Better When He's Brave (Welcome to the Point #3)(77)
I was tired and I hurt all over, so instead of jumping into the showdown I knew was waiting for me, I asked him if I could use the bathroom to clean up a little bit. He told me to wait a second and I heard him banging around as he was rushing to clean up a little bit before I saw even deeper into who the man behind the badge really was. It took him twenty minutes or so, but when he was done he came and got me, led me to a bathtub filled with steaming water, and waited while I crawled inside. He watched me as I sank my sore body into the heat and told me he would get me something else to wear since the stuff I had on was either trashed or borrowed. I nodded and watched as he walked stiffly out the door.
He was mad and trying to hide the fact while he struggled to be gentle for me. He was mad at me for lying and mad at himself for not being there when I needed him, and wasn’t sure which of those things had him more fired up. I also wasn’t sure that he was going to be able to look me in the eye after I told him why I had the gun and what my initial plan had been to do with it. He said we would work through it but I was going to let him down again, and I wasn’t sure his innate sense of morality was going to be able to handle me admitting I was fully intending to be part of another person’s death. It was a lot for anyone, especially a man with such a strict code of right and wrong, to have to muddle his way through.
I wasn’t supposed to get the stitches in my chin wet, so I submerged myself up to the top of my shoulders and did my best to scrub the raw wounds on my arms and legs. My hair floated out like a dark cloud around me and I had to concentrate really hard on my breathing so that I didn’t start shaking and crying all over again.
Not much scared me. I had seen a lot, lost a lot, suffered a lot, but being blindsided by Zero in a place that had felt so safe was enough to make me feel like I would never be secure again. He was just there, in my face and everywhere, without a sound and I knew he was there to kill me on Conner’s orders, but the look in his eye told me he would make it hurt and make me suffer for his own pleasure.
He was a brutal-looking man. I recognized him right away with his bald head and tightly trimmed goatee. He smiled at me when I screamed and I saw the knife flash out, and it caught me across the fleshy part of my arm before I realized I should be fighting back. Only I was in the bathroom, in my pajamas and completely unarmed. I was as helpless as I had ever been in my life. It wasn’t a fair fight by any stretch of the imagination, and just as I realized I should make noise or try and run he lashed out with a closed fist and punched me in the face. It was a hard enough blow that I fell immediately to my knees.
He put a hand in my hair and jerked my head closer to his crotch as he brought his knife down and touched the tip to my cheek. “No wonder Conner has such a hard-on for you. You’re even better up close and personal.”
The sting of the blade and his crude words were like a slap across the face. I had no clue how he had gotten inside the condo, but I knew only one of us was walking out the front door.
“Conner is a lunatic. He’s ruining lives because of a man that was a sociopath, a man that didn’t claim him as his own until he needed him!” I didn’t think, I just threw my head forward until my forehead connected solidly with the vulnerable parts of his body hidden behind his zipper. It was enough of a shock that he doubled over, giving me enough room to move around him. I scrambled on my hands and knees out the bathroom door, leaving a sizable chunk of my hair in Zero’s fist. He swore and dove for me, but I was faster, and as soon as I cleared the bathroom I got to my feet and made a mad dash for the stairs.
The Glock was still in my purse. No one had seen Booker and I wasn’t ready to admit to anyone else that I had it, and right in that moment I was so glad I hadn’t gotten rid of the weapon.
When I was halfway down the stairs I was hit from behind hard enough to pick me up off my feet and send me flying through the air. I didn’t hit any more stairs and crashed to the ground floor with all of Zero’s weight on top of me. My teeth tore into my bottom lip, my chin cracked into the hardwood with enough force to make me black out for a second, and my palms and knees lost the first layer of skin as I hurriedly tried to find any kind of traction on the floor to get away from the oppressive weight on my back.
He swore at me, called me filthy names, and flipped me over so that he was straddling my waist. The knife glided across my chest as I swung wildly at him with my fists and tried to claw at him with my fingernails. He just laughed at my struggles and used the blade to cut the strap of my tank off of one of my shoulders. I screamed at him as he told me all the disgusting things he was going to do to me as the knife dug into my chest. I screamed until I had no air left but that just seemed to egg him on as he leaned down and bit the exposed slope of my breast where the fabric of my shirt had been torn away. He swatted my hands away and used his free hand to wrap around my throat.
All I could taste was panic and blood and he applied pressure and continued to nick at my skin with the blade. I kicked my legs uselessly under him as he went on and on about how hot Conner told him I was in bed, about all the obscene and awful things he’d been doing to himself while watching me for the last few months. It was gross and far more violating than the way he was sitting on me and the way he was choking me.
I was starting to see spots around the edge of my vision. I needed air, but no matter how much I pried at his hard fingers he didn’t loosen them an inch. I heard my phone ring from somewhere in my purse. It made him laugh as he moved his lips over my own where I was gasping like a landlocked fish for any kind of breath.