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“Stella, you must be a good girl, or Kevin will stop loving you,” she said as if quoting another person. She spoke as her hips swayed back and forth, unstable. “Sit down, child. Behave, child. Don’t wear that, child. Don’t speak too loudly, girl. Don’t wear a skirt that short, girl. Smile at that man, sweetheart. Don’t hold a resting bitch face. Engage with them. Don’t offend them. Don’t speak back. Sit. Kneel. Pray. Be quiet. Ladies are seen, not heard. Shut up. Speak up. Sit down, child. Behave, child. Don’t wear that, child. You’re too fat, Stella. You’re so ugly, Stella. You’ll never be enough.” She snickered to herself as she stumbled, and then she tripped over her feet and began her descent. The way her ankle bent made me cringe. It looked painful, to say the least.
Before she could meet the ground, I caught her.
She looked up at me with those eyes that forced me to feel alive. “Well, will you look at that? The Beast saves Cinderstella.”
“I’m sorry, Stella,” I said, on the verge of a level of emotion that I’d hadn’t felt in decades.
“For what?”
“For every person who’s ever hurt you.”
She lowered her head a bit. “That’s a lot of apologies,” she whispered, her voice so low that I would’ve missed her words. I would’ve missed them if I wasn’t wholly zoomed in on her. But I was zoomed in. I couldn’t tear my focus away from her if I wanted to.
“Who said those words to you?” I asked. “About you never being enough.”
“The three stepmothers from hell,” she replied. “They made me believe that everyone else’s feelings were more valid than my own.”
“So, you allowed any kind of treatment because you believed you didn’t deserve better.”
“All I wanted to do was make them happy,” she explained. “All I ever wanted to do was make people happy.”
“Even at the expense of your own happiness?”
“Always at the expense.” She removed herself from my hold, and I let her go.
I gave her a broken smile, and shit, I didn’t smile at most people. So, within seconds it dropped into a grimaced frown. Her thumb moved up to her lips as she took a moment to stare at me.
“It was almost there,” she whispered, brushing her lower lip with her finger. “Right against your lips.”
“What was almost there?”
“Your soul. Then again, I can also see it in your eyes.”
She turned and began walking away, limping as she moved.
“Your ankle,” I called out. Clearly, she was in pain.
She didn’t look back at me as she muttered, “I’m fine.” She left me standing there, wanting to murder every single person who led to the creation of Stella’s pain.
“Damian, Damian, wake up.”
I was shaken from my slumber and sat up straight and in defensive mode. The room was still dark, and no light was coming in from the windows, making it clear that the sun hadn’t awakened yet.
“What the hell?” I growled, rubbing the palms of my hands against my eyes. When I removed them, I found those brown eyes that’d been hypnotizing me over the past few weeks. “Stella, what are you doing?” I asked.
Her face was clean of all the makeup she wore that evening, and her eyes were filled with a concerned look. The defensiveness I’d woke with disappeared instantly when I saw her worry.
“What is it? What’s wrong?”
“My ankle,” she softly spoke as a tear fell from her eye. She wiped it away swiftly but sniffled a bit as she nodded her head down to her leg.
I grumbled a bit as I reached toward the lamp on my nightstand. As I hit it on, my eyes fell to her ankle. “Fuck!” I yapped, staring down at her ankle that was the size of a melon. It was black and blue up her leg. I could only imagine how painful that was.
“We gotta get you to the emergency room,” I said, fully awake, standing from my bed.
“Okay.” Tears kept falling down her cheeks, and she didn’t even try to stop their descent. It must’ve hurt extremely bad because Stella wasn’t one to show weakness. “Can you drive me?”
I hesitated. “I’ll call a driver to come take us.”
