Stalkers: A Dark Romance Anthology

by Ally Vance

  Asher kneels back on his heels and grips his cock in his hand. I know that despite having just come, my body is nowhere near prepared for the pain he’s about to inflict on me.

  My blood runs cold when Asher smiles a bitter smile, and it doesn’t take me long to figure out I was right.

  Chapter Five

  Three weeks…

  It’s been three weeks since Asher first raped me. I’ve lost count of how many times he has since. I look over at his sleeping form. His hand with the lily tattoo resting on his abs. How ironic that tattoo is. Life imitating art. Me, his Lily, caught in his web. His chest rises and falls, face relaxed, and I wonder how he can rest so peacefully knowing what he did to me. Asher has been a constant in my life for the last seven years. Maybe I did use him for sex, but I felt something for him too. I might not have felt exactly the same way for him as I did for Dale, but I loved him in my own way. Besides, I thought Dale and I would never be more than friends. Even if a large part of me wished it could be otherwise.

  I blow out a silent breath when I think about how I used to fantasize about having both Asher and Dale in my life. How just after Dale called things off, I wished I hadn’t opened up to them about my past so things would have always remained the same. So my heart didn’t have to choose. And how I felt like I was safer with Asher than I’d ever be with Dale.

  My heart, anyway.

  I realize now, how wrong I was. Pain threatens to swallow me whole, but I push it down. I can’t afford to think about this again today. I can’t afford to get choked by remorse. Even if I deserve to be. Not when I need to fight for survival, even though I know I won’t survive.

  I move slowly, trying to get into a comfortable position without waking Asher. Being trussed up the way I am has wreaked havoc on my back and hips. The chains are now long enough that I can lie on my side, but then I end up tangled in the heavy metal. On my second night here, Asher had unchained me so I could go to the bathroom, and I tried to escape. That resulted in a broken nose, which is only now healing, as well as the revocation of my freedom.

  I feel like I’m slowly suffocating in this basement. The only glimpse of the outside world is the occasional small sliver of sunlight that stubbornly breaks through the grimy basement window. Man, I miss the sun. The way it kisses the clouds and trees. I miss the feel of its warm rays soaking into my skin.

  I’ve never been so cold in my life. It’s a chill the settles deep into my marrow and has my jaw tense from keeping my teeth from chattering. I long for a warm shower to wash the filth away from my body and to give me a momentary respite from the bone-aching chill. I’m naked now; it’s easier for Asher this way. Every morning, he gives me a bed bath with a bowl of warm water and a cloth. The warm cloth against my skin is agonizing cruelty. The small sliver of heat I get moments before the frigid air creeps over my skin is almost unbearable. Then when the bathing is over, I know what’s coming next.

  Asher turns over in his sleep, and my heart catches in my throat. Nerves race through my body, and I hold my breath. He settles back down, and I blow out a relieved sigh.

  Last week, Asher left me alone to help Dale “further investigate my disappearance” and cancel upcoming tour dates. Really, what he was doing was trying to frame poor Bianca. When I asked Asher what he’d told Dale about his own absence, he said he’d just told him we’d had a fight, and that’s why he’d left me alone. That if he’d been with me, “Bianca” wouldn’t have gotten to me. Then he told Dale he had rented a fishing cabin in the woods so he could get away. It worked well to corroborate the guilt he was supposedly feeling over our fight.

  I bet he played the grieving, guilt-ridden boyfriend part perfectly as they followed lead after lead that was going to get them nowhere. While he was gone, I counted every second till he was back, terrified that something would happen to him while he was away, and I’d end up starving to death in this miserable shithole.

  So why now, was I wishing he was gone again?

  Living with only my thoughts has taught me some strange shit. Like, anticipation is the worst form of torture. In the dead of the night, when everything is pitch black with not even the shapes in the room to distract me, I wonder what he’ll do to me when he wakes up in the morning. Some days it’s worse; other days, better, but regardless of which kind of day it is, the suspense of what will happen is slowly killing me the most.

