by Eden Ashley
Everything changed when the passenger door swung open and a second policeman entered the squad car. Suddenly, the first cop transformed, returning a smile of camaraderie over capturing a suspected cop killer so quickly. Five minutes into the car ride, every muscle ached with tension and Davey willed herself to relax but had little success.
Sergeant Frank, the driver, told his partner to inform dispatch they’d be stopping for fuel. After Deputy Mullin complied, dispatch crackled through the radio. Davey couldn’t make out the words, but the faceless woman sounded displeased.
Frank grabbed the radio. “Tell the feds to keep their panties on. We’ll deliver their suspect soon enough. Over and out.” He looked at the younger deputy. “Grab us a couple of coffees, will ya?”
“Sure thing, boss,” Mullin said.
Frank’s mask came undone as soon as the deputy was gone. Davey hadn’t imagined the dual personalities. Sweat prickled her armpits and she shifted nervously as Sergeant Frank quietly stared at her, saying nothing. Then he slid out of the car to pump the gas. Davey dragged in a long gulp of air, not realizing until then that she had stopped breathing. She looked around the parking lot hopelessly, really starting to think she might be in serious trouble.
Mullin came back with the coffees, sparing a worried glance at Davey. He looked at Frank, still busy at the fuel pump, and then back at her. “I can loosen those cuffs if they’re too tight.”
Davey shook her head quickly, pressing herself further into the seat. “I’m okay.”
Mullin watched her for a moment. “You seem like a nice girl,” he finally said. He scratched his head, looking at his partner again. “I probably shouldn’t say this, but those two bodies we found were federal agents. Your prints were everywhere, fresh ones, covered in blood. The lab matched them from your juvenile record. They won’t go easy on you. Ask for a lawyer before you tell your side of the story.”
Davey worked her throat, forcing a swallow. “Why are you telling me this?”
“My old man is a lawyer. I served time at SCU Law before coming here. I see both sides, I guess.” Mullin faced the front of the car and fell silent.
“What about Ethan?”
Mullin quickly turned back to her. “Look, kid,” he started hesitantly. “I’m really not supposed to question you, but if you know the whereabouts of Officer Remington, it can only help your situation. We’re still trying to track him down. The feds will want to talk to him. Our captain sure as hell does. Maybe he can corroborate your side of the story, help everyone understand what went down back there.”
“I don’t know where he is,” Davey managed. Her mind was reeling. Had someone taken the body? Was Ethan not dead? She had seen the bullet holes. She had checked for a pulse and found none.
Frank settled behind the steering wheel and Mullin pushed a cup of coffee into his hand. The sergeant looked down at the cup. “One sugar, no cream?”
“Yeah,” Mullin confirmed.
Frank smiled and started the car. “You’re a good kid.”
A few miles later and Davey was still struggling to process the information Mullin had shared with her. Ethan’s body hadn’t been found. Though it was unimaginable that he had survived, Davey found herself clinging to the possibility. Maybe it was because she had nothing else to hold on to. The thought still possessed her brain when Frank turned left before the railroads tracks, taking the squad car through an alley of long abandoned warehouses and in a direction outside of town.
“What the hell, Sarge? The station is the other way.”
“Relax, kid. We’ve got to give Ms. Little the treatment all cop killers get.”
Mullin looked at Frank, clearly aghast. “Innocent until proven guilty, Sarge. Besides that, she’s a kid.”
Frank shook his head. “Doesn’t matter.”
“I can’t be onboard with this.” Deputy Mullin reached for the radio, and Sergeant Frank shot him, point blank, in the face.
Davey screamed, at first in shock and then in horror. Mullin struggled in the passenger seat, right arm flailing weakly as his breathing was reduced to a sickening gurgle. Frank shot him again.
Blood went everywhere. Exploded against the window and down the seats, it flowed onto the carpet, pooling in a gruesome slush. Davey yanked her socked feet away as the warm liquid dripped on them. Choking back a sob, she turned her focus inward. When the outside world became too much, into herself was the only way to go.
“He really was a good cop,” she heard Frank say.
