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“This ends right now,” I tell her, crossing my arms over my chest. “You’ve got a chance to nail his ass to the wall, and you’re taking it. I’ll fucking carry you kicking and screaming to the hospital if I have to.”
She just looks at me for a second before bursting into tears. Covering her face with her hands, she sobs until her shoulders are shaking.
“I know,” I say softly, getting back to my knees on the floor in front of her. “I know this is hard, but—”
“No you don’t.” She takes her hands away from her face, her eyes wide and her cheeks wet with tears. “You don’t know, Anton, because you’re strong. You take no shit. But this is just another time I fell fucking victim to Adam. I don’t want to go to a hospital and have pictures taken of the bruises on my body. I’m so…ashamed.” She weeps again. “He treats me like a worthless piece of shit and it makes me feel like a worthless piece of shit. He hurts me over and over, and every time, he gets away with it and I end up crying and ashamed.”
I put my hands on her thighs. “He’s not getting away with it this time.”
“I wanted to fight back so bad, Anton. So fucking bad. I wanted to put bruises on his skin. I wanted to make him hurt. Show him how it feels.”
“You’re gonna hurt him in a different way. You’re upset and I get that, so let me help you. We need to do this, Mia. I’ll be with you every second we’re there.”
She sighs heavily and nods. I tell Anita we’re leaving and get Mia’s coat. And in the quiet moments on the drive to the hospital, when she’s silently staring out the window and hardly moving, I think about her words and vow to do what she couldn’t.
I’ll bruise him back. I’ll make him hurt. I’ll show him how it feels. And then some.Chapter NineteenMiaI’m sweating through my nightshirt when I wake up at 4:00 a.m. three days after the attack. I shove the down comforter in Anton’s guest room aside and go into the kitchen for some water.
My heartbeat is just now returning to its normal pace after I dreamed about Adam breaking into Anita’s apartment with a butcher knife, telling me he was going to finish the job he started.
I sit down on the couch with my water and click the remote to turn on ESPN, hoping to catch hockey highlights. Dix and I watched Anton’s game last night, but I’d like to see replays of the two goals he scored. One was a shot across the ice that sent the crowd to its feet.
Adam was suspended from the team, and Anton told me he’s likely to be released. He’s out on bond, but I got a restraining order against him.
Not that it’ll stop him from coming after me if he wants to, but he won’t be able to get to me now. I’m staying at Anton’s apartment, and he hired around the clock security to sit in the hallway outside his front door.
He also offered to pay for Anita and Dre to stay at a hotel, but she declined. She carries her bat with her every time she leaves the apartment now.
Dix will be up in a couple hours, if not sooner. He went to bed right after the game ended last night. Since Anton told him what happened, he’s been taking it easy on me. No complaining or excessive swearing. I miss the old Dix and hope he doesn’t plan to keep this up for long.
Hockey highlights aren’t on, and since it’s winter break, I don’t even have any studying to do. I’ve gone from falling into bed after shifts at the bar and waking up with drool on my pillow and a headache from not sleeping enough to not having anything to do.
I go into the kitchen and dig through the fridge and pantry for ingredients to make my grandma’s banana muffins. They were my favorite smell to wake up to as a kid.
Dix eats two muffins after he wakes up, commenting on how nice the sunrise is as he takes a sip of coffee.
“I’m fine, you know,” I say in a cross tone.
“What’s that s’posed to mean. I never said you weren’t.”
I shake my head as I wipe down the table. “You’ve been super nice to me since the other night. I don’t want you feeling sorry for me.”
“I don’t feel sorry for you.”
“What’s with you, then? You haven’t bitched about my cooking once. You haven’t called the people who make your word search books cocksuckers or asked me to get you booze.”
Dix rolls his eyes. “You never do it anyway so why would I keep asking?”
“Because that’s you. I’m not some damsel in distress, you know. Getting choked by my soon to be ex-husband sucks, but I’ve taken my knocks before. Maria Pelini busted up my face real good when her boyfriend dumped her to ask me out sophomore year.”
