Save Riley

by Yolanda Olson

  I pushed open the door to the room and smiled when I saw Riley leaning against the balcony, her back to me, and the moonlight once again dancing on her body. I tossed the box on the bed and went out onto the landing. I pressed myself roughly against her like I had in the airport terminal. I ran my hands up through her hair and roughly pulled her head back. I leaned down and kissed her neck as she reached up and wrapped her arms around me. I inhaled deeply and grinned. “I can smell your sweetness already,” I whispered to her.

  “Jax,” she whispered back. Her hands run through my hair rather wildly as I push harder against her. Her gasp for air makes my dick harder and I take one of her hands away from my hair, placing it on my now throbbing bulge. I want Riley to pull it free, I want her to do it because she wants nothing more than to put her hands on me as I’m putting my hands on her.

  I left a finger slide into her wetness and she arches her back as her body starts to tremble slightly. I still have a firm grip of her hair in my other hand, so I gave it a hard tug.

  “How’s this, Riley? Is this what you wanted?” I ask not recognizing the tone of my own voice.

  “Yes,” she grunted through the pain.

  “Good girl. Stay here and stay just like this, I’m going to get somethings for us to play with,” i whispered to her.

  I stumbled back toward the bed for the box. I was to a point of sexual arousal that I had never been to before and I was loving every moment of it. I opened the box and threw the lid aside grabbing the collar and the chain. I went back to the balcony and secured it around Riley’s throat and hooked the chain on. She moaned quietly as I pressed myself against her again and balled the chain in my hand. I gave it another tug but this time something went wrong. Horribly wrong.

  I heard a whimper and a snap and then Riley’s body pitched forward and fell over the balcony. I ... I had killed her.

  What have I done? I thought frantically to myself. I looked over the side of my house and saw her body had landed at an odd angle. Her eyes, her beautiful haunting blue eyes were staring up at me vacantly. Her head rested on her shoulder and a small trickle of blood poured from the side of her mouth.

  The one moment I considered us equals, the one moment I wanted to tell her that I loved her was gone now.

  I would never have a chance to love her again, to feel her warm body in my hands. I had just murdered the one person I honestly loved.

  Any ounce of sanity I had was finally gone.

  Epilogue

  I was never a religious person really. I mean I believed that there was something up in the sky floating out there in the universe watching us, but I never actually prayed to anything.

  Not until the day I was taken, not until the day everything went awry and Jaxton lost his mind. Not completely of course, but enough to make me do whatever he wanted and agree to everything he said.

  I was scared of him now more than ever. A terrible thing was unleashed from him the night that Riley died. He had come back to the Alone Room when I was on my last breaths with someone. An older man I couldn’t quite make out. The older man stitched me up and hooked me up to what I think was an I.V. I got better a few days later and the older man left. He told Jaxton he would have to be more careful now because if he messed up once more it was his last time helping him. He said that he wouldn’t clean up any more of his messes.

  After that, Jax would pace the upstairs hallway every night talking to himself. I could never make out what he was saying, but to be honest, I was too scared to ask.

  He hadn’t said much to me. Only twice did he really talk directly to me and that was to ask me what Riley said to me before she attacked me

  “She said to tell you that she loved you and was afraid because of it. Afraid of what she would become if she let herself stay with you knowing that she would do anything for you. She said to tell you goodbye and that she hoped you’d fine peace one day. She said she was going to turn the razor blade on herself once I was dead.”

  He laughed at first. Then he cried and then he got angry. So insanely, terribly angry that I started to pray that very night.

  I didn’t pray to just one being either, I prayed to anything and everything that would listen. Hoping that maybe I would get out of this before he destroyed us both.

  Last night was the scariest moment of all. He had invited me into his room but stood on the balcony after giving me permission to sit on his bed. I was wearing a terribly uncomfortable corset and he told me that the reason he made Riley wear one so tightly for a few months was because he had gotten her pregnant and didn’t want to risk a child of his being a monster like him. He said that the corsets being tightened would abort the baby naturally and that Riley never knew.

  I knew that Jaxton Whitlock was a monster, but I never knew to what extent until he told me that story. I had nightmares every night since and no amount of prayer seemed to be saving me or stopping the nightmares.

  But tonight was different. Tonight there was no pacing and there were no hurried voices in the upstairs hallway. There was simply the sound of footsteps as he walked down the hallway and descended the staircase with a blank face. I stood at the bottom as I always did on his command. When he reached the main floor landing he smiled at me, a friendly smile and ran a hand down the side of my face.

  “I’ve thought of something great. Something that will make us both happy and something that will keep us both alive,” he said cheerfully. “Would you like to know what it is?”

  “Yes sir,” I whispered.

  “You are the reason Riley went away for a little while and I know how you’re going to repay me that debt. Your name isn’t Tempest. It’s Riley. Do you understand that? Your name is Riley, my Riley,” he said happily. “And now we get to have the forever that I wanted us to have. But first I have to train you to hunt, to be like me and then we’ll live our lives together.”

  My body began to shake violently. I was never going to get out of this place and he looked so happy and sure of his plan that I would have to play along just to survive.

  Dear God, won’t someone help me?