  Waiting and watching for every agonizing second to pass before he uses my body is, by far, worse than when he’s inside me. Some days, I get a glimpse of the old Asher—the one who used to pretend to love me. Those days fuck me up the most because I crave them and cling insanely to any morsel of kindness he shows me, even if I’ll never let him know that. I get lost in the fantasy that everything is fine and even pretend that we are back in my old apartment fucking around and “playing.” Then there are the days when a glaze moves over his eyes, and I have to fight down the bile because I know it’s going to be bad.

  My bladder cramps, reminding me that I haven’t peed since before sundown. I turn my head to the stainless steel bucket in the corner. The bucket Asher brought in when he revoked what he called my “privileges.” I hesitate for a second, knowing that the minute he hears the chains grind against each other, he’s going to wake up. I slowly move my hand and position the chain into the middle of the bandage. Asher dressed my wrists yesterday when my right one got infected from the chains cutting into me.

  If the smell hadn’t bugged him so much, I doubt he would’ve done anything about it, but he’d said it interfered with him getting hard. Part of me wishes he hadn’t cleaned my wounds. Dying from septicemia wouldn’t have been fun at all, but at least I’d be dead, and this nightmare would be over.

  The pain in my abdomen sees to it that I can’t procrastinate any longer, and I scoot to the side of the bed. The chains clink, and I shoot a glance over to Asher, but he hasn’t stirred. I blow out a breath. As much as the suspense of what today might bring is doing to my nerves, I know that if I don’t get to empty my bladder, Asher will just fuck me while it’s still full, causing me to humiliate myself. And I don’t know if I can bear that again.

  I make it to the bucket and suck in a breath when the sting of my pee flowing over what feels like a million tears causes me to grind my teeth. As tempting as it is to stop the flow, I know I won’t be able to, so I close my eyes and ride it out.

  “You hurting, baby?”

  My eyes snap open when I hear Asher’s voice, but then I quickly look down at my toes, refusing to answer his question, and more so, refusing to allow him to see the pain on my face. The blue gel on my toenails has grown out and reminds me that I missed my last pedicure. I wonder briefly if they charged my credit card for the missed appointment or if they called to find out why I didn’t come and if Dale had to take the call. My chest tightens when I think of Dale and what he must be going through. How he must be going out of his mind.

  The last time I went in for a pedicure, Dale came with me. We’d been so busy rehearsing for the tour that outside of work, we hadn’t had time to have a real conversation. Dale had teased that if the only way he’d get to have time with me was at the salon, he’d have to get a pedicure too. I’d teased him back that he was all talk and no action, but he’d ended up with purple toes—claiming he was so sexually frustrated that it was fitting. Proving to me once again that despite what he’d gone through during his early years, he chose to live life to the fullest, never taking himself seriously, always brightening my day. We’d laughed so hard that if I hadn’t been a long-time client, I’m sure they would’ve kicked us out of there.

  The idea of never getting the opportunity to do anything like getting a pedicure with Dale again is what undoes me the most. It’s not so much the horrors of what goes down in this depraved little basement. It’s the loss of hope. The knowledge that I’ll never have something to look forward to again. That I’ll never see Dale again. Regrets smothers me because if I had it all to do over, I’d get my shit toge
ther and tell Dale how I really feel instead of using sex to mask the guilt of my past. I’d find a way to make it work between us.

  My lip starts trembling, and as much as I try to stop them, the tears well and spill down my face. The sobs that I’ve spent the last three weeks suppressing rip free, and I can’t stop them anymore.

  Asher is off the bed and at my side in seconds. He crouches down next to me, an arm around my shoulders as he looks into my tearstained face. He looks so concerned after everything he’s done to me, and I can’t take it. His concern is worse than his abuse, and I lose it. Every single evil, vile thing he’s done to me bubbles to the surface, and suddenly, I don’t care if I die down here today. I will not let him lay one more finger on me.

