Keep Me (38 page)

Gone for good? Was she dead?
I was going to kill this guy with my bare fucking hands. I had to check if she was still breathing, still had a pulse. But Zack was hovering so close to Tessa, and Luca was still screaming. I needed to be in three different places at once. My head was going to explode. I needed to figure something out. This psycho fuck had to be talked down, calmly, like in the movies. Then I would take him the fuck down.

Standing helpless in between the two most important women in my life, I pleaded. “Come on, Zack. You’re a reasonable man. You love Tessa, right? Let’s not do something stupid that we can’t take back.” And that’s when I saw the gun.

My throat momentarily closed up, my mouth totally dry.
Think, Marcus, think! Everyone’s lives are in your hands!
I stared at Tessa, the tears spilling down her cheeks, her hands clasped together—maybe she was silently praying or reliving old nightmares.

Her eyes caught mine and I hoped—begged, pleaded—that my message to ‘stay calm’ spoke through my own panicked gaze. But it was hard enough convincing myself—how could I convince her I had this covered?

“We’re all gonna take deep breaths, cool down and then talk like sane, rational adults. We can—”

“Enough with the ‘we’ shit, asshole,” he barked, infuriating me even further. “You’re
no one
in this equation. Tessa’s mine. She’ll be mine forever.”

I was ready to lunge at him, but he raised his arm, the reflection of shiny metal flashing in the lamplight. Tessa’s beautiful face was the last thing I saw. The gut-wrenching cry that escaped her was the last thing I heard. The skin-splitting, muscle-tearing pain the last thing I felt—before everything went black.

“Noooo! Noooo! Marcus! Oh, my God, Marcus!” I watched his strong body go limp, falling to the floor with a thud. “Oh, my God, no!” I screamed, hot tears blinding me, the sound of Luca upstairs calling out for me faded, washed out—everything was going fuzzy. I fell to my knees, crawling toward Marcus. He was shot. Where, I had no idea, but I had to be near him. I needed to know he was alive. There was blood, lots of it. It crept out from under him, but I had no idea where the fuck it was coming from.
Please God, don’t let him be dead!
I reached out to him, but was pulled back by a painful tug of my hair.

“Stop right there. Don’t even
think
of touching him. Let him bleed out like the wife stealing scumbag he is,” Zack growled his venomous words as he yanked me up, pulling me against his unusually thin, frail body.

With his hand at my throat keeping me in place, I surveyed the grim scene. It was like a horror movie—lifeless bodies strewn across my floor, unrelenting shrills and shrieks coming from my baby boy upstairs. And here I was, helpless. In the arms of a certified maniac. I felt something hard at my back. I thought it was the gun, but when I felt the cold metal at my temple, I realized it was his arousal poking at me from behind.

“You belong to me, Tessa. I’m your husband and you’ve been acting like a whore this whole fucking time while I was working on getting better. You wanna be a whore? You deceitful, lying cunt—I’m gonna treat you like a whore.”

I smelled the alcohol on his breath, felt the spit from his words as they flew out of his disgusting, hateful mouth. There were no more tears, I was drained, numb. It was over—everything was taken from me. I only pleaded with God that he would have mercy on my son.

“Please, Zack. Please let me see our son.”

“
Our son
?” he groused in my ear as if the word repulsed him. “He doesn’t even fucking know me. You made sure of that, you conniving bitch. The minute you got pregnant with that kid you were done for—he’ll always be in the way and when I’m done showing you that you’re mine again, I’ll shut him up and get rid of him, too.”

He sounded deranged. His words, his plans—it was all so much more than frightening, more than terrifying—it was paralyzing.

I wilted in his arms, helplessly stunned. If I couldn’t fight for myself I needed to fight for Luca but I was frozen, unable to move one single petrified muscle. Finding a single thread of strength, I encouraged myself to struggle. My brain told my body to do something, but it just wasn’t happening. His berating words—
whore
seemed to be the favorite—all jumbled together like incoherent ramblings. But when he started to speak about harming my son, the only thing I had left to live for—especially if Zack had succeeded in taking Marcus from me—a prevailing energy coursed through my veins, empowering me to take back what was once mine.

