AllFreeNovel
Share Us
You’ll be mine forever, my angel.
* * *
I wait arounduntil it’s almost closing time, sitting at the table, hoping to get another chance to talk to her. I’d planned on approaching her again when I could get her alone, but it looks like my angel just can’t stay away from me. She’s heading straight toward me with a glare that could kill a weaker man. The sweet smell of peaches hits me before she even stops walking, making me groan internally.
“Why are you still here?” she demands, crossing her arms over her chest.
I smirk. “You said we could talk later, so I’m just waiting.”
She rolls her eyes. “I meant like another day.”
“Well, I’m here now. Can we talk?”
She looks around the library before letting out a heavy sigh. “Make it quick,” she mutters, taking a seat in front of me. She looks like she’d rather be anywhere else than sitting near me.
This is my chance. She needs to know what happened that night. She thinks I deceived her, but that’s not true.
“I didn’t betray you, angel. I would never.”
“Pssh. Yeah, right,” she interrupts.
“Please, just let me get this out,” I plead with her. She gives me a nod, telling me to keep going. She’s probably waiting to see how I fuck this up even more. All I want to do is reach across the table and take her small, soft hands into mine, but I know she wouldn’t let me.
“After I left that night, after saying those horrible things to you, my father took me home and beat the shit out of me. When he was done, I was so bloodied and broken that I couldn’t get off the floor. He had to drag my limp body to my room.”
Memories of that night flash through my mind. He was completely deranged. I’d never seen him like that before. He was always angry, but he was also cold and calculating, so that was out of character for him. I should’ve known he was about to go off the deep end, because he’d been unusually quiet for a couple days beforehand. I should’ve known he was up to something.
Pain etches across Lainey’s face, but I continue.
“Even if I could have moved, I couldn’t get out. He locked me in my room for a couple of days.”
Lainey’s eyes widen, and her mouth falls open in disbelief. “What do you mean he locked you in?”
“For as long as I can remember, there were locks on the outside of my bedroom door. He’d lock me in when he thought I was being bad, when I wasn’t listening, or when I just wanted to do kid things like play outside.” He was never one for anything fun, it was only ever about building the business and becoming a man.
“Oh my god,” she gasps, throwing a hand over her mouth. She knew he was an evil man, but she never knew all of the things he did to me behind closed doors. I never wanted to burden her with more. The beatings weren’t even as bad as what he used to do to me in the woods.
The woods will always be my worst nightmare.Will she love me if she knows what I did out there?
“When he finally let me out, you were gone. He’d sold you without telling me. I didn’t know until it was too late.” I remember limping back into that warehouse when I was healed enough, looking forward to seeing her beautiful face, but instead seeing her empty cage. My soul was crushed. I was broken. She was gone and I didn’t have her to anchor me to my sanity anymore, so I became the devil... Just like my father wanted.
Confusion spreads across Lainey’s perfect face, and her eyes drop to her hands in her lap. I can see the wheels turning in that pretty head of hers. We sit there in silence for a while, before she pushes out of her chair.
“I have to get back to work. Please leave, Greyson.” She rushes away, not even giving me a chance to say anything further.
“Lainey, please!” I call after her, but she doesn’t acknowledge me.
I told her the truth, now I just need her to believe it.
For the past three weeks, Greyson has been coming into the library every time I’m working, even though I’ve told him to stay away. A normal person would think he’s an obsessive, crazy stalker and call the cops, but I’m clearly not normal. He’s definitely obsessive and crazy, but I’d be lying if I didn’t say his persistence kind of turns me on.
He hasn’t tried to kiss me again since the day I refused. Part of me is thankful for that, but the other part of me wants to crash into him and let our lips take us into an endless abyss. It was hard to reject his advance like that, but I’m just not ready.
I have so many conflicting feelings about him, and I don’t want to lead him on. Maybe at some point, I’ll be ready—but for now, we can just keep it to him coming in here, and me ignoring him for the first thirty minutes, then finally caving to talk to him. It’s been the same routine for three weeks straight; I’m beginning to wonder when he’ll get tired of waiting for me to finally let him in.
We haven’t really talked about what happened between him and Lya, but we’ll have to at some point, if this goes on any longer. Whatever this is.
Ever since that conversation about the night his father beat him half to death, I’ve felt more open to him. I stormed out because I felt overwhelmed, but I’ve had time to think about what he said actually happened. I should’ve known that his father was manipulating me. Knowing now that Greyson didn’t betray me, I feel relieved and guilty at the same time. All these years, I’ve been putting the blame on him, but it was never his fault.
