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Because Reign would have found something to say.
He would have told me to stop talking about it. To stop thinking about it.
And I would have.
And I wouldn't feel so shitty.
I tilted my head up to look at the ceiling, taking a deep breath, closing my eyes tight to keep the tears from spilling over. Because the same rules applied. I wasn't going to fucking cry. I could bury my face and I could scream. I could tell Martin and Daniel and my mother to rot in hell. But I couldn't cry.
So I sucked it up.
Eventually, sleep got the best of me.I woke up to a hand pressing hard into my throat. “You stupid fucking bitch,” Martin's whispered voice cut through my sleep fog and I was instantly alert. My eyes snapped up to his face, seeing red dried around his nose, one of his eyes blackening. “You think you can put your fucking hands on me and not get taught a lesson?”
Fuck.
Shit.
I knew it.
I knew it.
She had no control over her men.
What a pathetic fucking excuse for a crime lord.
Martin's hand meant business, his hand not pressing onto the carotid so I didn't pass out, but pressing so hard that I couldn't draw a proper breath. Or scream. Or think of anything but how bad it was hurting. How terrifying it was to feel your air cut off. To know you could only go for so long without a good lungful of air.
“You break my fucking nose? I'm gonna break your fucking face.”
Then his hand was moving from my throat and cocked back so fast, I couldn't even draw a breath before his fist landed hard next to my right eye.
The pain was like an explosion. Like fireworks. How the hit is in the center and it radiates out, spreading, consuming. My entire face felt the sting. The second the contact ended, the pain turned to a throb, deep and insistent.
“That's just a preview you stupid cunt,” he growled when a tap sounded at the door. No doubt, the buddy who was assigned to watch him.
The door opened, the light from the hall painful and I saw the outline of another guy. Not Daniel. Someone else. Someone I didn't know. Someone I had a sinking feeling I would get to know quite well in the time coming.
The door shut me back into darkness and I rested my head back against the headboard, taking a deep breath.
It was just a black eye. That was it. It was no big deal. Worst case, broken eye socket. Not fatal. Probably wouldn't be pretty. But swallowing a bullet was going to make an open casket impossible anyway so it didn't really matter.
I needed my answers.
And then I needed a permanent way out of the hell.
I choked back a weird sob as a flash of Reign came into my mind.
I pushed it away, trying to not think about him.
But that wasn't possible.
He wouldn't be happy I was dead.
I kind of liked that.
It would be a blow. Because he wanted to save me. Because he was going to make V pay for what (s)he did to me.
But it wouldn't break him.
He had lived too hard a life to be shaken by my death.
He would be okay.“What the fuck?”
I forgot how alarming it was to wake up to angry male voices.
I tried to shoot up out of bed, but my wrists pulled, my shoulders screamed, and I fell back against the headboard.
“Oh, fuck it gets worse,” he repeated. I blinked slow, taking in Daniel standing in the room. In a gray suit. White shirt. Gray patterned tie.
“What?” I croaked, my throat like I swallowed razors.
“Mother fucker. I should have known,” Daniel said, shaking his head.
“Worried Mom will be pissed?” I asked, wincing at the stinging.
At this, Daniel gave me an weird smile. “No. It's just the point,” he said. “I gave you my word. Come on,” he said, reaching for a key and letting one of my wrists free. “Bathroom break and then V wants to have a sit down.”
“Oh joy,” I drawled and I could have sworn I heard him chuckle. But that wasn't possible.
He opened the bathroom door and let me shuffle inside. I turned back to him. “I know... five minutes,” I said, rolling my eyes.
He shook his head, a smirk toying at his lips like something about me amused him, then shut the door.
I took a deep breath, letting my eyes meet my reflection in the mirror.
“Shit.”
No wonder he sounded pissed when he saw me.
There were defined blue finger prints to the left of my neck, a long blue band across the center from the space between his thumb and forefinger. My eye was blackened. All dark, awful blue and purple. But, more than that, the sclera of my eye was blood red.
It wasn't pretty.
I sighed, turning on the water like I always did before I peed so whoever was standing outside didn't hear me. It was kind of stupid to feel insecure about going to the bathroom when those men had seen me on my period, but still. It made me feel marginally less like a captive and more like a normal human being.
I washed my hands and tried to work some order into my hair. Then the door was opening and I had to give up.
“To the basement,” I said in a weird, cheery tone, flinging a hand out and feeling like a total dork. But it was cool. I was going to die soon. I wouldn't have to live with the mortification for long.
I held out my wrists and was cuffed in the front. “Kitchen,” he corrected.
I pursed my lips and shrugged, following him downstairs.
And, sure enough, there was my mother in the kitchen. Looking well rested and gorgeous in faded bluejeans, a navy v-neck tee, and camel colored high heeled boots. Her hair was loose, falling in the same kind of wavy mass that mine did.
I felt dirty.
Once I got out of her house the last time, I showered as much as possible. Two, three times a day. Never feeling like I could scrub the dirt and sweat and disgust out of my skin.