  I turn and scream. Catching him off guard, I score my fingers down his face. He screams so violently and takes a few steps back, clutching where my jagged fingernail raked over his eyeball.

  “That was a stupid fucking thing to do, Raine!”

  He lunges for me, but I stand, reaching down for the bucket and smash the metal rim into his face. Urine splashes over the both of us in a warm flood, and I’m so cold that for a brief moment, I forget to be disgusted long enough to relish the small reprieve. Asher slips on the wet puddle and lands on his back, the sound of his head hitting the floor a sickening crack. I close my fingers around the rim of the steel bucket and bring it up over my head, ignoring the crushing pain as the chains grind against my bones. I smash it down on Asher’s head over and over and over again, rage a feral beast screeching out of my throat.

  Asher’s hands fly to protect his face, but he can’t fend me off. I keep at it, blow after blow, until the bucket slips from my wet fingers and crashes to the floor. I lunge for Asher, but he’s just out of reach, and the chains stop me inches from my target.

  He stumbles to his feet, blood staining his face. His eyes blink rapidly to clear the streaming blood from them, and he rushes me. Asher’s arms go around my waist and he slams me into the wall. Air whooshes out of my lungs as my back connects with a pipe, and no matter how much I open my mouth, I can’t seem to get air into my lungs.

  Asher’s hands fly to my neck, and he tightens his grip on my throat. I try to wheeze in air, but it’s no use. I watch the hatred fill his face and close my eyes, not wanting that to be the last thing I see. I feel his hands grow even tighter, and my hands fly to his, trying to claw him off me. It doesn’t work, and my knees start buckling.

  I hear the sound of gunshots moments before Dale’s sweet voice fills my ears over the persistent zinging in my brain.

  I’m glad that in my dying moments, my brain gave me my own version of a white light. I feel arms wrap around me and succumb to the feeling of being safe.

  Even if it’s all in my head.

  I come to and groan, my eyes still closed.

  I’ve grown accustomed to pain over the last three weeks, and at times, even relished the company it offered, but the minute I come to, the pain radiating through my body has nausea washing over me in waves, and for a brief moment, I wish I was dead.

  And then I smell it—a mix of citrus and sandalwood.

  Dale.

  My eyes flutter open slowly, and Dale’s perfect face, stained with tears, stares back at me.

  “I didn’t die.” I only manage a whisper.

  He smiles, but it’s broken a little. Not the usual full-blown megawatt smile he usually gives me. “You didn’t die.”

  I sit up, and the room spins, so I clutch Dale’s leather jacket.

  “Easy, baby,” he murmurs as his arms tighten around me.

  When the room stops revolving, I look over to where Asher is lying face down in a crimson puddle of his own blood. “You killed him.”

  “I did.” Dale’s tone is harsh, and I turn to look at him. “He was going to kill you,” he says, softer this time.

  “I know.”

  “What did he do to you?”

  I shake my head vehemently, not caring that it feels like a thousand knives being driven into my skull. “Not today.”

  Dale kisses me on my head, and I want to withdraw, but I don’t. My hair smells disgusting, but it feels too good having his lips on me.

  “How did you find me?” I rasp.

  “Not today,” he murmurs my words back at me, his lips still pressed against my head. “I just want to hold you.”

  We stay there for long moments. I know I should be eager to get out of this hellhole, but for now, I just need to be in Dale’s arms. Even if that means I’m sitting on a cold basement floor mere feet away from a dead body.

  My boyfriend’s dead body.

  Make that ex-boyfriend.

  About Ryleigh:

  Ryleigh Sloan is a romance author with a master’s degree in being an indecisive control freak. Her favorite pastime is driving her friends crazy by writing multiple books at once.

