Chapter 72: The Maddening Landlady, Part Three
Chapter 72: Chapter 72: The Maddening Landlady, Part Three
Chapter 72: The Maddening Landlady, Part Three
"I can eat by myself."
Cory sat at the far end of the couch, close enough to reach the open food container but far enough from Daphne Whitlock to make his preference obvious.
Daphne did not argue.
She only lifted her phone.
The hallway footage remained open on the screen, frozen on the image of a small black-haired figure entering the building behind her. It was not a police report. It was not proof anyone outside this apartment would understand. Yet it was enough to keep Cory still.
With her other hand, she held out a bite of food.
Cory stared at it.
The situation was humiliating in ways he did not know how to separate. He was hungry. The food smelled good. The phone sat in her hand like a threat she could press into any conversation she wanted. He could refuse the food, but refusing would not remove the cameras, the footage, or the fact that Daphne had locked the door behind herself.
He took the bite.
Daphne’s mouth curved.
The phone remained raised while she offered him another.
The method was ugly. She knew it was ugly. Adults had more tools for making people cooperate, and that did not make the tools any better. It only made them easier to use.
Tonight, she was willing to use every one she had.
Cory ate in silence.
The sight gave Daphne an uncomfortable sense of satisfaction. She had spent days being handled by a smaller, sharper version of Cyrus who knew how to leave at exactly the right moment. Cory had kept his distance, accepted what he wanted, and disappeared before she could ask any questions.
Now he was sitting in her apartment, accepting food because she held the evidence.
Daphne had finally recovered a little ground.
She reached across the couch and pulled him onto her lap.
Cory stiffened immediately.
"Rent and dinner are both under my control," Daphne said. "You should keep that in mind."
"That is disgusting."
Daphne ignored the insult.
Cory’s child-form was cool against her arm, though she did not linger on it. The important thing was not the closeness. It was the proof that he had stopped trying to flee for the moment.
The food container was nearly empty.
Daphne glanced toward the bedroom, then back at him.
The thought that she could keep him somewhere he could not bolt from came too easily. It should have made her stop. Instead, she lifted him from her lap, set the remaining food on the nightstand, and carried him toward the bed.
Cory reacted as if she had stepped on a trap.
The moment she crossed the bedroom doorway, his body changed.
White spread through his hair first, bleaching the dark color away until every strand held the pale shade she had seen in the security footage. His frame stretched upward at the same time. The oversized clothes tightened, shifted, and settled around him as he returned to his usual height.
Cyrus stood in front of her again.
His hair remained snow-white.
The sight of him made Daphne pause.
He looked different without the school disguise, without the black hair and lowered posture that made him disappear inside a classroom. His face was sharper now, his expression openly wary, and the white hair made the resemblance to Cory impossible to ignore.
Cyrus stepped back from the bed.
"You are not taking me in there."
Daphne closed the bedroom door behind them.
"I only want to talk."
"You had a strange way of showing it."
Cyrus kept his distance, but the room was smaller than the living area. The bed took up most of the space. A narrow path led to the door, and Daphne stood between him and it.
He understood the setup immediately.
The locked apartment had already made him uneasy. The bedroom made something older stir under his ribs, a memory with no clear image attached to it. He hated rooms where someone else controlled the door.
Daphne moved before he could get around her.
Her hand caught both of his wrists.
The strength behind her grip shocked him again.
Cyrus tried to pull free, but she forced him back onto the bed with enough pressure that his shoulders hit the mattress before he could correct his balance. Daphne followed, pinning him there with her weight and holding his hands above him.
The phone remained on the nightstand within her reach.
Cyrus stared up at her.
The hunger in her expression had changed.
He had hoped that returning to his normal form would end whatever twisted interest she had shown toward Cory. It did not. Her attention had simply followed him into a different body.
That realization made his stomach turn.
"Change back into Cory," Daphne said.
"I am not changing back. Let me go."
"I am not letting you go."
"Then call the police."
"I will not call them."
Cyrus’s anger sharpened. "Let me up, and I will call them myself."
Daphne’s eyes moved toward the phone.
"The footage is still on my phone."
"Are you really going to hold that over me forever?"
"If I have to."
Cyrus turned his head away.
Everything about this had gone wrong. He had thought being exposed would mean a difficult conversation, maybe questions, maybe a demand to explain why the cameras had caught someone who was not supposed to exist.
He had not expected to be pinned to a bed by the woman who controlled his apartment.
Her strength made no sense.
She had been impossibly strong in the entryway, and now she was holding him down with one hand while keeping both of his wrists trapped. Even after eating, even after changing back, he could not find enough leverage to throw her off.
The situation made him furious.
It also made him afraid.
Daphne’s face hovered above his.
"Cyrus," she said, softer now, "you should have told me."
"You would not have believed me."
"I would have tried."
"You locked my door and threatened to call the police."
Daphne flinched.
The response was small, but Cyrus felt it.
For an instant, he thought she might finally let him go.
Then she reached up, caught his chin, and turned his face back toward hers.
Cyrus tried to pull away.
