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Chapter 22
Addie
Every good memory I have was tainted by a bad one.
When I was five-years-old, we moved out of our quaint, Victorian manor. I remember how diminutive that house seemed, at least in comparison. A yellow painted building with dark shingles, a brick chimney, and windows stretching the expanse of the back, it was the epitome of “cute.”
We hadn’t move into the resort at first. No, instead, my parents chose for us to live in a hotel, owned by one of their shell companies. While the hotel was large, it lacked any warmth. With the white painted walls, leather couches, and bleached linoleum flooring, it was immensely unwelcoming.
Father had been happy that day. I wouldn’t be able to tell you why, though I imagined one of his deals had went through. He had lifted me up, spinning me in a circle, tears in his normally piercing dark eyes. I had never seen my father so happy before, so energetic. He made it feel as if he had the world at his fingertips, and I, by association, did as well. Planting a sloppy, wet kiss onto my forehead, he had called me his “angel” before gently setting me down onto the floor.
I was elated by his show of love. For the first time, I succeeded in bringing happiness instead of inflicting pain. You may believe that’s demented thinking for a child, but I had lived my life under this constant pressure of being perfect and having my surroundings behave perfectly as well. It failed to reach my parents’ attention that I had no control over the world. I wasn’t like my father. I couldn’t just snap my fingers and have the world fall to its knees.
Only an hour after that initial spurt of happiness, the anger began to brew, like a bloated storm cloud tethering at the edge of the sky. It hadn’t quite concealed the sun yet, but the slow-moving storm would eventually consume it.
I prepared myself for the darkness.
When it came, I held my hands up to protect my face. Only, instead of rain, it was fists. Instead of thunder, it was screams. Instead of lightning, it was a blistering sharp slap to my cheek.
The deal had fallen through. I didn’t know the logistics, but, for some reason, he took the blame out on me. An innocent.
That was my first trip to the hospital. The doctors had examined me with raised eyebrows, but no questions were asked. My father spun his web, and they became stuck in its binding. They were nothing but insects to him: a food that could easily be devoured.
I had never felt so helpless before, so empty. The world was crumbling around me, yet all I could do was watch it fall. I was balancing precariously on a ledge and a part of me wanted to take that leap. Would it hurt if I fell? Would anyone care?
I could see, now, all of those emotions in Ryder’s face as the girl leered down at him. There was so much pain.
Nobody could live through that much pain.
I longed to reach out to him, to comfort and touch him, but there was nothing for me to do but watch. Watching, I realized, was nearly as agonizing as being the one tortured. I would rather face a thousand of my fathers than see that helpless expression even once on Ryder’s face.
Was that love? Or was that merely human decency?
“You don’t have to do this,” Ryder gasped, slowly climbing to his feet. The girl watched it all with an amused expression.
“Why wouldn’t I have to do this? This is the only way for us.” She sounded so young just then, so full of hope. She stared at Ryder as if he held the moon. Awe, longing, love.
“Liz, please...”
The girl, Liz apparently, yanked on the leash, and Ryder stumbled forward. On closer inspection, I saw that his eye was completely swollen shut and blood smeared the roots of his hair. What had the bitch done to him?
Smirking, she lowered her voice in a poor of impersonation of Ryder’s. “Liz, please,” she mocked. Then, in her normal, singsong voice, “Don’t you want to be my husband?”
“Of course I do!” Ryder said quickly. Too quickly. If Liz noticed or suspected, she didn’t say anything. Instead, she continued to stare up at him with her doe-like, innocent eyes. Eyes that had the capability to penetrate skin like millions of tiny knives. It was always the innocent looking ones that were the most dangerous. Liz was no exception. “I just don’t understand what she has to do with anything.” He nodded his head towards me, refraining from making eye-contact. His hands were clenched tightly, the only indication that he was anything other than fine.
“Her?” Liz glared at me over her shoulder. “My partners have more interest in her than I do. But I do need her at our wedding. The other woman.”Her face contorted into its customary sneer, but all I could focus on were her first words.
Her partners? Who were they, and what could they possibly want with me? But I couldn’t afford to focus on that right now. I had to focus on the now, on the current problem.
Liz.
Ryder, however, narrowed his eyes at the petite bride.
“What do you mean? Who’s after her?” His entire body was considerably more taut than it was moments before, as if the threat against me trumped the current threat against him.
Oh Ryder...
“Why do you care?” Liz hissed. “She’s nothing to you. I’m your wife!”
