Page 24 of Twisted Addiction
“Since when do you care?” Her tone was acid, but her body sagged against the wall, the defiance in her words dissolving into exhaustion.
She pulled her knees tighter to her chest, her dark hair falling forward like a curtain, as if it could shield her from me.
“My uncles... Uncle Rocco, Uncle Carlo, and...” Her voice frayed, barely more than a whisper—words she might have been saying to herself rather than to me.
She shook her head violently, fingers digging crescents into her own arms as if trying to anchor herself to the present.
“And who?” My attention sharpened, my pulse rising.
It wasn’t just the two? Whoever this third man was, he was already a ghost walking, and his death would be exquisite—a lesson carved from pain.
I leaned forward, my tone steady but coiled with menace. “Tell me. Who’s the third?”
“Let me be!” she screamed, hands flying to her ears as if to blot me out, her voice cracking like splintered glass.
The sound scraped against my nerves, but I held myself still, fists curling at my sides, fighting the urge to cross the space between us and shake the answer from her.
Instead, I moved toward her, each step deliberate, my shadow looming over her curled form.
“And who?” I asked again, my tone softening to a dangerous gentleness, a velvet glove over an iron fist.
I needed the name, and my patience was fraying like a taut wire.
She didn’t answer, her eyes squeezed shut, her breaths shallow and erratic.
I crouched to her level, my face inches from hers, so close I could feel the tremor of her exhales against my skin.
“Who is it?” I murmured, a low hiss dressed as a whisper.
“Say it.” Inside, a storm clawed at my ribs.
Someone had dared to linger in her dreams with those animals.
Someone else. Another ghost I would have to hunt.
Her eyes snapped open. The look she gave me wasn’t fear of the unknown—it was recognition. Horror, naked and unfiltered, like a knife sliding between ribs.
“You...” she whispered.
The word was a blade.
For a second, everything inside me went still. Then my body reacted before my brain did—I shot to my feet, stumbling back as if she’d just driven that blade into my gut.
“What?” My voice cracked, sharp enough to cut glass. “I’d never—”
But she was already moving. She pushed herself upright, fear folding into fury, and bolted for the bathroom. The door slammed shut behind her, rattling in its frame. The echo hung in the room like gunfire.
I stood there, frozen, her accusation ricocheting through me. Me. In her nightmares. Twisted into the same shape as the monsters I’d already destroyed for her.
I’d never touched her like that. Not then. Not now.
Back then, she’d been fifteen—a fragile girl caught in her family’s claws—and I’d been nineteen, already scarred, already dangerous but meticulous about boundaries.
We’d had moments: glances stolen like contraband, nights spent talking until the world outside dissolved.
But I’d kept my distance. She’d been a flame I’d sworn to protect, not consume.
How could she dream me into the dark? Into their mold?
