TAMED | FREENBECKY

12

It had been two weeks since Kirk touched Dr. Becca Armstrong.

Two weeks since he held her down on the ground and pressed his thumbs into her throat. Made her beg and quiver, reduced her to a pathetic shadow of the competent professional she pretended to be. It had been fourteen days exactly, and Kirk wanted to do it again.

But this time he yearned to take it further. To smack her in the face until she cried. Cut her. Maybe even work up the nerve to rape her. Not because he got off on that kind of thing, but because he knew it would frighten her.

And, Christ, how her fear fed him like nothing ever had.

He had planned to taunt Becca Armstrong, not torment her. Confound her, not confront her. But now that Kirk had glimpsed another possibility for their game, the idea consumed him. For so long he'd told himself he would come up with a brilliant plan, then stick to it no matter what. That was the way not to get caught. That was his way.

After five minutes alone with Becca Armstrong, Kirk didn't know if that was how he wanted to do things anymore. Where was the fun in being too afraid to improvise? Too rigid to seize an opportunity when it presented itself?

It wouldn't be enough to outsmart Dr. Becca Armstrong. Not for him, not anymore. He wanted to destroy her. To be the last thing she saw before she died, the monster she feared until that day. He wanted her, full stop, because she was quite simply the strongest, most competent woman he'd Ever encountered. And yet he could reduce her to a quivering mass of flesh.

What could be more exhilarating?

So he would change his Plan. Nothing held him to it, really. Nothing except his own expectations.

No matter what, he wouldn't kill her yet. The anticipation was too delicious. Once he killed her it would be over. He would have to come up with a new game. And at the moment, he couldn't think of another adversary he'd rather defeat. So he'd keep this going as long as he could. First he would kill another woman for her to examine, but then maybe he'd pay the good forensic pathologist a visit.

Touch her again.

Leave her afraid.

He wanted to destroy her mentally so she would never be able to defeat him with her science, the cold logic with which she had taken down Charlie Wang. Just because he didn't follow the original Plan, just because it served his basest desires, he wouldn't be sloppy. Wouldn't make the wrong move.

He could do whatever the fuck he wanted. And what he craved most in the world, even more than being untouchable, was to terrify the living hell out of Becca Armstrong.

So he would.