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He is, however, reclaiming control in more ways than I thought. He took Cali the weekend before classes started, the same day we saw Summer move into her new apartment. I went for a run on my usual hiking trail and remember passing her, then I was in my basement. It’s not the first time I’ve blacked out, but that should have clued me in.

I’m lucky Cali isn’t from Kinsmen, so no one made the immediate connection. I went to Summer’s house the next night to visit her and woke up to a bunch of pictures I don’t remember taking.

Although, I didn’t complain too much about that and thought it would be fun to mess with her, so I sent out one of the photos to the rest of the class as I usually send similar photos every year.

As soon as the news spread that there was a missing girl, I searched the tunnels that led to this house, and there she was, a striking image of Summer. In that instant, I momentarily mistook her for Summer. The poor girl was scared shitless and since I wasn’t aware she was here for three days, she was nearly dead. I was relieved to see he at least had the foresight to give her a bottle of water, which is probably the only humane thing he’s ever done.

I’ve been nursing her back to health ever since.

His hatred for Summer runs so deep—the kind of hatred that simmers in every cell—and at the same time, his love for her is so binding.

Summer woke Mikael up; she must have. The power she has over him is stronger than any drug I can take to suppress him.

I grab my pills and study them, inspecting them for any sort of tampering and only when satisfied none are missing do I pop one into my mouth. The label hasn’t changed in years, no reason to. Just a mild dose of antidepressant prescribed by Dr. T. Garcia.

You see, dissociative identity disorder is not treated by a pill—you can’t prescribe it away the way you can depression. And in my case, we aren’t trying to get rid of me; we are working on silencing him.

The world is better off without the original inhabitant of my body, and the world will be a much better place with me in it.

I can only keep Summer alive if I’m the one in control. Mikael simply cannot come out of his box, and he knows it. I’m the only reason we’re not in an insane asylum, the only reason he’s not slaughtered hundreds of girls during his miserable excuse of a life.

All he sees is death, blood, and destruction, and it nourishes his soul. The more he gets, the more he wants, and he’s insatiable.

To distract me, I pull open the next of two hundred essays I have to read through. Pages upon pages of crap, lines of drivel and thoughts of stupidity. I bridge my nose at the thought of reading another reflection paper on Dr. Garcia’s mocking burning building example, as if she wasn’t the one that burned that hall down. I skim through three of them, grading each a C, before finally reaching the one I was keenly waiting for.

Even seeing the name on paper makes him squirm inside me.

Summer Landry.

So much pure radiant emotion flows through him. His desire for her is giving me a physical response, making me really turned on.

I turn my attention to the replacement blonde on my bed, still sleeping soundly. Her bare legs are draped over top of the covers, and she’s in a clean shirt.

I’ve thought about fucking her…I have. What guy wouldn’t? However, I’m not that kind of psycho, and I’m not going to fuck her, even though I could.

Mikael’s not the only one with an attachment to Summer Landry. He’s not the only one who got a taste of her all those nights we snuck into her bedroom. She belonged to both of us, even if my motivations were entirely different from his.

Her name still sends a thrill through me. Part of me still can’t believe she took the bait. In her mind she’s following in her father’s footsteps, and in my mind, I want to quite literally see if she’s like him, so I lured her here.

I’m sure her mother wasn’t pleased about it, either.

Deviant little thing, aren’t we, Summer?

I grab my phone and type in Summer’s name. I haven’t contacted her since the rave, because I’ve been busy, and I ignored her in class yesterday, hoping she would come see me during my office hours, which she didn’t. On top of the two classes I TA for, I’m also working on my PhD, and I defend my thesis in January. I’ve not yet completed my research and although I hate to admit it, the girl Mikael plucked off the side of the road is helping immensely with that.

A call comes through from Xander as soon as I grab my phone. I swipe to answer it because he won’t stop pestering me until I agree to hang out tonight.

“Xander,” I say casually, knowing I’m probably on speaker phone with his girlfriend Bianca—the one he will never kill, because I’m pretty sure he can’t stand her.

He responds quickly, “I realize you’re super smart and important, but can you spare an hour to come upstairs and hang out with me tonight?”

I pause for dramatic effect. “I can spare an hour.”

“Good. Bianca has her friend over. By the way, how was your night on Saturday? You disappeared on us for quite a while.”

This gives me pause. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

He chuckles. “Yeah, you do. How was she, bro? You’re one savage motherfucker. I saw you in the corner with some chick. It was her, wasn’t it? You were knuckle-deep inside Summer Landry.”