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I don't make eye contact with my two bodyguards that are stationed outside of my room. I heard them out there chattering last night so their presence isn't a surprise. What is concerning is that we've never needed this level of security inside of the house. It's not unusual for my dad to have guards around when taking meetings but my bodyguards usually disappear the second I arrive home.
My flip-flops slap on the floor as I descend the stairs. I knock on my father's office door, the action more muscle memory than any formal show of respect. As if being punished for my delay, I stand there for a solid minute before the door opens and I'm allowed entry.
I don't know why I expected this meeting to just include me, my mother, and my father. Why would we need a private moment to discuss anything that's happened to me in the last month?
With tired eyes, I look around the room. My exhaustion is bone deep. I've done more in the last twenty-four hours physically than I've done nearly the entire month I was with Liam. The fatigue experienced from running on the treadmill doesn't even compare to the weariness I currently feel in my bones and my muscles. I guess that's just how heartbreak works though.
I look around the room again, making eye contact with Christine, my dad's PR specialist. The family lawyer and my father's personal assistants are in the room as well. This meeting looks like any other meeting he would have to discuss schedules, poll numbers, and strategic plans for the future.
I look to my father but I get nothing more than what my mom offered, standing in my doorway upstairs. There's no joy. If anything, disappointment clouds his eyes. My heart begins to race, my mind wonders that maybe they know what happened with Liam without me even speaking the words. That would make it easier, I guess, if my confessions weren't a surprise. I cross the room to take a seat in the chair across from my father's desk and it already feels like an interrogation without a word being spoken.
“Are you hurt?” my father asks, as I'm taking a seat.
I shake my head because I know he's not concerned with my emotional wellbeing. He frowns, and I'd say the response is misplaced. Physical ailments, he could codify. Physical issues could be an excuse, a reasoning to justify how I've ruined my prospects of marriage, which in turn ruins his plans for his own future. I imagine it would be difficult to marry off a daughter who possibly had been tortured, abused, and sexually assaulted for a month.
I don't open my mouth to assure him that I'm fine. It's not like he would care anyway. Thomas Reed’s only concern is his career and how those around him are classified into two groups. Those that can help him and those that cannot. From the look on his face, I can easily see that I've been moved from one camp to the other.
“Who was Liam Stone to you?” my father asks.
His name on someone else's lips makes my heart race and my hands grow clammy.
“Who?” I ask, coughing to clear my throat when the word comes out on the squeak.
Anger rages in his eyes but I know my father would never lose his cool in front of witnesses. Despite everyone in this room being loyal to him, he's not a man to take that kind of risk. He knows I’m lying, even if he didn't have the evidence from Liam's house. He knows I’m not telling the truth. It's not surprising. I've never been a very good liar.
“He never told me his name,” I lie again. The instinct to save face and please my father is inherent.
“He's the one who held you captive for the last month,” Christine, the media expert, says but I don't take my eyes off my father.
I can be strong in front of him because that's the expectation. Looking toward someone who may have sympathy in their eyes would break me. It would make me cling to the hope that there's a way out of this differently from how I know this will go.
“He didn't tell me his name,” I repeat, knowing my silence won't be tolerated like it was at the hospital for much longer.
“He enslaved and tortured you, right?” Dad asks. “He held you against your will.”
I clamp my mouth closed, despite my silence being a lie in and of itself. My dad looks less than impressed, and I imagine there'd be an irritation on my mother's face if I was willing to look in her direction as well. My father's jaw clenches, the muscle flexing in irritation, but I stand my ground. I've learned very recently that the silence doesn't have to be filled especially when you have nothing to say.
“You're clearly still exhausted,” my father says. “You should go back to bed. Maybe when you wake up, you'll have more information.”
I don’t hesitate to stand up and walk away from the scrutiny of his gaze. Before I close the door, I hear, “mental break, Stockholm syndrome, petulant damn child.”
My bodyguards follow me right back up to my room and it makes me want to dig a little bit deeper into the whole situation. I'm surprised they still have jobs. I have no doubt my dad somehow spun it to make it look like they were heroes who were not outsmarted but possibly physically outmanned during my abduction.
Thomas Reed wouldn’t make the mistake of hiring someone that would be easily duped.
As I close and lock my bedroom door behind me, I don't feel protected at all. For the second time in my life, I feel like a prisoner.
Chapter 37
Liam
I have always lived my life in the shadows. I’ve spent my time on the edge of everyone else's existence. It's either that I don't care or it's the whiskey in my veins causing the change. The news stories of Raya’s return haven't slowed down despite the lack of new information.
The police have to know It was me. They raided my house. They found her DNA, but somehow, for some reason, they’ve kept that information away from the press.
I've spent the last several days fighting the urge to turn myself in. Doing so would be stupid. It would go against everything I have fought for in life and that's my freedom. But there would be a trial and I'd get to see her in person during the court hearings. And that's almost enough to make me sacrifice everything.
I miss her soft breathing. I miss the sight of her sweat glistening skin after a run on the treadmill. I miss the moans she makes when she comes. I miss everything about her. There's not one recollection of her that comes to mind that I don't ache to experience all over again.
