“Shut up. Shut up!” I say, shaking my head. I can’t give in now. I’ve come too far.
“Lillith …” he murmurs.
“No,” I say. “Call me Miss Carrigan, like you always have. Like you did when you kidnapped me and used me.”
“It’s still me, the same man you fell in love with at the hospital, and you’re still you, the woman who needed a man to control her emotions and give her peace.”
“I didn’t ask to be tied up and abused!” I say it more to myself than to him, like I need to prove to myself that I’m not in love with an abuser. That I’m not in need of someone to control me … I don’t even know why I’m saying these things, but I know that I must. For Ashley. Just the thought of her being locked up there with those men makes me want to scream.
“You asked me to love you, which is what I did,” Sebastian says. “This is who I am. A man with uncontrollable urges to tie you up, taste your blood, and claim you as his own. This is what you need, what you begged me to give you … my love.”
The knife punctures his skin little by little. “Don’t twist my words …” Blood seeps from his neck.
“Don’t twist your own feelings.”
“I don’t want to hear it anymore. Let’s go.” I push the knife further into him, causing him to step away from the window.
“Okay. Whatever you wish.”
“Give me the keys to both rooms. All the keys,” I say.
He holds up his hands in surrender. “All right. If that’s what you want.”
“Just give them to me.”
He walks to his nightstand, opens the drawer, and hands me his key. My key is on my nightstand, which I grab quickly before returning my gaze to him and the knife that I have to his throat. Adrenaline clouds my mind, preventing me from feeling guilty for what I’m doing. I force him to walk to the door with me.
“Open it,” I say.
He turns the handle and pulls open the door. “Lillith, before you go, please tell me where you intend to go.”
“What’s it to you?” I growl.
“My life.”
The way he says it, with a deep sigh and low voice, creates goosebumps all over my body. I shake to rid myself of them.
I push him to the side, walk past him, and turn around. Now we’re face to face, and what I see almost breaks my heart in two. His lips are scrunched, his brows furrowed, like he’s genuinely worried. He really does care. Which makes this all the more difficult.
But I have to.
“I’m going to find Ashley,” I say.
“What?” he gasps. “No, you can’t.”
I point the knife at him. “Shut up! Didn’t you hear me? I’m going after her. There’s nothing you can say or do that’ll change my mind. I have to find her.”
“Lillith, you don’t understand–”
“No, you don’t understand! I left her there!” I scream, waving the knife about. “I left her there, in their claws, and she’s all alone and has no one to protect her. I have to protect her, Sebastian. I’m going to get her out of there if it’s the last thing on earth I do.”
“You can’t save her,” he says with a loud voice. “Please, trust me on this. Come back inside and I’ll explain.”
“No, I’m kind of done right now. If I hear one more thing from your mouth, I think I might actually kill you.”
He’s silent for a few seconds, his head dropping back between his shoulders. “I knew it would come to this one day.”
I don’t know what he means by this, but it doesn’t matter. Right now, I’m the one in control and I won’t let him seduce me back inside with the promise of truth, because I can’t trust him. My mind, soul, heart, and body want to trust him, but I can’t. Saving Ashley is far more important.
I push the key into the lock. “Stay safe,” I say as I close the door and lock it.
“I won’t let you go. I’m coming after you, Lillith. One way or another. You’re making a big mistake. I’ll find you. Whatever it takes,” is the last thing I hear before I rush down the hall and force away the regret.
Accompanying song: “The Hunted” by Snow Ghosts
New Haven, Connecticut – June 10th, 2013. Early morning.
It took some time to get the staff here and break me out. She cleverly unhooked the phone, which I only discovered after fifteen minutes. Then another twenty minutes passed before the staff actually managed to find a spare key to her room. Of course, it didn’t help that it was four in the morning. When they finally arrived to free me, I was livid. If I wasn’t so keen on chasing after her, I would’ve trashed the whole place. The table didn’t survive those thirty minutes, that’s for sure. Of course, by the time I was running down the street, she’d already been long gone.