The sergeant drove far outside of town, past a patch of wooded forest, and into the neglected farmland beyond it. Davey knew this man would succeed in killing her, but if given a chance, she swore to make it as difficult for him as possible.
Frank parked the car in tall grass reaching as high as the door handles and pulled Davey from the backseat, flinging her to the ground roughly. She grunted, bruising her shoulder in the rocky soil but rolled to her knees and quickly staggered to her feet.
“You’re a fighter.” Frank’s mouth twisted into a delighted expression. “I see why Marx is hot for you.”
Understanding she had zero chance against a stronger, defensively trained opponent while in handcuffs, Davey turned and ran. Taking him by surprise bought her a head start, and Davey was a fast runner. She had nearly reached the far side of the field before Frank caught up. Seizing her from behind, he pulled Davey down by her hair, making her bite back a yelp of pain as she was forced to the ground again. Kicking out with every shred of anger at the man standing over her, she drove the heel of her foot into the side of Frank’s knee. Letting out a howl, he swore. Then he grabbed Davey by the ankles and dragged her toward him.
“You stupid little bitch,” he panted.
As hard as she struggled against it, the sergeant was able to flip her onto her stomach. His knee wedged into the small of Davey’s back, pinning her helplessly in the dirt as his fingers tore at her skin and clothing, ripping away her jeans and panties.
“No,” Davey screamed as he yanked them past her hips. “No!”
Bending one leg, she kicked upward and felt her foot connect again. When the weight briefly left her, Davey struggled to rise, but her hands were cuffed, and now even her clothing—pulled down to her thighs—acted like shackles to hinder her movements. On her feet again, she started to run. But Frank had rebounded. Grabbing her wrists, he spun her around. His face was bleeding and furious. He slapped Davey, and she fell backward, slamming her skull into the packed earth. Dark spots flashed across her vision. Rough hands dug into her flesh again, rolling her body over and then pushing past her thighs to shove two fingers painfully inside of her.
“Don’t worry,” Frank whispered. “You won’t have to live with this. I’ll kill you as soon as it’s over.”
Bringing her knees up, Davey twisted away and was rewarded by a breath-stealing punch to the gut. Robbed of the air to cry or scream, she lay gasping in the dirt listening as the sergeant unbuckled his pants. She squeezed her eyes shut at the sound of a zipper being pulled and willed her mind to go someplace else. She thought of a home where she was loved and felt safe, never worrying about when the next hateful rage would be launched against her. A feeling of peace began to settle over her. Davey was surprised but didn’t question it. Maybe it was normal to feel this way in the moments before death. She didn’t cringe when the sergeant’s skin touched the backs of her thighs as he settled astride her. With silent tears on her cheeks, Davey clung to hope, staying within the folds of the promise that everything would be okay soon. She wouldn’t have to live with this because Sergeant Frank had sworn to kill her.
And then suddenly, the crushing heaviness of Frank’s body was gone. The feeling of Davey’s peace intensified, becoming this odd and overwhelming sensation she couldn’t readily identify. Opening her eyes brought her face to face with Frank. The sergeant lay next to her in the dirt, eyes wide and unseeing. His mouth was open but slack, and his neck lay at an extreme angle. It was then Davey realized
Frank’s head faced her though his body did not.
She felt her jeans being tugged to cover her. The chain linking the cuffs around her wrists snapped like dry spaghetti. Then Davey was hauled to her feet. She knew who it was before she saw him. Everywhere his hands touched had left her skin buzzing with a sense of urgency and calm all at once. No one could do that except Ethan. He lifted her into his arms, and Davey met his gaze for a long time, wondering how he was here. Then she rested her head against his shoulder and was safe.
14
Ethan seemed to know what he was doing. Driving three towns over in a car stolen from a local shopping center, he paid for two nights in a decent-sized hotel room using cash. Then he helped Davey inside, sat her on the bed, and asked her to wait while he went for supplies. She nodded numbly. Dizzy and in pain, she had resisted the urge to puke for the last hour.
When the door closed and he was gone, the room felt smaller and quieter. Wrapping her arms around her, Davey puzzled over the thought. It wasn’t as if Ethan was some great conversationalist—the guy had barely spoken three sentences since stopping Sergeant Frank from raping her. With an extra person gone, the space should have felt roomier, not tighter.
