Kill Switch by Penelope Douglas

She was right. I’ve found that to be true.
But instead of hurting myself to mask pain with more pain,
tonight I learned something else.
Hurting others is just as effective.
My mother left after that beating. An hour later, Banks and
I had gone back to my room to find her gone, and we fell
asleep on the bed, leaving the door unlocked, because we
knew. We couldn’t stop the world from happening to us. We
could only react.
By morning, my mother was gone, and I never asked
where. And as time passed, my father made no effort bring her
home again. I didn’t see her until a couple of years later.
And I dealt with it for good that night.
Just like I was going to deal with Winter and the false hope
she nearly destroyed me with.
“I want her to want it,” I told Mikhail, his brown eyes
looking up at me expectantly. “I want her to want me, to give
me her heart, and be my soft, sweet, smiling Little Devil,
clutching at me and unable to stop herself.” My heart
quickened. “And then I want her to hate herself for it. To turn
against herself and hate that she likes it, so she knows she’s
weak and pathetic and no different than any other bitch. That
she wasn’t special.”
Once I see her as just like everyone else, I’ll have
destroyed her and killed my obsession with her. I would’ve
killed her power over me, just like Natalya’s.
“And I think she wants to play this game with me,” I joked
with the animal.
A knock sounded on the door.
“Come,” I called.
The door opened and closed, and then I heard Crane’s
voice behind me.
“She’s inquiring about the dog, sir.”