining my skin, but I don’t stop. The edges of my world blurs and everything goes quiet, except for one question.
Was I just a pawn in some twisted game of Zed’s, one he never meant for me to win? Was I anything other than a means to an end?
The music begins to slow, sounding more demonic the slower the needle spins around the record.
Run—stab.
Run—pull out.
Run—stab.
It goes quiet, the crackle from the record player the only sound in the room now.
The body beneath me stills. I lose track of how many times I’ve stabbed him, how much of him I’ve torn apart. The worldfades and all I can hear is my own pulse, my own fury, my own emptiness. I release the ram’s horn and fall back. My backside lands in a pool of now-tacky blood.
I use the couch to help pull myself to my feet and scan the room, finding a shiny object on Fenris’ desk. I walk over knowing I need to have a weapon, small enough to be discreet, if I want any chance of getting out of here alive. What I thought was a letter opener turns out to be a knife. It’s cold and solid in my hand as I wrap my fingers around its handle and feel the intricate metal carvings raised, looping patterns press into my palm. Some edges are worn smooth, others still catch against my skin.
I walk back and step over Fenris, his eyes flutter, but if there’s any life left in him, it’s on its way out. All of a sudden the door bursts open and Harold rushes through. His eyes go wide, pure terror flashing across his face when he runs to Fenris and falls to his knees beside him.
The anger on his face is something I never expected to see. It doesn’t seem directed at me, but nothing makes much sense right now. “Did he hurt you?” His words are measured and calm.
Is he asking to see if it was self-defense? To see if he could maneuver around the truth so he can kill me? Is he wanting to know my story so he can interrogate me on it? Bait me? I’m given a split second to analyze why he’d be worried about me.
I trip over my reply. “Yes.” He looks down at Fenris’ body.
“We need to get you out.”
He comes toward me and I hold my hands up and try to protest. “Ple-please he was r…”
“Quiet,” he says, looking back at the door. He walks to a closet and pulls out some jeans that look like they’re two sizes too big, but I can’t be picky right now. He tosses them to me and I put them on. I feel like I’m swimming in them, as expected. The combination of pure terror and leftover adrenaline cause mybody to shake. “Catarina, I’m not going to hurt you… you have to go.”
I start crying. “Go? Where will I go? What do you mean? Zedediah?—”