She kissed him anyway.
The contact was not gentle. It was not wanted. He bit down when she tried to force the moment further, and Daphne jerked back with a sharp breath.
For one second, anger flashed across her face.
Then it became something worse.
Cyrus felt it before he understood it.
The room seemed to narrow around him. The locked door, the phone, the camera footage, the heavy pressure of her hands, all of it closed in at once. He fought harder, but the strength in her grip only increased.
"Let me go," he said.
Daphne did not answer.
What followed was not a conversation, and it was not something Cyrus could bargain his way through. Daphne used the door, the evidence, her strength, and the fact that he had nowhere safe to run. Cyrus resisted until his body stopped responding with enough force to make a difference.
The next stretch of time broke apart.
There was the scrape of sheets. The pull of fabric around his wrists. The sound of Daphne moving through the room with the calm certainty of someone who had decided she was allowed to take whatever she wanted.
Cyrus kept his face turned away.
He did not want to give her his expression.
He did not want her to see fear, anger, humiliation, or the point where exhaustion began to hollow him out.
Daphne crossed the line again and again while he fought to stay present.
At some point, she demanded, "Will you change back now?"
Cyrus barely lifted his head.
"Go to hell, Daphne."
That answer earned him no mercy.
By the time the room finally fell quiet, the night had dragged far beyond anything Cyrus wanted to remember. His hands were still bound. The sheets were tangled beneath him. His body hurt in ways that made him want to crawl out of his own skin.
Daphne dressed with unnerving composure.
Her face was still flushed, but her movements had settled into the same controlled calm she wore at school. She picked up her phone, stood near the door, and let the camera make a crisp shutter sound.
Cyrus could not tell whether she had taken a picture or only wanted him to believe she had.
"You know what you need to do," Daphne said.
Then she unlocked the door and left.
The click of the latch echoed through the apartment.
Cyrus lay still for a long time.
The fight was not over.
Sleep came eventually, but it brought no dreams.
By morning, the apartment felt too bright.
Cyrus sat on the edge of the bed with the blanket pulled around his shoulders, staring at the small bottle of Frostborn suppressants in his hand.
He swallowed four tablets in quick succession.
The medicine was supposed to settle reactions his body could not always control. This morning, he needed it to force himself back into something functional. He waited in silence until the lingering physical response faded enough that he could stand without feeling betrayed by his own body.
Then he got dressed.
He left half an hour earlier than usual.
At his regular time, he might run into Daphne in the hall. He did not want to see her. He did not want to hear her voice. He did not want to look at the door of the apartment beside his and remember that she had entered his home with a dinner container and left him with a new reason to fear his own address.
For a while, Cyrus had managed to live freely.
He had worked, studied, bought his own food, worried about rent, and made decisions that belonged to him. Then one woman had gotten hold of a camera recording and wrapped it around his throat.
Women were trouble.
Every single one of them.
Cyrus would delete the footage eventually.
He would find the cameras, get into whatever account Daphne used, erase the recordings, and make sure nobody could use Cory against him again. He did not know how yet, but he had time to figure it out.
He needed a better plan than jumping off a balcony.
The route he took to school was not his usual one.
He avoided the apartment block’s main street, cut behind a laundromat, crossed through a quieter section of town, and stopped at a bakery he normally passed without entering.
A small cake sat in the display case near the register.
Cyrus bought it.
The frosting was pale, the box was simple, and the whole thing cost more than he wanted to spend before breakfast. Still, Audra had helped him study. The Most Improved Student Award had not appeared out of nowhere. He owed her a thank-you, and he wanted the debt settled before another woman found a way to turn kindness into something he could not escape.
Holding the cake box in one hand, he pulled out his phone with the other and sent Audra a brief message asking her to meet him near the skybridge before class.
October mornings were supposed to be getting colder.
The air disagreed.
There was a mild warmth in the sunlight, enough to make Cyrus regret his jacket as he entered campus. Only a few students had arrived this early. Their scattered presence made him feel safer than the empty streets had.
Daphne was still a teacher at St. Alder.
She could not do anything obvious to him here.
At least, he hoped she could not.
Cyrus reached the covered skybridge and waited beneath it with the cake box held against his chest.
Audra arrived soon after.
She slowed when she saw him.
Cyrus did not give her time to ask why he had texted.
He stepped forward, pushed the cake into her hands, and said, "This is a thank-you for the tutoring. I need to get to class now."
Then he turned and walked away.
He did not wait for her response.
From this point on, he would avoid making new connections with women whenever possible. He had enough problems already. He did not need more favors, more tutoring, more meals, more concern, or more people discovering that he had secrets worth holding over him.
Behind him, Audra stood beneath the skybridge with the cake in her hands.
She had not even managed to say thank you.
Cyrus had looked exhausted, distant, and strangely determined to get away from her. The feeling was unfamiliar enough that she remained still for a moment, trying to understand it.
Why did it feel like he had handed her the cake only so he could escape before she asked a question?
Audra looked down at the box.
Sooner or later, she would find a chance to ask him what had happened.