He didn’t answer me, though, and I opened my eyes, blinking. Someone had just opened the door, right?

“Ethan?” I called, sitting up straight.

The theater was about to close, and other than the front desk attendant, I didn’t think anyone else was in the building anymore.

And then…he was there.

He rested his hand on top of mine where it laid on my thighs, his chilled fingers making me suck in a breath and laugh. “Hey, you scared me,” I said. “Did you get the Band-Aids?”

Fingertips came up to my face, brushing a strand of hair out of my eye, and I recoiled at the icicles on my skin. What was he doing? I took his hand off my face and held it in mine, reassuring him.

“I’m okay.”

His body came in closer, though, forcing my knees apart and his clothes chafing the inside of my thighs. He took his hands off me, and I stilled, feeling the warmth of his breath right in front of me, on my face, as he leaned in.

What the hell was he doing?

“Ethan…” I protested but wasn’t sure what to say. He’d gotten close a few times, and while I knew he wouldn’t say no to more, it just never happened between us. He wouldn’t try again?

“Shhh…” he said.

And I stopped breathing. The heat of his mouth was centimeters from mine, and suddenly, my heart started hammering. He’d never felt like this. He was never forward, and I was instantly uncomfortable, old memories coming back.

Please don’t try to kiss me, I begged.

Water pumped through the pipes above my head, and I could hear the dull hum of the furnace somewhere in the distance, but otherwise, it was quiet down here, and we were all alone.

“I need the Band-Aid,” I told him, forcing a little smile. “Come on…”

“So pretty,” he whispered over my mouth. I could taste the smoke on his breath.

Smoke…

“Okay, I got them!” Ethan suddenly shouted from around the corner, stunning me out of the quiet as the bathroom door swung open again.

I gasped, rearing back. Shit!

I darted out my hands, looking for the man who was just here, but finding only empty space.

Tears stung the backs of my eyes, my pulse throbbed in my neck, and I couldn’t catch my breath as I sucked in lungfuls of air.

Motherfucker. Goddamn him. Where was he? I searched with my hands. Where did he go?

“Hey, hey, hey, what’s the matter?” Ethan asked, coming to my side.

But I just grabbed onto his sweatshirt, fisting it as I breathed hard.

If Ethan didn’t see him, he was already gone through the exit on the other side of the bathroom.

I shook my head, trying to calm down.

I’d relaxed. Like an idiot, for five minutes, I’d relaxed, and he never did. He would always be at the ready.

“Just get me out of here,” I told Ethan. “Right now.”

“What about the Band-Aid?”

“Now!” I cried out.

And he didn’t need to hear anymore. Pulling me off the counter, he took my hand, and we left the theater as quickly as possible.

I let Ethan take me home, followed closely by my driver, I was sure. Even though I had transportation at my disposal, I couldn’t stomach anything to do with Damon. I got in Ethan’s car, told my driver to “go to hell” when he protested, and we left.

Once Ethan dropped me off and left, albeit with some hesitation, I walked into the house, Mikhail trotting up to greet me and hearing my mother’s voice coming from the dining room.

I leaned down to pet him and give him a kiss. “Feed you in a minute, boy.”

Walking into the dining room, I felt their footsteps and heard pages flipping from the dining table.

I hadn’t spoken to my family much in the past few days. Angry, I stayed in my room, chewing my nails and trying to figure a way out.

“We could do wallpaper in the kitchen,” my sister said. “Like just one wall. It’s back in style now.”

Decorating? They were fucking decorating? Jesus.

“I tried to leave a few nights ago,” I finally told them, brushing my hand against the doorframe and stopping there. “Back to Montreal.”

Silence suddenly filled the room, and I could guess both of them were trying to process if they should be angry or not. My mother wanted me safe, even though she wouldn’t do anything to ensure it herself, and I was pretty certain my sister would love having me out of the way. They would both know, however, that it would displease Damon, and there might be consequences if I ran and he couldn’t find me fast enough.

“The police,” I went on, “on Gabriel Torrance’s payroll, no doubt, caught up to me and turned me around.”

“Ethan was helping you?” my mother asked in a tone that said she already knew the answer.

I nodded. “And if I want him to stay safe, then he’d better not help me again. That was the gist of the warning anyway.”

