Silent Night (Twisted Holidays)

11. Saint

ELEVEN

SAINT

Even when I walk away from her after preparing her bath, I don’t leave. Why? Because I’m a fucking moron who instead lingers outside her house, watching and waiting for the bathroom light to turn off and for hers to switch on. That’s when I’ll leave for good, I decide. When I see she’s tucked into bed on this Christmas night, visions of sugarplums visiting her dreams rather than me.

When I do see her, it’s an outline hidden behind that fucking curtain I still want to burn. The delicate material reminds me of the kind of woman she is, and the kind of man I’m not. I’ll never be like the people she goes to school with; the future businessmen and lawyers, doctors and architects who’ll make the world a better place. They’re everything I’m not and will never be.

After a few minutes, the light flicks off, but she draws the curtains open. She could very well be only letting the moonlight into her room, but I let myself fantasize that I have something to do with it.

So I don’t leave. Not yet. Soon though, I will.

More minutes pass, my eyes growing heavy when her light abruptly switches on again. I straighten from my slouch, heart beating a bit faster.

Then I see her through the sliver she’s granted me by parting the curtain. She shoots up in bed, her attention toward her door and that’s when I realize something is wrong. Very, very wrong.

A figure moves into view, leaning over her. Her stepbrother. She shoves him away, but he pushes her down, and that’s all I wait around to watch before I’m cutting through the yard and toward the back door.

Now, having picked this lock a few different times, the door opens quickly and I rush through the house, passing the living room that now holds better memories for me than any other house I’ve been inside or lived in, and up the stairs, taking them two at a time.

I don’t stop, throwing her door open, reading the scene for only a second before reacting.

She’s pinned to the window, his hand tight on her throat. Her eyes flutter shut, even while she continues trying to push him off her, her nails imbedded into his wrist and she doesn’t see me burst in.

He does, though. He glances over his shoulder, his mouth parting. I don’t give him a chance to talk before ripping him off her. Hayley moves quickly, ducking to the side of the room and I push him against the window, in the place he had her pinned hard enough the window cracks, just a tiny spider one.

He was trying to hurt her, so I’ll hurt him. It’s as simple as that.

I lunge at him, landing throwing fist after fist into his face. Bentley might be around my size, but his muscles are manufactured with his expensive gym membership. The man doesn’t know genuine work. To live on the streets and fight for what you want, what you own. It’s do or die out there, and more than once I’ve gotten into scraps to protect food, clothing, or other critical items.

And Hayley is mine . On the streets or in this house, against a gang or against one asshole stepbrother, I’ll always fucking protect her.

After my fourth punch, he seemingly wakes long enough to manage to duck the next oncoming one and to dive toward me instead. He staggers, clumsy and injured, alcohol wafting from him.

But I’m quicker. I pause for a moment, crouched, letting him approach before springing up and jamming my shoulder into his stomach, shoving him back to the window.

Everything happens at once then.

That spider crack in the window crumbles beneath the force I shove Bentley’s body into it, shattering the glass. It falls to the ground below.

And Bentley alongside with it.

“No!” Hayley yells, pushing away from where she was out of the way. She reaches the window and sticks her head outside. “Shit!”

I’m stuck, almost numb, as I watch the scene unfold. No way he’d survive a fall from this height, snow or otherwise. If he had, it’s likely he won’t be awake anytime soon. It’s quite possible I accidentally killed him.

She turns away from the window, her face whiter than ever—all except for the red staining her skin. Her cheek for one, and the shadows surrounding her neck from where he was gripping her.

Fuck, he better be dead or I’ll go down there and finish the job myself.

I want to go to her, hold her, tell her he’ll never touch her again, but I’m still numb, watching as she paces by me, wringing her hands together.

“I-I have to go check on him.”

She heads for the door and I turn to follow, only for her palm to quickly come between us. Of course, she doesn’t want me anywhere near her. I’m a monster who just ruined someone’s life, dead or otherwise.

“Stay. One way or the other, I’ll have to call 9-1-1. If there’s two sets of footprints in the snow back there, they’ll question it.”

Fuck. Me. Even now, after everything…she’s protecting me by limiting the evidence the police would find here.

My throat stops working entirely so I merely watch her dash off before heading for the window, eyes skimming the surrounding houses. Everyone’s lights are off and the window breakage didn’t make much noise, and no one’s come running in the past few minutes so at least there’s no witnesses.

Hayley’s now outside and she slowly treads toward her stepbrother’s body. His face is marked with gashes from my punches, but it’s the angle of his neck suggesting his injuries are beyond a few cuts and bruises.

Hayley approaches him, and I hate it. I don’t want her anywhere near him, especially if he’s dead. She crouches by his side and reaches a finger toward his neck, checking for a pulse.

It’s the longest two seconds of my life, but when she looks up at me, my suspicions are confirmed even before the slow shake of her head.

Dead.

This should be the moment guilt creeps in, but it never comes. Sometimes, it’s kill or be killed, and after living on the streets, things like other people’s lives matter less. It’s me or them, and I’ll always choose myself. In this case, I chose her .

Hayley backs away from him and returns inside the house. I listen for her steps coming up the stairs and back toward her room, wondering at what point she’ll realize what I’ve done, how big of a monster I am, and she won’t look at me how she had in the bath. She’ll understand what taking me in like a stray dog has done to her life.

