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Turning my head, I glance over, only to find Liam standing on my front porch. Disheveled, with a sad look in his eyes, he waves one hand hesitantly before shoving it into his pocket. Swallowing the lump forming in my throat, I look back at Travis.
“That really what you want?” he scoffs.
“I, no. Yes. H-he’s… I’m engaged.”
“Go then. Fucking go to him,” he leans down to whisper in my ear, making my entire body quake, “You’ll be back though. You’ll crawl back to me, and when you do, I’ll put my collar on you so everyone knows just who the fuck you belong to.”
Trembling, I slide his jacket off and hand it over to him, his words leaving my brain a conflicted and muddied mess. Do I want this? What do I want? I want to climb back on that bike and never look back, but I can’t. I can’t make that decision.
Gripping the jacket, he leans back on his bike, crossing his arms over his chest, and stares directly into my eyes. Darker, colder, and full of pain, but he doesn’t move to stop me.
Please stop me. Decide for me. Don’t let me walk away.
“Th-thank you, again,” I mumble, before I turn and walk slowly up the steps to the porch. When I reach the landing, I wrap my arms around Liam, and break into a sob holding him tightly. I’m so confused, and I don’t understand my own feelings. Am I happy to be home? Am I even happy to be in Liam’s arms? If I’m so fucking happy, then why do my insides feel mutilated? Why does it feel like I can’t breathe? Like I’m dying?
Liam rubs one hand up and down my back, and I settle into his embrace at the familiar feel.
“So that’s where you’ve been these past few days?” his voice sounds cold, distant. Not like the man I’m about to marry, and confusion settles in.
“It was…”
“Running off with another man while we are supposed to be celebrating our engagement?” his hand runs up my back and his fingers slip into my hair, gripping at my scalp. It burns, and I’m so exhausted, so damn tired, I don’t even know how to react.
“Inside,” he grits, releasing me from his grip and pulling the door open.
Once across the threshold, I turn to face him. His usual bright blue eyes are a dull gray, and he reeks of spiced rum. Is this what he’s been doing? Drinking himself to death at my house while I’ve been missing?
“Someone took us. Me and Echo. I was so scared, and she’s sti-“
It happens too fast to stop it, but I see it go down in slow motion. His palm comes for me, and I’m too slow to pull away. Whipping across my face with force, I’m knocked off of my feet, falling to my knees at the bottom of the steps. I’m too stunned to move. Too frozen to say anything.
“You ran off with some other guy? That’s it?!” his harsh voice bounces off the walls around me.
Clutching the side of my face with one hand, I flinch at the stinging sensation, “No, no, Liam, honey. He j-just, he found me. He’s Declan’s friend they were looking for us an-“
“Shut up Aria. Shut the fuck up!” crouching down he grips a handful of my hair near the crown of my head and pulls tightly, tilting my head up, forcing me to meet his angry stare. “Declan’s friend huh? Then why did he put his hands on me at the party?” His grip is strong and I’m so confused. Travis hit him?
“I knew you were a fucking whore.”
This is only because he’s drunk. I know it. He would never do this to me if he were sober.
“Aria, do you know what whores get?” he seethes.
I still myself, and close my eyes, waiting for the moment to pass.
“Answer me damnit!” he screeches, pulling my hair harder, and I jump at the intrusion of his voice.
“N-no,” I whimper.
“Look at me,” I open my eyes and watch his tongue moving around behind his lips, and when they part, he spits forcefully on my face. A single tears rolls down my cheek as he releases his grip on me and walks up the steps, leaving me alone on the floor of the foyer.
With the hem of Travis’s t-shirt, I wipe my face free from the saliva and tears. I deserve this, and so much more. Because he’s right, I am a whore. I breathe in deeply and shove down the pain. I tell myself it’s going to be ok. Tomorrow he will be sorry.
He always is.
Travis
Swallowing my pride like sharp razor blades, I grimace, watching the woman who holds my heart in the palm of her hand, as she curls herself into the arms of another man, before disappearing into her house. Not just the arms of any man, the arms of a man who spoke about her like she was trash the night she was abducted. A man that does not fucking deserve her. A man that I probably would have killed with my bare hands in that rundown bar, if my best friend hadn’t pulled me away.
