against the man. Against his face and shoulders. When he locks the door behind them, she pulls at his hair and kicks and bites. She’s more of a handful than he expects, so he throws her on his bed and wraps her in a blanket.
I know what is about to happen. I’ve been on the receiving end for as long as I can remember. But it’s my fucking dream. Why can’t I stop him?
I’m trembling and tears are blurring my vision.
She is kicking from under the blanket. He holds her down with his arm. Hard.
Her heart is racing when he lifts the blanket over her legs. She kicks some more, so he presses harder. Almost crushes her windpipe, but still she fights. She tries to push him off her. She scratches and claws at him, but he is lost. He runs his fingers along the band of her panties. They are pink with tiny flowers on them.
I am shaking so hard, I almost throw up. I can feel those same fingers on me. Pushing. Pinching. Invading.
Stop. Stop. Stop.
She manages to get the blanket off her face and she sees me. I feel it the moment her gaze lands on me. I’m in my cloak, though. She can’t see my face, but she’s even more afraid. Why? I’m not the one who wants to do bad things to her.
But that doesn’t matter. She has stopped fighting and is staring at me, her eyes, like raw gold dust, large and shimmering with unspent tears. He doesn’t pay attention. He is mesmerized by her panties. By her slim legs. By the V they create at her crotch. He pushes her knees apart. She lets him. She’s gone completely limp, but I know what he is going to do next.
Vomit creeps up my throat. This is my dream. This is my dream. Not his.
He pulls her panties down, and something inside me breaks. I can’t see him do this to her. He’s been slated for hell for years, but he doesn’t go for a long time.
So maybe he doesn’t die just yet, but that doesn’t mean he should be able to hurt people. Especially not Dutch. Not my Dutch.
If this were a video game …
My cloak billows around me like a deep black sea. The cloak that I created with a single thought. What if—?
I reach behind my back as I would in the video game at the laundry mat, wrap my fingers around the hilt of a blade, and unleash a wicked sword. It’s hot like it just came out of a fire. Smoke drifts off its razor-sharp edge. An edge that’s serrated with wisps of curves and hooks, very much like the markings on my shoulders and back. And I know it’s from hell. Like me.
I wrap both hands around the hilt. I have no choice but to do this in front of Dutch. Her gaze is locked on to me. My every move. My every emotion. She no longer even notices where his fingers are. How he has violated her.
I jump onto a dresser and swing the sword. It slices clean through him. Easily. Like he is barely there.
But there’s no blood. There’s no wound. He doesn’t cry out or double over, and I stand there in shock. I’ve failed. My eyes drift shut. I’ve failed. There’s nothing I can do.
A thud echoes in the room and I look down as Ethan slumps over. His eyes are wide. He doesn’t know what happened. But neither do I.
What I do know is that they are looking for her. Her father and uncle are in the alley, calling her name. I can hear them, but Dutch is in a trance. She huddles in the corner, her panties around her ankles, the blanket bunched in her tiny fists and around her midsection. It covers half her face and she is biting it. Biting her knuckles through it.
“Run,” I tell her.
She hears me. Her eyes widen even farther, but she remains silent.
“Where?” her father asks a woman in the alley.
She shakes her head. Unsure. “I just saw a little girl. I was carrying groceries. I just— I don’t know.”
“Go, damn it. Run.”
Dutch continues to stare, so I grab a handful of hair and jerk her toward me. I don’t show her my face. I keep it hidden in the black. Maybe that’s even better. Maybe that will make her even more scared of me, which right now would be awesome.
I wrap my other hand around