  Following the advice of established authors to read, read, read in order to hone one’s craft she does just that and engrosses herself in as many romance novels as she can get her hands on. Her bad habit of writing more than one book at a time carries over to her reading and she can be found reading, and listening to multiple titles at once and enjoying every moment.

  If you'd like to see more from Ryleigh Sloan, sign up for her newsletter.

  Books by Ryleigh:

  The Dark Side of Chemistry

  Cliché

  Risky Rockstar: A Hero Club Novel

  Karolina

  A Nefarious Story

  Yolanda Olson

  Blurb

  They tore us apart when we were younger.

  I was the bad one they said, and the only way to save her was to send her away from me.

  It took years before I found her again, and I spent every waking moment obsessing over everything we could have been together.

  She never saw me, though.

  Truth be told, I don’t think she saw anyone or anything, but I know that she misses me as much as I do her. And because of that, I’ll finish the work she started.

  The sin of one brother is easily levied against the other regardless of how clean his slate may be.

  I’ve been watching, waiting … hoping.

  And now the moment has arrived.

  I’ll make her proud of me.

  I’ll show her that I’m nothing to be afraid of, and maybe one day we’ll find each other again.

  For now, I have to pay homage to her every move and painfully exquisite thoughts.

  I’ll prove to her that we’re not so different.

  It’s the only way to get her to love me again.

  Prologue

  The rain hits my umbrella at an odd angle. My white-blonde hair is damp and sticking to the side of my face, but I don’t make a move to push it away.

  I can feel the damp grass starting to seep through the holes in my shoes and lifting one foot, I rub it against the back of my leg.

  I do my best not to brush my shoe against the hem of my old, black dress. Even though I’m not the best dressed girl here, I put on my best clothes in the hopes that maybe Mom and Dad would be proud of me for once.

  With a sigh, I return my undivided attention to the family plot in front of me.

  Somewhere in the distance, I can hear wailing. Someone has lost their loved one and they’re being mourned. But that will never happen for my family—we aren’t meant to be mourned. We’re meant to be discarded and forgotten.

  I begin to chew the inside of my mouth as I crouch down and wipe away a wet leaf that has landed so crudely against my mother’s name. She was a woman that even nature is be happy to hide, and I can’t help but chuckle at how the universe works. Not that I’m here to see her; or him, I think as I glance at my father’s name.

  “I came for you,” I say softly to the name at the bottom of the small monument.

  But she’s not here, either.

  She’s far too smart to die before she’s good and ready. It’s just that seeing her name can make me feel be
tter sometimes, and that’s why I make my way into this fucking cemetery when I’m feeling lonely.

  Paloma Grace Albertine.

  I miss my sister.

  I found her online one day when I was digging through websites I shouldn’t have been visiting, and I recognized her right away. Her eyes, almost the same as mine, watched us more than we did her. I paid no mind to the derelicts that were making requests as she fulfilled their every whim with madness in her smile, a beautiful void in her big, blue eyes, and cruelty in her heart.

  I fell in love with her all over again and wished to God that she really could see me.

  I performed for her too.

  I mimicked her almost every move. Anytime she shoved something inside of herself, I’d grab the nearest object and did the same. If one of her shows was borne of malice and the requests were for violence, I’d hurt myself, because even animals won’t seem to be afraid of Haight.

  I did my best for my sister, but if she could see me, she didn’t acknowledge me.

  And that’s okay.

  It just means I have to work harder to be better so that I can become something more than just my sister’s shadow.

  I stand up and turning my face away for a moment, my eyes land on a daffodil that’s trying to stand up against the storm.

  A quick glance toward the spot between Grace and our father’s name, I see my own.

  Karolina Haight Albertine.

  I clear my throat as I pick up a handful of grass and begin to press it against my name as I always to do before I leave my beloved Grace.

  My parents gave her the middle name of Grace and mine is Haight because she was always the good one. Obedient to a fault, always said her midnight prayers, and hid her sins from the moonlight.