“No!” I shouted, my elbow impaling him hard in his groin. “You can’t take my son! You won’t hurt him!” I bolted for the stairs, but even though his face was contorted in pain, Zack lunged for me, grabbing my leg at the ankle.

I stumbled forward, my cheekbone hitting one of the steps, the impact causing me to whimper. He took advantage of my momentary weakness and dragged me down the few steps I’d managed to climb, trying to escape.

“You won’t get away from me this time, Tessa. I told you, you’re mine.”

“I’ll never be yours,” I spat in his face from the floor. “You disgust me! You’re a fucking monster.”

He jerked me up to him again, this time by my sweater, the anger in his eyes ferocious. When I looked into them I knew I didn’t have a fighting chance—I wasn’t facing a sane individual. He’d passed that point a long time ago. So I did the only thing I could to aid my cause. I screamed.

“HELP! HELP!” I yelled at the top of my lungs. “Please someone help me!”

He wound up and slapped me hard across the face. “Shut the fuck up,” he roared, “The next time you try something like that, I use this.” He waved the gun wildly, warning me.

I held my free hand to my cheek, the stinging ache bringing on more tears. Staring at the gun as it swayed in his hands, my brain started to shut down all lucid reasoning. What was I going to do? There was nothing I
could
do. Couldn’t anyone hear me?
Please, God. Please let someone save us.

Without another word, he dug the barrel of the gun between the blades of my shoulders and ordered me to march upstairs. “Time to take back what’s mine. I’ve been waiting too long.”

“No,” I cried, shaking my head frantically, but it was only a whisper. He wouldn’t shoot me. He wanted me alive—it was more about the torture with him, showing me who was boss. He didn’t want me dead, he just wanted to own me.

“
No?
” he laughed maniacally. “You really are a brave one.” I felt the stabbing of the gun gone from my back, but then new suffering ensued as he dragged me up the stairs by my arm like a rag doll.

“Stop! Please stop. I’ll go willingly. You’re hurting me.” How many times had I used that phrase in hopes he’d stop his torture and show some mercy on the woman he supposedly loved? It was futile, but I had to try.

“Good. You deserve to be hurt. Just like you’ve hurt me. Maybe now you’ll learn your fucking lesson.”

He continued dragging me up the stairs, as my sweater rode up and the bare skin of my stomach scraped and burned with the friction of the carpet covering the stairs. Why was this happening to me? Why did I deserve this? I was just getting my life back. I was finally happy. That was all a distant memory right now as I was being hauled off to my demise.

When we made it to my bedroom, I realized amongst all the insanity taking place that Luca’s crying finally subsided. I’d give anything just to make sure he was okay, asleep, oblivious to the horror around him. My arm darted out in the direction of his room. “Please let me check on him?” I sobbed, my voice barely audible.
Please show me there is actually a human left underneath all that monstrous hate.

“No,” was all he said, as he lifted me to my feet and shoved me into my bedroom. “And don’t think of screaming again. I want you to feel me inside you, your delicious body stroking mine the way it used to—but if you scream again, I’ll knock you out and fuck you anyway. It’s been too long since that pussy’s been mine. I’ll have it one way or another.”

The last shred of dignity, of hope, I had left in my weakened body vanished with his words. This was it. Not only had he tormented my son, beat me ‘til I bled, and possibly murdered my best friend and the love of my life, but now he was going to do something that would haunt me for the rest of my life—ruin any chance I had at being normal again. I never imagined that Zack, the man I once loved, was capable of the crimes he committed here tonight.

“Don’t do this, Zack. It doesn’t have to be like this,” I begged, my thoughts becoming foggy, my body checking out of this reality.

