by Rue Volley
“Call someone—call someone!” I screamed as he let the streaks of light engulf him.
Jerod rested in his room. The stab to his chest had penetrated his breastbone, but missed his heart by an inch. I stared in as Tasha held his hand and spoke to him. He was sleeping, he would recover from this wound, but I doubted if he would ever recover from the ones that simply being a Landon had inflicted on him.
Their father, heavy-handed and mentally unstable. Their mother, cold and indifferent. Tasha, a superficial Band-Aid to hide the pain of losing Rose. His brother, who had taken the one thing he was so ignorant to squander. All of it was a terrible weight to carry. I understood him more now, even more than I did Jack.
Jack stood silently off to the side of me as I watched from the doorway. I took a slow breath and turned to him.“He needs to go to a hospital.”
Jack shook his head. “We have the best doctor here, he will be fine. This isn’t the first time.”
“What? What do you mean?”
“I told you, Abigail, we get hurt here, we get fixed—right here, on the estate.”
I sighed. Of course they were. How many times had they stabbed one another? How many times had they stitched themselves up and accepted this as a normal way of life? It was twisted and wrong. No way to live and to be raised. My anger for his parents rose in me.
I paused, I wanted to say so much to him, but my feelings over what had been said spurred me on.“Why? Why did you lie to me, Jack?”
Jack looked in toward his brother and back to me. “Fear, fear of losing you before I even had a chance to win you, Abigail.”
“I am not on the board. I’m not a prize to be won. I’m a real person, standing right here before you.”
He stepped toward me and tried to touch me, but I walked away from him. “Everything is on the board, “he said as his hand lowered to his side.
I shook my head no as I walked out and down the long hallway. He followed me, quickly catching up as he reached out and grabbed my wrist. I jerked it from him.
“You fucked her.”
He stood his ground and watched my lips as I spoke to him.
“Say it again,” he whispered to me.
“What?”
“Fuck—say it, Abigail. I fucked her; I don’t want to fuck you. I want more.”
I stepped back as he walked toward me. I felt the door to my back as he reached out and took one of my wrists and held it at my side. I struggled a little bit, but his strength overpowered me. I turned my face, so I didn’t have to look at him. He leaned into my ear.
“If you want to fuck me like you hate me, then do it. Hurt me, cut me—take everything that I have to offer to you and devour it. Devour every piece of me. I offer that to you, but don’t, don’t pretend that you don’t know what I am.”
“Jack, don’t. Don’t talk to me like that.”
He paused and lifted my wrist above me. He grabbed my other one as I struggled with him. I couldn’t stop him, but it fueled him. He wanted me to hate him.
“Why, Abigail, does it hurt to hear the truth from me? To understand what really sets me free? I want to be treated as I deserve. For the animal that I am. I want you to submit to that part of me. Until you do, you will never know who I am, not fully.”
I turned my face as he leaned into my ear. “Beg…”
I shook my head. “I won’t.”
“Submit to me, tell me to take it from you. I know that’s what you want of me.”
I turned my face, my eyes soft and tender. They filled with tears as he released my wrists and stepped back from me. “I only want you. Just you, Jack. Nothing else, and if I have to beg then I can’t be what you want.”
He held his hands out as he saw the blood that still lingered on his fingertips. He held it up to me and I watched as his hand trembled before me. “Abi…help me.”
He lowered to the ground as I knelt down and cupped his face in my hands; I made him look at me as my mind raced and my heart pounded in my chest.
“Jack—I need you just as you are, but this isn’t the truth. This is what your father left behind for you; it’s a lie. You’re not the monster; he is.”
Jack leaned into me and sobbed like a child. I held him and let my fingers gently move through his thick hair. After all that had been said and done between us, it was he who needed to submit. Not to me, but to the truth. All I did was speak the words. He moved back and placed his hands on my face and parted his lips. The words right there between us, I slowed my breathing. The world all around us fading as he started to speak to me.
“Abi—I lo…”
“Jack?”
We both stopped and looked in the direction of the small voice that spoke his name. My eyes widened as Rose stood there in the long hallway, with Victoria at her side. Jack rose up as I did, the sight of her bringing me back to a harsh and unforgiving reality.
“Rose?” Jack said as she started to walk toward him. I stood there, unable to move, unable to think, unable to breathe.
Victoria watched on as Jack stepped up to Rose and I watched him touch her face, her bottom lip, he lingered on her as he did on me. She reached up and placed her hand on his as she spoke.
“Jack—I’ve missed so much, Victoria, the doctors, they told me.” She looked back at Victoria, and she nodded to her, never once looking at me. “They told me how you saved me, saved my life that night, how you pulled me from the car. Oh Jack. I love you so much, I—they told me that the new medication woke me up, it was as if I had been in a dream for years. Jack, oh my God. I missed you so much, baby.”
Jack held her face in his hands. “Rose—I love you,” he whispered to her.
She leaned in and hugged him as my heart sank into the deepest pits of hell, far away from the three simple words that should have been spoken to me.
Book Two, The Devil’s Fire
Coming SUMMER 2015
Thank you for starting this journey with me. This series will have THREE books in it.
The last book, The Devil’s Kiss, will be out this FALL. xoxo ~Rue
