AllFreeNovel
Share Us
And with that her fist came hurtling toward my jaw, and pain bloomed where she made contact, my face throbbing as she pulled back. She didn’t even have the decency to look shocked, she just stared back at me with a hint of satisfaction as though she’d been waiting to do that for a very long time.
“Do you feel big and strong, Pam?” I asked, my voice thick with hatred. “Does hitting your daughter make you feel like you’re actually worth something?”
Silence rang through the entryway, her face falling slightly as I stared back at her, unflinchingly. Her body trembled slightly, not from remorse, but fear. She hadn’t expected me to take the hit like that, she had wanted me to fall at her feet and beg for forgiveness. But that wasn’t the person I was. I wouldn’t let her see the pain her strike had caused, nor would I let her see the betrayal that pierced through my heart like the final nail in her coffin.
“If you touch me again, I’ll slit your fucking throat,” I hissed, raising my chin in defiance, letting that mark she’d undoubtedly left shine like a mark from battle, something I would wear with pride as a symbol of this split from these two vile excuses for humans.
“Giana,” Greg chastised, but I sneered at him, my eyes begging him to try something. Because I wouldn’t falter. She got one hit, but that was it. The next time either of them tried anything, they were dead. He fell silent though, his throat bobbing as I glared back at him, showing the promise that laid there. It wasn’t an empty threat, far from it.
I stomped up the stairs and into my small room, my brain already making a list of what I had to take. I wouldn’t let them have anything I worked for, any money I’d earned. No, that would be stored away for a rainy day, whatever I earned after college would go to that, for the chance to leave, to escape. I moved about the space methodically searching in every single hiding place I’d stashed my valuables, never trusting my parents wouldn’t come in while I was out and take what they wanted for smokes and alcohol.
Fuck them, I fumed, gritting my teeth and swallowing back the bile that rose in my throat as pain radiated through my jaw. They’d been verbally abusive to me for many years but hadn’t done more than a shove or a push or grabbed my arm hard enough for their fingers to leave a bruise. But for Pam to strike me, to deal that final blow … they were lucky to walk away alive. They had no idea how strong I was after my lessons with the guys, the training I’d done to prepare myself if this ever happened.
I held myself back only because I was gone. They had no more control over me, couldn’t beat me down with their words or their fists. I was free from them, just to be locked up in another cage. I guessed that was all I was meant for, to be locked away at someone else’s mercy, destined to keep that part of myself caged too, the one that wanted to bring all of them to their knees and watch them cower for once. But Greg and Pam sure as hell weren’t worth it, they were scum, not worth the bruises they’d leave on my knuckles. And Tommaso, well that would never happen—could never happen as long as he held the lives of my friends and their families over my head.
I shoved everything I needed into the small suitcase and pulled it behind me as I trudged down the stairs, grateful they’d gone into the kitchen so I wouldn’t have to see their faces again. Hatred for them burned in my chest as I vowed never to see or speak to them again. There was no coming back from this, no chance at perhaps understanding each other with distance. They showed no remorse, no care for me past what this would all mean for them. They could rot in hell for all I cared.
I grabbed my bag by the front door and pulled it open, the fresh morning air hitting my face in a welcoming embrace, strengthening me for this new beginning. I wouldn’t allow myself to break with this new set of chains clanking around my ankles, just like I hadn’t before. I let the thought of someday escaping push me forward and give me the drive to fight. I slammed the door closed behind me just like the life I was effectively leaving behind.
“What is that?” Tommaso barked, his fingers tentatively reaching out toward the bruise blossoming on my jaw.
“It’s nothing,” I sighed, moving out of his reach, about to stride past him.
“I’ll kill them.” His jaw worked as he stepped forward, and I knew he would. He’d kill anyone that even looked at me wrong.
“They’re not worth it,” I breathed, my hand taking his, my stomach twisting at the contact. “Let’s just go.” It would be so easy to just let him march in there to take them out with two shots from the telltale bulge of the pistol under his jacket. This was my final act of mercy for them, for the man and woman who should’ve never had a child they weren’t prepared for, who were kept down by their circumstances. But there would never be another.
His mahogany eyes glanced down at where my fingers twined with his, a delighted grin stretching across his lip. “Let’s go home.”
Chapter twenty-six
Giana
Now
“She’shome?”thatalltoo familiar voice asked. He sounded distant though, like he wasn’t entirely in the same room.
An ache radiated through my neck as the blackness faded, a faint light trickling in through my closed eyelids. I peeled them open slowly but didn’t dare move a muscle, not wanting to give away the fact that consciousness was gradually seeping back in. Sleep coated them, gritting against the inner corner of my eye, and I pushed back the urge to wipe it away. My mind quickly pieced together that I wouldn’t be able to anyway, since my arms were tied behind my back, my body slumped uncomfortably on a chair. I wiggled my fingers, tentatively grasping at the back of the slightly familiar wooden slats.
My head pounded but I pushed the pain aside as my adrenaline kicked in, my memory sparking with recognition as I looked at the familiar furniture and marble floor of the entryway. I was back in Tommaso’s house. My memory filled in the rest of the pieces at that realization. The chair I’d been placed on as one of the new ones that had been delivered for Tommaso when we made the move.
My head was lolled to the side, and I absently wondered just how long I’d been out for as daylight trickled in through the windows. No wonder my neck ached and my muscles barked in protest.
“Yes, sir. I took her back to your house like you asked me to,” a deep masculine voice rumbled in the distance. Relief washed over me as I realized Tommaso wasn’t here, his voice had just echoed over the speaker of my captor’s phone.
There was still a chance to get away, or to prepare myself for when he came, because there was no way I’d let myself be tied to a chair when he arrived. I pushed down the rage that simmered in my veins I wanted to slice him and whoever took me to shreds, but I couldn’t do that—not yet.
“Is she awake?” Tommaso asked brightly, his tone brimming with triumph. I fought against the scowl that curled on my lips, needing to pretend I was still unconscious. That would be the only way to escape.
Footsteps pounded in my direction, echoing off the hardwood floor from where my kidnapper must’ve been standing in the kitchen. I let my face relax and my breathing calm, not letting any sign past my façade. The steps stilled before me and I waited for him to answer Tommaso, to tell him I was still out and for him to walk away so I could formulate my next move.
But instead, a cool wave smacked against me, and I sputtered as water splashed against my face. I spat out anything that had made its way between my slightly parted lips, fearing what may be in it.
The liquid ran down my chest in rivulets and soaked into my clothes, leaving me completely drenched as I blinked against the moisture, my eyes flickering open to the sight of the massive form of Mike, the bouncer, poised before me. His lips curled in a sneer as I pulled in a ragged breath now that my mouth was clear of the liquid. I bared my teeth right back at him, my fingers curling, ready to claw at the restraints so I could tear that look straight off his face.
“Watch it,” Tommaso growled possessively, the smack of his hand pounding against something. “I told you she wasn’t to be harmed.”
“It was just a splash of water,” Mike groaned.
