Every syllable slices deeper.
“I screamed. Told him never to touch me again. Said I’d tell…” Her voice breaks sharply. She inhales, fragile, trembling. “He covered my mouth. Dragged me outside. To the edge of the yacht. And just… pushed.”
Silence bleeds into the space between us.
Heavy.
An executioner’s quiet.
My vision blurs, not from tears but rupture. Reality itself has split wide open, and I’m caught in the torrent pouring out.
Everything’s stained in shades of crimson— not poetic, not metaphorical. Real and visceral, fresh and bleeding like a splitartery. My chest heaves violently; I don’t remember taking a single breath. My fists clench so tight my knuckles ache.
I’ll tear that motherfucker apart, piece by bloody piece. No hesitation. No mercy. Slow, precise brutality. I’ll savor every moment, every scream.
Not justice. Justice is sanitized, safe, sterile.
This is slaughter. Dark ritual. Sacrificial, dripping in pain, deliberate and vengeful.
She trembles in front of me, voice unraveling slowly. “I don’t know how I survived, but I did. I tried telling my parents.”
Then that bitter laugh breaks from her throat, a broken, splintered sound that punches into me like shattered glass.
“Douglas told them I slipped.” Her voice cracks, pauses, choking on itself. “They believed him. Instantly. Just like everyone else.”
I move before I realize it, closing the gap between us, fingertips finding the soft curve of her cheek. My thumb strokes carefully, reverently, like defusing something delicate, volatile. She’s shaking, fracturing under my palm.
My voice slips out dangerously soft, quivering with violent, lethal pressure, like a dam only seconds from rupturing. She’s sitting in front of me, barely holding together, trembling like the earth beneath a quake.
I give her something stronger than agony, something sharp enough for her to grip with bloodied fingertips when memory digs too deep.
Pulling her into me, forehead to forehead, breath to breath, I let my words sink bone-deep: “You weren’t meant to be believed.”
I breathe it into her like a vow carved in skin and bone. “You were meant to be feared. And they made the fatal mistake of forgetting.”
I pause, let silence stretch between us. My words slip darkly into her bloodstream, a promise sealed in blood and vengeance. “Everything Douglas took from you?”
I whisper ruthlessly, “I’m taking it back…with interest. With cruelty.”
Her eyes flicker, wet, burning, but still locked to mine. Still breathing. Still alive.
So I give her the truth. The real one. “You don’t need to be okay.” My voice goes darker. Deeper. “You don’t need to heal. You don’t need to forgive. You need a fucking monster.”
I press my hand to her chest, right over her heartbeat. “You survived him. But now I’m here.” My jaw’s clenched. My throat’s raw. “I devour. I break. I end.”
Another breath. Her breath. My voice drops to a growl. “I’m going to be the thing he fears before he dies. Your monster. Bound to you in blood and purpose.”
She exhales like her lungs forgot how. And I seal it, low and final, the words sinking into her skin like ink, like fire: “I’m going to carve the truth on every inch of Douglas Everhart’s body.” A breath. “And when he’s screaming in the dark, choking on his own blood, he’ll know it was you who sent me.”
She exhales again…like her lungs had been holding that breath for years. Like something just cracked loose inside her and started breathing again. Her eyes flicker, wet, burning, but still locked to mine. Still breathing. Still alive.
And now? She’s mine. Not owned. Not possessed. Chosen. I give her what seals it.
What binds the vow.
I kiss her.
Not soft. Not sweet. Deep. Consuming. Final.
