Chapter Eight
Jada was alone, or at least she seemed to be. She had to pretend that Luke wasn’t in her closet the whole time, even though he was. It was a little awkward; she had made him promise to look away while she changed for bed, and even then, she finished off in the bathroom to be sure he couldn’t see anything he wasn’t supposed to.
Then, she was ready for bed, and what else was there to do? She looked at herself in the bathroom mirror and sighed. She looked good. She worked hard to maintain a slim figure, a little muscle in her arms and legs, though not too much. She had been blessed with a good bone structure by her gorgeous mother, and she worked hard on her skin, too, keeping it fresh and smooth.
She looked way too good to be a murder victim.
But what else was there to do? She had to go back out there, open the lock on the bathroom door, and wait for it to happen. She was already feeling like maybe trusting Luke hadn’t been the right idea. She had known him for, what, a few hours? And she trusted him to save her life already?
Putting the doubts out of her mind, Jada switched off the bathroom light and opened the door and stepped out into the bedroom.
That’s when he grabbed her.
The invisible force was on her, suddenly, gripping her arms by the elbows and lifting her up off her feet. She squirmed and thrashed in mid-air, feeling her feet connecting with the hard bones of his legs several times, but he only grunted and forced her down onto the bed in front of him.
She fought him hard and reached out wildly to slap the area where his face might have been as soon as he let go of her arms. He kneeled above her, the pressure of his thighs keeping her legs tightly in place, and he gradually forced both of her arms into the grip of his one hand. She bucked, twisted, and tried to get him off, but he only shifted and gripped her tighter.
One by one, he forced her arms down, moving his legs for a split second so that they were also trapped between his thighs. She could feel the hard bones pressing in on both sides, even as she continued to twist and shake. Every move brought her a little more freedom, but then he would shift and trap her again.
Now that his hands were free, she felt a sudden pull on the top of her nightgown. It was hard to struggle and fight against something that you couldn’t see. She was afraid now, more afraid than she could ever remember being in her life. She had thought she was strong. He made her feel like a weak child.
Then there was another sensation of pressure, across her chest, and it was relieved by a ripping sound. In front of her eyes, she watched her nightgown ripped open with an unseen force, all the way down. It exposed the lingerie that she wore underneath.
She screamed, louder than she had ever screamed before.
She felt hands on the cups of her bra, and then, suddenly, nothing. A heartbeat later and the pressure on her legs was gone completely, the mattress sprung up in release. Jada scrambled backwards, finding herself free. She glanced down and saw white marks on her legs and arms, points where she had been held so tightly that the blood had rushed away.
Noise was filling the room, noise from a source that she could not see. Grunts and snarls, the sound of fists landing on flesh, crashing noises on the floor. Her bedside table fell suddenly, the contents scattered. Some of them seemed to hover in the air for a moment before they were shaken off by an invisible body.
“I won’t let you -” she heard Luke say, and then more grunts and animalistic growls.
The sounds moved out of the bedroom and into the hall, accompanied by a heavy crash against the doorframe and a cry of pain. Jada wrapped the tattered remains of her nightdress around herself, unsure of whether to follow them or stay back in safety.
She could hear their voices moving along the hall, out into the open living room, half-formed words, and shouts. They sounded like they would kill each other.
Jada heard a strangled cry and covered her mouth with her hands. The power went suddenly and plunged the room into darkness. She realized that the water she could feel on her face had to be her own tears.
There was an unmistakable noise which she knew to be one of the windows in the living room opening. Then it slammed shut. Jada wrenched her eyes to the bedroom window and saw a shadow pass by, illuminated by the faint glow from the street lights a few levels down.
The power was only gone for a moment. The lights flickered back on one by one. The bathroom light spilled out into the bedroom. Jada got up hesitantly and wiped her face, trying to hold the shreds of her nightdress as tightly against herself as possible.
She tiptoed out of her room, out into the corridor. She couldn’t see much, but there was a dim shape on the floor in the living room. A shape that could only be a man. She stopped for a moment. Her heart beat so fast she could barely breathe. Which one of them was it? And why weren’t they moving?
She took a couple of steps forward, swallowed, and took a deep breath. She closed her eyes for a moment, and when she opened them again, she switched on the light before she could change her mind.
It was Luke.
Her initial relief soon flooded away when she realized that he was lying across the hardwood floor, still and unmoving, and there was a dark liquid slowly spreading out beneath him.