When I took a restroom break at the portable toilets, I noticed the back of the door was freshly engraved with words. Words that seemed intimately directed to my eyes.

Lust lingers, love stays.

Lust is impatient, love waits.

Lust burns, love warms.

Lust destroys, but love? Love kills.

S.A.B.

When the clock hit midnight, I gave up. I wasn’t going to find him.

My phone was blowing up, and I knew my parents were going to send a search unit if I didn’t come back home.

A missing seventeen-year-old girl was a non-issue if it had only been eight hours since you’d last seen her.

A missing seventeen-year-old oil heiress whose daddy was one of the richest men in the world sure was, though, and I had no doubt my family would raise a ruckus.

I was a Fitzpatrick, and Fitzpatricks should always be protected.

I glanced at my phone again.

Mother: I am getting increasingly worried. Just text me, please. I understand that you are upset, but you are upsetting us all by disappearing like this! I cannot get any sleep. You know how much I need my sleep.

Mother: Your father will be blaming me for this entire ordeal. I do hope this pleases you, Aisling. Getting me into trouble.

Oh, Merde. Put a lid on it, Mother.

Hunter: Da will have a heart attack, sis. Just sayin’ (more hugz from Cali).

Cillian: Stop being so emotional. She was the hired help.

Da: I am sorry for your loss, Ash. Please come home.

Leaves crunched beneath my feet as I made my way to Mom’s Volvo XC90. I was about to swing the door open, get inside, and gun it back to Avebury Court Manor, our house. That was when I heard it. A crunch that had nothing to do with my feet. My head snapped up in the darkness. Toward the edge of the parking lot, about three cars down from my vehicle, was a corner nestled between a thick line of trees leading to the woods by the highway. Secluded and dark.

“No, no, no. Please. I know I fucked up, but I promise, I’ll stop.”

Someone wailed. A man.

I squinted, ducking between my car and an Impala, peeking at the two figures under a thick mass of leaves. One of them was standing, holding a gun. The other was on his knees, in front of the standing figure, like he was praying to a merciless god. Maybe it was the fact I’d already witnessed one death tonight, but even though my adrenaline kicked in, I couldn’t muster the hysteria I probably ought to feel right now.

“Lying will get you nowhere,” the standing man clipped harshly.

“What makes you think I’m—”

“Your lips are moving,” the standing man kicked the man on his knees with the tip of his shoe, eliciting an animalistic wail. “I told you there won’t be a third time.”

“But I—”

“One last wish, Mason,” the man tsked, and my blood ran cold because I recognized that voice. I would recognize it anywhere, I realized, from tonight until the very last day of my life.

It was the voice of Monster.

My monster.

The man who gave me my first kiss.

The guy on his knees was trembling, trying to contain his frightened tears. He shook his head then finally, blurted out, “If Nikki asks, tell her it was drug-related. I don’t want her to know the truth. She’s suffered enough.”

“I will. Goodbye.”

With that, Monster used the gun pressed to the man’s forehead and popped off two bullets. From the dull thuds, I gathered there was a silencer on the gun. I slapped a hand over my mouth, muffling a horrified scream that ripped out of my throat.

He’d killed a man.

He’d killed a man out in the open.

And he hadn’t even blinked.

My legs shook, and I fell to the ground, the concrete biting into my knees. I scrambled for my keys in my hoodie, my knees hot with fresh blood oozing out of them from my fall.

Run, Merde. Run.

I unlocked the Volvo and glided into the driver’s seat, frantically wiping the tears and sweat from my face to clear my vision, biting on my lower lip to suppress a scream.

This night is not happening. It’s just a figment of your imagination.

A slam on the window beside me made me jump so high my head hit the car’s roof. I twisted my whole body and saw it was Monster. He must’ve caught sight of me, or worse … heard my scream. With shaking fingers, I started the car, blinded by tears. The Monster jammed something into the side of the door casually, unlocking it with terrifying ease, preventing me from throwing the car into reverse.

He parked his hands on the car’s roof, his biceps bulging from his short sleeves, looking blasé and indifferent.

“You’re having one hell of a night, aren’t you, little Aisling.” The deadly calm in his voice made everything so much worse.

“I didn’t see anything,” I exclaimed, jerking back, like he was going to strike me.

To my surprise, he started laughing. Wholeheartedly. A guttural noise that sounded weird coming from him, like he wasn’t used to laughing.

“Now you believe that I’m a monster?” He leaned forward, his lips hovering close to mine. My blood turned to ice, and yet, for the life of me, I couldn’t pull away this time. It must be the shock, I told myself. This was a fight-or-flight situation, but my traitorous body went for secret option number three: freeze.

No. This wasn’t just fear. There was something else thrown into the mix. Something hot and pungent. Something I didn’t want to know about myself.

Know your bones.

This beast just put two bullets in someone’s head, and yet here I was, my body humming, sizzling, begging to be touched by him.

“Are you actually going to let me kiss you?” He furrowed his brows, his lips practically moving over mine. I was spellbound. Speechless. I had to move.

Move, Merde. Move.

Finally, I managed to shake my head no.

He tugged my lower lip between his teeth, sucking on it teasingly then swiping his tongue over the inside of it.

“You’re a beautiful liar, Aisling.” His low tenor vibrated in my stomach. “Guess you found yourself, then. You’re a monster, too.” He kissed me again, with lips and teeth, before finally pulling away.

“Tell anyone about this, and I will find you, and I will kill you, too. Now, I suggest you run. Far and fast. I’m giving you a two-minute head start before coming after your ass.”

With that, he turned around and ambled away, the streetlamps catching his silhouette and making him look like the complex villain you secretly root for in a film noir, sliding into a car parked a row from mine.

Slow. Steady. Lethal.

I floored it, never looking back.

Driving so fast, the car whined and died as soon as I got home.

Shortly after the Aquila Fair, my brother Hunter came back from California for good.

Golden, tan, and blonder than ever. He moved into a penthouse downtown with a girl named Sailor, who’d been hired as his babysitter. I’d seen her a few times, when her mother used to cook for us on special occasions.

Da liked to rule all of us with an iron fist, and Hunter was by far the hardest to tame.

A few days after Hunter and Sailor moved in together, I’d visited him at his penthouse. Sailor was out, and he was taking one of his extras long showers, which I suspected involved a lot of self-pleasuring, seeing as he wasn’t allowed to date anyone since moving back to Boston.