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“Shut the fuck up slut!” he screams, spit flying from his mouth, as he slaps me across the face. The sting is brutal. Painful. Bringing my hand to my cheek, I tap the skin gently and wince. The skin beneath my eye is broken, and my fingertips are wet with blood when I pull them away. Whimpering I slide down to the floor.
“Baby, please, do-“
“I said shut up!” he grabs me by my hair, dragging me toward the staircase.
I reach up and grab at his hands, trying to loosen his grip, “Please, stop, Liam you’re hur-“, suddenly he hurls me against the steps and it knocks the wind out of me. The hard wooden steps dig into my back and spine and I can already feel myself bruising.
Trying to catch my breath, I roll over, press my hands to the step and attempt to push myself up. Without warning, my face is pressed down into the step, his hand holding my head in place.
“Liam s-stop.”
“You want to be a used up fucking slut?” He leans in close and I smell the liquor on his breath. “I’ll treat you like a used up fucking slut.”
I hear his belt unbuckling, and the zipper of his pants sliding down.
“S-stop,” I plead. The tears that were welling up in my eyes spill over.
Still holding my head in place, he rips down my sweatpants and before I can register the feel of the air against my skin, he shoves into me violently. I scream out in pain as he thrusts into me hard, over and over. Sobbing, I quit begging him to stop, and just close my eyes, waiting for it to end.
Suddenly his body jerks and he thrusts into me one last time before pulling out, and I feel warm, sticky liquid hitting the skin on my lower back.
“That’s what fucking whores get,” he spits.
I hear him zipping his pants. I hear the buckle of his belt. I can feel him walking away, but I still don’t move. I stay laying face down on the steps, too scared to so much as flinch. Too afraid that anything I do will set him off.
“Clean up the fucking mess,” he spits. Then the loud creak of the door opening and closing sounds behind me. After a couple of minutes, a car engine cranks, and the sound of the car accelerating moves further and further away.
With my face against the steps, I heave and sob loudly. The tears pour from me like an open faucet and a loud wail escapes my lips. I let it all out. The pain. The frustration. I sob, and sob. Then I take a deep breath, I wipe my face, and I reach down to grip my sweatpants, pulling them back up. I breathe in deep, and reset myself, refusing to shed one more fucking tear.
Rolling over, I slide down the steps on my butt and crawl over to the crumpled up card lying on the carpet. Flattening the card-stock, I flip it over and read it.
What the hell?
No way.
No fucking way.
With shaky hands, I push myself up and retrieve the broom from the hallway closet. Resting the broom against the wall, I pick up the roses one by one, and place them into the trash bin. Taking hold of the broom, I sweep up all the glass from the vase into a pile, then sweep the pile into a dustpan, emptying it into the trash. When the mess is contained, I head for the bedroom and change into clean clothes. I wash my face and dab some ointment on the split skin below my right eye.
My left cheek is puffy and there is rug burn from the rug runner that lines my wooden steps. Sighing, I pull my hair into a ponytail and start the process of covering it all up. Green to hide the red scrapes. Some yellow to hide the circles beneath my eyes. Perfectly toned foundation to cover it all. One layer after another until I’m sure I’ve camouflaged the evidence of today. Until I’m certain no one will ask any questions.
Not that it would matter anymore if they did, because the way things are looking, I may just need to disappear all over again.
Chapter sixteen
Travis
Rolling into a parking spot out front of the building, I cut the engine to my bike and kick down the kickstand. As I slide off, I remove my helmet and hang it over the handlebars. The looming brick building on the corner of 68 th and Main, is completely dark, save for the neon green sign that flashes Havok Hills Tattoo & Body Piercing. Sighing, I mutter under my breath as I head for the doors, questioning why the fuck I agreed to conduct business at a tattoo studio, but I’m choosing to put my faith in the kid, and I’m desperate.
When I pull on the door, it’s locked, so I tap on the glass a few times when Riot appears from a back room and approaches the door, unlocking it, letting me inside. As I step in, he locks it behind me.
“Hey Riot, so, uh, why here?”
“Zeke has all his shit setup back here. He needs it to help out.”
Nodding, I motion ahead, “Okay, lead the way.”
“This way,” Riot nods and turns, leading me past the counter and into the back. We walk past a few stations with chairs set up for tattooing, and a single station set up for piercing. Everything is clean and orderly. Everything has a space. The walls are covered in bright, eccentric graffiti-like artwork. Demonic entities in a garishly cartoon-like format plastered from floor to ceiling.