I heard a slow but deep intake of breath and a quiet exhale, and I knew my mother was trying to stay calm, but I was done pretending to be. Damon was clever, diabolical, and patient. All of the things I wasn’t. At least not right now. I was too fucking angry.

It finally dawned on me that no one was actually on my side.

“I hate you,” I said to my mother, letting it go with my chin trembling. “I would rather live in the gutter than have him in our lives!”

I gestured to where I’d heard my sister chatting. “I know why she’d do this, but you’re supposed to protect me,” I told my mom. “He raped me!”

“He didn’t rape you,” my sister snapped back, pushing out of her chair. “We all saw the video. The whole world saw the video! You wanted him. You were in love with him.”

I shook my head. “Not him.”

I had never been in love with him. Not with Damon.

That damn video.

Tears spilled, and I couldn’t stop them. I folded my lips between my teeth to keep from sobbing. A video of us was leaked, he was sent to jail for statutory rape, because he was nineteen, and I was still a minor, but nearly everyone in this town took his side. He was a little richer, a lot more popular, and two of his friends went with him for their own misdeeds leaked on other videos, as well.

But he got the most time.

He was the only one convicted of a sex crime, and in everyone’s eyes this was a grave injustice, because their basketball star, golden boy only had sex with a willing girl who just happened to be a couple years shy of the legal age of consent. Big deal.

Hey, in some other states sixteen is old enough, isn’t it?

This is a technicality.

Did he even do anything wrong? How many of us were having sex at that age?

Don’t ruin his life. It’s not like he hurt her.

Hey, she seemed to love it well enough.

The backlash was sickening, and while other girls claimed he’d taken advantage of them, too, by the end of it, they’d all folded, and it ended up just becoming an example of how warped our justice system was when there were “actual” predators out there. I’d ruined a young man’s life. To-may-toes, to-mah-toes.

All they saw in that video was me willingly kissing him.

Touching him.

Holding him.

In their eyes, I’d wanted it, and he was ‘the man’. But they didn’t know what was really going on in that video. They didn’t know what he’d done to me to get what he wanted from me.

Footsteps approached, and I smelled my mother’s Chanel No. 5.

“Winter,” she said calmly. “Do you really think he needed to marry into this family to get anything he wanted? He could’ve easily threatened Ethan anyway to keep you in Thunder Bay and under his thumb. Or threatened us, your grandparents, or any other friends. No matter what, this was going to play out how they wanted, because they have the money and we have nothing anymore. Nothing.”

‘Because of my father’, I finished for her.

Yes, I knew. She wasn’t entirely wrong.

And in that moment, I hated my father, too. His crimes didn’t put us in this mess, because Damon would’ve eventually found another door if that one had been closed. I only hated him for leaving. Gabriel and Damon Torrance could do anything they wanted with us now. And given their reputations, I tried not to think about how bad this could get or I’d be sick.

“At least now,” my mother continued. “We have something to work for. A light at the end of the tunnel.”

The divorce settlement? Was she actually that stupid? Damon would get Ari pregnant, and there would be no way out after that!

“And what were you planning for us to do in the meantime?” I challenged. “As we wait for this year to pass?”

What would I do as she tried to wait this out, day after day, week after week?

“We survive,” she finally answered.

Survive.

Submit, you mean?

After a few moments, I left the room and made my way upstairs, shutting myself in my bedroom for the rest of the night with Mikhail. I fed him but forwent dinner myself, not hungry anyway, and I only left briefly to shower.

I couldn’t make my mother’s decisions for her, but she also couldn’t make my choices for me, and there was no way I’d do whatever it took to survive. I had my limits, and I wasn’t going back to that place with him.

If it even came to that.

But hopefully I’d find a way out of here before it did.

I blinked my eyes open in my bedroom hours later, my lids still way too heavy, but the air was chillier than usual.

Was it six yet? My alarm hadn’t gone off.

I reached over and hit the button on my bedside table, the male voice in the machine saying loud and clear, “Two-thirteen a.m.”

“Two-thirteen?” I breathed out, painfully awake now.

I closed my eyes again, hoping to fall back asleep, but my brain was already working and assessing. The night was silent outside. No rain or wind, but we would probably get snow in the next month. I allowed myself a moment to feel wistful for it, but the weight of all our troubles descended again, and I wanted time to slow down, not speed up.