Her eyes are downcast as she enters and I wait for her to make the first move. To demand I stay so she can have me arrested. If I go to jail, it’ll be worth it knowing he’ll never harm her again.

She crosses the room, every step toward me one more piece of my sanity she’s stealing for herself. She breathes in and out through parted lips once, twice, before blinking, her gaze finding me again. Her hand cups mine, the one I hit him with, the fucker’s blood staining her palm.

It’s all I can focus on. The wrongness of it.

“Thank you for saving me.”

She’s not cowering. She’s thanking me. This fucking girl…Before I’m not allowed to anymore, I cup her face in both hands, remembering this look. The look before she comprehends what it means to have a dead body in her backyard.

“I told you, I’ll protect you. Always. Against anybody.” My fingers stroke over the red mark on her cheek, thumbs brushing the dark shadows blooming on her neck, the desire to hit him becoming so overwhelming once again. “He hit you. Strangled you. Are you okay?”

She nods shakily, rubbing her hands up my arms. “I-I should call the police before neighbours notice him back there.”

“I’m not sorry,” I tell her. “He was hurting you.”

Her eyes flutter shut for a brief second. “Is it wrong to say I’m kinda happy he’s dead? Does that make me a bad person? I never thought I’d want anyone dead, but he?—”

I don’t think. Just act. Just re act.

Because my sweet girl is so fucking perfect.

I snap, and before I fully realize what I’m doing, I have her pants yanked down, mine undone. A few strokes for us both and I have her seated on my cock, her legs around my waist, her arms draped over my shoulders as I thrust her into the wall.

I murdered someone.

I protected her.

I’ve claimed this is it too many times with this girl, but this time, it’s the truth. I have to get the fuck away from here—far away.

Until then, while I have her for this moment, before I risk her changing her mind and going from thrilled to heartbreak and hating me, I fuck myself into her.

It’s quick and quiet, only the sound of my thrusts and her little moans filling the room. I duck my head to bite her nipple through her shirt and she rewards me with nails scraping my shoulder.

“You’re safe,” I whisper to her between thrusts. “He’ll never go near you again. No one will ever hurt you, sweet girl. Not if they want to live.”

Her pussy clamps down on me, her head tossed back into the wall as she cries out her orgasm. I drink up every sound, every breath, as I too thrust a final time inside her, lingering long after we both come down, not wanting the moment to end.

Too soon, her eyes flick toward the broken window and widen, the spell officially failing. This is it. She’ll hate me. Her previous comments mean nothing ? —

“Y-you have to get out of here.” She pushes against my shoulder until I unwillingly lower her to her feet. “I-I’ll claim it was self-defence. I can’t be charged for that. I think. Not with the marks on my neck.”

I study the broken window she’s about to claim she’s broken when pushing out of it. The cops will never believe this tiny girl managed that. I grab her as she tries to rush by me, bringing her fist up to my face, stroking the back of her silky, soft skin.

“Hayley, they won’t believe you.”

Anguished eyes turn on me, and it’s an immediate punch to the gut. Harder than any I’d given the body on the ground. “I don’t care,” she says in a determined growl. “I won’t see you go to prison because that’s exactly what’ll happen. I was fighting for my life and got a burst of adrenaline. You hear about this all the time. They’ll have no other evidence to go off of.”

I’d go to prison without a paid fancy lawyer to back me up, while her stepfather would pull out every stop for his son. It’s a fact I’m almost certain of. I’d be a statistic. Foster kid ended up on the streets, surviving, only to end up locked up. All for her. I’d like to say in ten years I’d regret it, but I wouldn’t. Not if it means he’ll never look at her again.

“You protected me,” she goes on. “It’s my turn now.”

My fucking god, the more she speaks, the more winded I grow.

Still holding her hand, I mentally scroll through every option we have—and there aren’t many. Any, really.

I may have protected her from him, but she’s now trying to protect me from the law. In order not to be charged with homicide in the case of self-defence, the cops will need to believe she had more reason to defend other than him sneaking into her room. Hopefully the marks on her body will be proof enough, but if they’re not, it’ll be her freedom on the line and I can’t stomach the thought. Not when she has a promising future ahead of her and I don’t .

No one’s ever protected me. No one’s ever saved me. No one’s ever wanted to.

But she has. In every fucking sense of the word, she’s saved me…and there’s nothing I can ever repay her with.

“This will work,” she insists, sensing my turbulent debate. “It’ll be up to the courts to decide if they want to prosecute, but it was my life or his. They’ll take my side.”

“You’re not selling this concept very well.”

Hayley reaches for my face. “Please. You need to leave right now and I won’t breathe a word to anyone, I swear.”

I turn away, unable to look at the monster I’ve created. This innocent girl went from letting a thief eat her food and openly steal from her to participating in a murder cover-up. Fuck, I’m so bad for her, even if she’s becoming everything I want.

“I’ll go now. Wait five minutes and call the police. Then your parents.”

I’ll go…but not far. Not until I know she won’t be taking the fall. The second I see her imprisoned, I’ll hand myself over.

I want to kiss her one more time. Kiss her while my cum still drips from her pussy, but I’ve ruined her life enough.

Goodbye, my sweet girl.

I vanish into the night, disappearing from the house that was supposed to be a simple robbery.

In the end, its stolen more from me.

Hayley robbed me of everything I was and made me want something else, to be someone new.

But I can’t be greedy with her.

Not anymore.