Echo(88)

He now knows the truth about his wife and son. I could overhear him when he was down the corridor and on the phone right after he bound me to the pipe. I knew he was talking to Jacqueline. He questioned her, and I could tell from the words he spoke, that she admitted the truth to him. He didn’t raise his voice or become irate. It was the opposite. He remained collected, but looking into his eyes right now as he cuts through my bra, I see the fire of betrayal burning, and I brace myself for what I know is coming my way—retaliation.

Richard doesn’t know how strong I am when it comes to sex. After all, I made it through four years of f*cking the enemy, and I did it so well that he was none-the-wiser of my deep-seated hatred for him. My body is used up and polluted. It always was and always will be. Even Declan desecrated it when he raped me. So when Richard pushes the fabric aside to expose my tits, I feel nothing.

The cold, dank air hardens my nipples, and when this happens, he smiles and gloats, “Eager, huh?”

Fucking idiot.

When he stands up, I notice his erection pressing against his slacks. He walks over to the desk, exchanging his knife for the gun, and returns to me. My breath catches when he shoves the muzzle underneath my chin.

“Don’t get brave on me,” he threatens. “One wrong move, I’ll put a bullet in you.”

Although I now know his true profession, I still want to doubt that he would be a man capable of killing, but his next words disintegrate all doubt.

“But something tells me you won’t beg for your life like your little boyfriend’s mother did, which is disappointing. I love hearing a woman beg.”

My eyes widen is shocked disbelief. “You?” I question, horrified.

“Sometimes in life you have to teach people lessons, and when Callum thought he could screw me over, I made sure he learned I wasn’t someone to be f*cked with.”

He’s right—I’ve gotten myself tangled in the most f*cked up cryptogram imaginable.

“What does Cal have to do with any of this?”

He shushes me, running his gun down my belly and shoving it into my pants, the coolness of the metal seeping through the lace of my panties. His grin is scathing when he unzips my pants to earn more room to slip the barrel between my legs. He slides it back and forth along my *, all the while smiling. But I’m detached. My mind is in the past with Declan on the afternoon when he opened up to me about his mom being shot in the head.

The pain he hides so well surfaced in his eyes, and just like me, the moment he lost his parent, he was forever maimed with a wound that would never heal. I would do anything for him, and to know that Richard was the one who pulled the trigger that forever f*cked up Declan’s faith in security and comfort fuels my affinity for revenge.

Richard catches my attention, taking me away from my memories when he begins tugging my bottoms down my legs.

“My wife acted like a cunt,” he says. “But she’s not here for me to release my anger on, and neither is Bennett. All I have is you.”

With my panties gone with my pants, he forces my legs wide open and presses the muzzle of the gun over my clit. My body locks up in horrid fear. I close my eyes, bracing myself for whatever is to come next, and after he makes me wait, I gasp when he forces the barrel of the loaded pistol inside of my *. Keeping my eyes pinched shut, I press my lips together and force myself out of this moment while he f*cks me with his gun.

I remove my emotions and escape, giving him my body that’s proven to be nothing but a piece of garbage. He glides the pistol in and out of me while I dig my fingers into the concrete beneath. Richard lets out a pleasurable groan as he starts fondling my breast in his one hand. I swallow down the puke that burns the back of my throat. My head rings loudly, and when the shield becomes too much for me to keep up, I beg for Pike to come, but he doesn’t.

The iron cast cracks, chipping away piece by piece, and behind my closed eyes is Carl. No longer is Richard’s gun raping me, but instead, Carl’s filthy dick. My body jerks when the numbness wanes, and soon I can feel everything that’s being done to me. When my hips buck, my eyes flash open to see the devil above me, and I lose it. With all my strength, I grab his wrist and lurch my hips back, forcing the gun up to my forehead, screaming like a maniac, “PULL THE FUCKING TRIGGER!”

He looks at me bitterly, and with my hands fisted tightly around the barrel of the gun, I shriek, pressing it harder against my head, “Do it, you piece of shit! Pull the trigger!”

He yanks the gun out of my hands and snarls, “What the f*ck is wrong with you?”