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“You did,” he insists and my entire body goes cold. It feels like being back in that cage. My blunt nails dig into my skin in a desperate attempt to hold on to anything at all.
“I didn’t,” I plead with him as tears slip down my cheeks. He doesn’t believe me. How could he not believe me? “I didn’t,” I try to speak, but I don’t know if the words even come out. So much fear consumes me at this moment that I’m light-headed.
Help me.
He creeps closer, the bed dipping as he does. “Just tell me the truth and I will figure it all out, Braelynn,” he nearly whispers.
I don’t know what to say, or if I’m even capable of speaking as the events of yesterday play back, faster and faster. Declan says something, but I can’t make it out. There’s only the iron cage, the freezing water. I can’t hear anything as it all whirls by. So quickly all I can hear is the memory of my own screams.
“Tell me,” he nearly yells as I see Nate murder Scarlet.
My hand whips out in front of me. I don’t mean it to. He’s just so close and I’m so scared. My palm burns as the slap rings out and breaks the visions, bringing me right back to the here and now. Shock overwhelms me.
My eyes widen as I realize the fear I felt before is nothing compared to this new terror. Slowly, ever so slowly, Declan turnshis head to face me, the red handprint on his cheek evidence of what I’ve done.
DECLAN
Ilet her scramble to get off the bed. I let her fall to the floor as she pleads with me for mercy. I let her scurry under the bed, hiding there as I remain perfectly still where I am. I don’t allow a muscle to move.
The anger simmers and a sense of failure seeps into me. Failing her, failing us. Everything crumbles when I lose control and I obviously lost it before, but I will not again.
For the sake of her life, I don’t allow myself to even breathe as she cries out for me to forgive her, her voice muffled from beneath the bed frame.
My poor little pet.
Every jagged piece of my brokenness feels for her. I remind myself of my conviction, of the only way she makes it out of this alive:If she gives herself to me, she will be fine. She needs to be mine and then everything will be all right.
There’s not a sound in the dark room apart from her heavy breathing and the pounding of my racing heart. The ability to keep calm and levelheaded has never been more difficult.
“Please don’t hurt me,” she murmurs in a strangled way.
With every ounce of self-control I possess, I carefully remove myself from the bed. I’m sure to step toward the opposite sideof where she is so shifting my weight doesn’t harm her, and to give her some distance between us. With slow, deliberate movements, I walk to the other side of the room, press my back against the wall and carefully lower myself to the floor.
Cross-legged and with my head resting against the wall, I let my gaze fall to the shadowy space where she’s concealed.
“How did you get yourself under there, my little pet?” I question loud enough for her to hear me. Exhaustion wars inside of me with every mixed emotion I feel.
Failure rings the loudest in my mind. Failing my brothers, failing her just the same.
All because I lost control. I was too weak to take care of her myself.
“I’m sorry,” she manages to say but doesn’t answer my question. She’s resisting my authority and untrusting. She’s terrified.
That’s how I told her to feel, isn’t it? Yet again, more evidence that I caused this. It was all in my control and then I gave it away. That won’t happen again.
I flex my jaw to dampen the sting from her slap.
With both hands resting on my knees, palms up, I tell her calmly, “Come here, Braelynn.”
Every second she hesitates anger stirs within until disappointment eventually settles through me. I have to remind myself she’s scared because of me. I did this to her. The only one I have to be angry toward is my fucked-up self.
“Come here, be a good girl for me,” I calmly command her, keeping my voice even and with a soothing edge. Time ticks by slowly with her mounting defiance.
Her sniffling is heard from the right side of the king-sized bed. “Please don’t make me wait any longer, my little pet. My patience isn’t what it typically is …” I swallow down everyemotion elicited as the past forty-eight hours flick through my mind. “I’ve barely slept and I know you haven’t either.”
The floor creaks as she carefully starts to emerge from under the bed. Her large dark eyes peer up at me and the look in them wrecks me. Genuine fear and genuine sorrow leave no room for anything else.
Her lips are parted as she takes in short inhales, her shoulders shaking with each one.