“Too late. You’ve given me no choice. I called and you ignored me, changed your number and pretended I didn’t exist. I’ve been watching you for a while now… whoring around with your new man. Quite honestly, it’s appalling… a married woman, a mother, fucking a lowlife out in public so everyone can see. He took what’s mine—now I’m taking it back.”

I didn’t have time to think how he knew about Marcus and me, or to decipher when or how he’d seen us together. My body tensed as he lurched forward, tugging my pants down and ripping my panties from my skin. I trembled beneath his ruthless touch, my skin prickled with fear. For a moment, I left my body as an empty shell, wishing it away, drowning it all out.

He pinned me to the bed, the gun jutting hard into my neck, his free hand finding my opening and working in and out of me, too fast, too rough. Tears spilled from my eyes as I succumbed to his will, becoming a victim yet again. I contemplated begging again, but knew it would do no good. It would only fuel his mission; fighting back always drove him further.

And what went beyond rape? Murder? I couldn’t let him kill me and leave Luca alone in
his
care. I had to submit, I told myself it would all be over soon and that at some point I’d find a way to escape.

With the gun digging into the already bruised skin at my neck, and his lips creeping across my skin sloppily, I sunk into the bed, into a daze, imagining a beautiful alternative to this nightmare. Even through the deafening pounding of blood in my ears, I heard him unzip his pants. How had it come to this? I guess I never knew the severity of his sickness. Maybe it was all my fault for not getting him help sooner. Maybe there was still hope?

“Zack, baby,” my voice quaked as I nearly choked on the endearment. It was my last prospect of preventing him from going any further. “Please don’t do this. We can talk. We can work it out.”

His body tensed. For a fleeting moment I believed I made a breakthrough—my trick worked, I could almost breathe again. But then I felt the blow to my head, the grip of the gun banging against my temple. I instantly felt dizzy; dread overcame me as I feared I would black out and never wake, never see my son again. I blinked hard, fighting past the blackness that threatened to take over. Swallowing the bile that rose in my throat, I caught a glimpse of Zack through bloody vision. “You’re a fucking liar. I’m not an asshole, Tessa. Don’t lie to me! Just shut the fuck up!”

I lay still and silent, afraid to goad him further. There wasn’t much more I could take. I felt broken all over again, but this time even if I survived, I would always feel dead inside.

His eyes turned from heated with hate and fury to burning with lust and desire. Only someone as sick as he was could find a way to partner the two opposing emotions.

I felt the tip of his erection on my bare thigh and watched as his hand traveled down my quivering body to ease himself between my legs.

“Don’t fight me, Tessa,” he growled when I instinctively locked my legs together, denying him entrance. Angered by my defiance, he reprimanded, “Now, we do it my way.”

My hands gripped fistfuls of sheets, my head swaying back and forth. “Noooo!” I screamed as he dug his fingers into my thighs. Yanking my legs apart, he spread them open and pinned them down. “Please don’t do this,” I wailed. “I’m begging you. Please.”

He ignored my desperate pleas as he positioned himself between my thighs, pushing the tip of his erection against my folds.

I looked at him one last time before he entered me. In the final, desperate moment before he violated me, and I knew I must be delusional from the trauma because I could swear I saw Marcus in the shadows.
I love you, baby.
I thought to myself.
I just have to get through this and I’ll find my way back to you again. I promise.

“Get the fuck off her!” I heard and I knew then that I was saved.
Marcus.
He was real, he was alive and he was saving me from this nightmare.

I blinked, still in disbelief, and felt the weight of Zack’s body vanish. Two large hands tightened around Zack’s neck and his bloodshot eyes widened with fear and shock. I turned my head away, terrified to watch what I knew Marcus would surely do. My eyes clenched shut and I waited and listened. But listening was worse than watching. As much as I wanted Marcus to put an end to Zack, I didn’t want him carrying the weight of taking someone’s life.

There were no sounds of a struggle, only gurgles and gags, but when I felt a body drop at the foot of the bed, I knew it was over. I prayed that when I opened my eyes again it would be Marcus who had prevailed, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it, my body in some form of traumatic shock.