Standing up slowly, Davey leaned one hand against the wall when everything shifted around her. Getting to the bathroom was a slow effort and made possible only by intense concentration. Once undressed and inside the shower, she began to feel better.
She ran the water hotter than she could stand it, hoping to undo the invasion against her body but ended up scalding her skin to an angry shade of pink in the attempt to burn away the touch of a monster. Davey lost track of time beneath the blistering cleanse and emerged only when she started to feel whole again.
Wrapping herself in a towel, she stepped over her discarded clothing and went back to the bedroom. Brand new jeans and a t-shirt lay neatly folded on the bed. There was also a sports bra and a pair of panties, a hair brush, and nightly toiletries. Tears came to Davey’s eyes as she looked at the items. When her hands started to shake, she folded them to her chest and breathed.
Ethan stood motionless in a corner, his back facing her and head tilted downward as if he were studying a stain in the carpet. Davey slid into the underwear, appreciated the near perfect fit, and thanked him. When he didn’t reply, she called his name twice more before his head jerked upward and he answered, turning around slowly.
“Where were you just then?”
“Sorry.” He smiled sheepishly. Davey didn’t miss the way his hand strayed absently to his chest. “Things haven’t finished…I don’t feel normal yet.”
Davey took a tentative step forward. “What happened back there, Ethan?”
“I don’t know. I don’t know.” He repeated it over and over again, completely monotonous in tone, while staring vacantly over her shoulder. “I don’t know. I don’t know.”
Frowning in confusion, Davey shook her head. “What the hell? Ethan knock it off. You’re creeping me out.”
His expression took on deep shadows of regret. The regret became something just shy of fear as Ethan backed away. “I’m me,” he said. “It’s me, Ethan Remington. I was not corrupted.”
“I don’t understand.”
Ethan shook his head as if to clear it, but his features didn’t shed the bitter remorse. “I’m sorry, Davey. There’s no excuse. I should have gotten to you sooner.”
Only a few paces of carpet now separated Ethan from the front door, and he definitely looked ready to bolt. Stunned by his behavior, Davey shoved aside her own turmoil, suddenly needing to save Ethan from his, and rushed forward before he could escape. Her hand enclosed about his forearm and the feedback was instantaneous. It was as if another life form had been caught between her skin and his. But this time, Davey held on through the humming and shifting current of the mild shock. Her touch seemed to calm him, to root him to the floor. Chest heaving, Davey told herself to keep it together.
“You did great back there. You saved my life.” Digging deep to find the courage to meet Ethan’s stare, she looked into his steel grey eyes. The terror was gone. “What happened at your house, Ethan? I thought you were dead.” Releasing his arm, she placed her hand over his heart. He inhaled sharply.
“I saw them,” she said while wrestling against a relentless force intent on pulling their bodies closer. “Two holes were here.”
He put his hand over hers, sending every drop of blood rushing to her head. Something incredible was happening, but Davey couldn’t begin to understand what.
“I’m okay now,” Ethan said softly.
“Yeah,” she breathed and leaned into him. “You are.”
Unable to stop herself, she kissed him. He met her lips eagerly, molding his mouth to hers, parting his lips to let her tongue slip inside. Pressing even closer, as if their very bodies could fit one inside the other, Davey clung to him and let her hands explore every part she could reach. She sighed as his arms slipped around her and his warm hands pressed against her bare skin, savoring the heat of his touch and the aura of safety that came with it. One hand moved to her hair as the kiss deepened, tugging tenderly at her still wet strands. Davey lifted his shirt, breaking contact only long enough to pull the soft cotton over his head, and then she molded herself into him once more. She felt his heart racing faster, could feel the organ pounding as if it were in her chest.
She gasped when his mouth moved to her neck and shoulder, searing a trail of kisses into her skin. The bulge of his increasing arousal pressed into her stomach, and her fingers frantically moved to his zipper. The hard length of him spilled out, jerking upward and lengthening even more when Davey ran a hand down the thick span of his arousal. Groaning, Ethan caught her hand. His breaths came unevenly, and his brow pinched with worry. “You were just hurt.”
“It’s okay,” Davey promised. She had never felt so sure of anything in her life. Being with Ethan would ease her pain and maybe even erase the humiliation done by the hands of Officer Frank. “I want to.”
Cupping her face gently with one hand, he pressed his thumb into her lips. The other hand slid downward, lifting her by the ass as if she weighed no more than a feather. Holding her and never looking away, Ethan carried Davey to the bed. After setting her down, he stripped away his jeans and boxers and stood before her. Davey admired his build. Well-muscled thighs and a firm butt transitioned into narrow hips and the slender but amply defined torso of a swimmer. Then her eyes locked onto the twin scars—one above and the other below his nipple line—and she reached up to touch them. The skin there was raised and pink as if freshly healed.
“Does it hurt?”
He shook his head. “Not anymore.” Reaching out, as if she would suddenly break, he carefully touched her, tracing the outline of her bra with his fingertips. Davey closed her eyes and savored the feeling as his hand slipped beneath the band of fabric, traveled slowly across her breast and caressed her hardened nipple. Then the bra was lifted, freeing her full mounds. She melted when his lips closed over each rigid bud and sucked it into the moist heat of his mouth. Davey wanted to—needed to—feel so much more of him, but Ethan took his time, exploring every inch of her body as if it were new or forgotten territory. He kissed her mouth, her cheeks, her chin, her ears—nothing was left untouched. His fingers trailed the length of her arms, sparing kisses for even the hollows of her elbows. He moved on to her wrists, hands and fingers. From her shoulders, he worked his way down, passing from breast to breast, hands stroking and caressing one while his mouth teased the other. By the time his lips reached her stomach, Davey was so aroused that she bucked and twitched uncontrollably with each kiss pressed against her belly.
“Ethan, please,” she begged. The tug in her loins had become torture. Her body craved the rest of him.
“Not yet,” he whispered.
His mouth tormented her a little longer before his hands finally tugged her panties down her hips and past her ankles. She kicked them off as he kissed her navel, slowly working his way
lower. She spread her legs eagerly, needing to have any part of him inside her. He acquiesced that longing, dipping his tongue into her folds in one long stroke of pure rapture. Beneath the continued caress of his magnificent tongue, Davey started to break. Ethan held her hips as she writhed in ecstasy, pressing his tongue against her clit as she trembled and bucked, not letting her escape. She moaned his name as the intensity built again and her movements became frenzied. She was almost ready to beg him to stop, unsure whether she could survive another release. Then Davey’s spine arched and her head lolled backward as another wave rolled her over, and Ethan finally let go. Once she was able to breathe again, she lifted her head and found his stormy eyes watching her with wonder. Gasping, sweaty, and dizzy, Davey could understand the awe. She had never felt anything so wonderful.
“Do you want to stop?”
“Hell no,” she panted. “Finish it.”
Ethan smiled.
He adjusted her legs, repositioning himself between them, and Davey thought the responsible thing would be to ask him to put on a condom. Screw it, she thought. She wanted to feel him raw—skin on skin—with nothing between their bodies. Then the rigid tip of him pressed into her—hot, thick, and urgent—and Davey stopped thinking. Ethan drove his hips forward, taking her in one deep stroke that filled her to the core. She wriggled, letting her body stretch to accommodate his girth, even as she squeezed herself around that wonderful thickness and began gripping and releasing him, syncing her movement with each thrust. It was Ethan’s turn to moan. His hand clenched the sheets. Biceps rippled as he supported himself on one arm and cradled her ass in the other, lifting her hips higher to change the angle and plunge even deeper into her folds. He stroked parts Davey hadn’t realized existed, causing sensations that made her moan his name and dig her nails into his skin. Stabs of pleasure ripped through her loins, joining together in one burning pool of anticipation. She half-growled, half-screamed when the dam burst, sending waves of bliss so intense they bordered on pain throughout her body. From the tips of her toes to the top of her scalp, muscles bunched in one big contraction and then released, pouring into dozens of ripples that seized her body and paralyzed her lungs. Davey couldn’t breathe until it was over. Then she collapsed into a gasping puddle of contentment.
