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Chapter 10
“And there she is,my precious daughter dear,” Reg said when he saw me coming down the stairs. His voice was sickly sweet and I suppressed a shudder at the hidden threat.
I’d heard them pull up outside and I thought I could hide out in my bedroom until he went to bed, but Mom had yelled at me to come down and see him.
It was just after dinner and we had ordered pizza. Knowing he was coming home meant that I frantically had to hide the pizza boxes and stash the left overs in containers in the fridge. Reg was weird about us getting food delivery, he had a fear that we’d gain weight or that people were adding things to the food we didn’t prepare ourselves.
I thought it was more about control over the family than anything else. A way to keep Mom shackled to the kitchen, to ensure she never stayed out too late with her friends or for her job.
I reached the bottom step and looked up and down as if to assess him for any signs of attack. The moment he entered the house, the energy had changed and I was now walking on the edge of a razor blade with all my senses on high alert.
“And there you are,” I said, looking him in the eye. I’d decided the only way I was going to handle living with him under the Organization’s rules was to meet the problem head on. I had to be brave, braver than I’d been up until now. And brave despite the fact that I was facing him head on all by myself. As much as I loved the support I got from my Kings, I had to develop my courage separate from them. I couldn’t depend on them for safety when they weren’t able to be around all the time.
“Here I am,” Reg said as Mom helped him get his jacket off. “As good as new. Like the bullet never hit me.”
His shirt was open wide at the collar and I could see bandages over the wound where I’d hit him. The moment replayed in my mind again, as it had over and over since the second it happened, and I could almost see Reg crumple to the floor in front of me right now.
“I still can’t believe how lucky he was,” Mom said. “The doctor told us that if the bullet had been just an inch towards his sternum, it would have hit his heart.”
“Can you believe how lucky I am?” Reg asked me, his gaze steely and unwavering.
“Can I go to Rachel’s to study?” Nat asked as she strolled into the foyer, her head bent down looking at her phone.
“No, you cannot,” Mom said. “First of all, your father is home and he wants to spend time with the family. And second of all, your room is a pigsty. You have some cleaning to do before you go anywhere, young lady.”
“Oh, hey Dad,” Nat said, barely looking up from her phone. “How are you feeling?”
“I’m just fine,” Reg said, still looking at me. “In fact, the doctors can’t believe how fast I healed. They said I’m so lucky I was cleaning a small caliber weapon or else the damage would have been much worse.”
“Oh yes, very lucky,” I said bitterly. I should have reached for a rifle so I could have exploded his chest like a ripe melon when the bullet tore into him. I should have shot him in the head, to ensure the job was done. I’d remember all this for the next time I decided to kill one of the men who abused me. And I was sure there’d be a next time, now that I was so far down the rabbit hole in Dirty Kingdom and the Organization.
I wasn’t stupid, I could read between the lines. The mere fact that they’d brought up being sold at auction in their list of rules hadn’t been sitting right with me. And then I’d caught on that they intended to sell the Tribute no matter the outcome of Dirty Kingdom. I needed to be ready for that move when they made it.
“Why don’t you come over here and help me onto the couch?” Reg asked me and held his arm out so he could walk slowly next to me, using me as support. “Your Mom has to get me a beer, and your sister is busy cleaning her room.”
Mom and Nat got the hint and scattered, while I was left facing him, my stepfather. My rapist.
“Get over here,” he hissed and I almost told him to fuck off, but then I remembered the rules. I was trapped, really trapped, and I didn’t like it.
But I didn’t want to get another black mark on his first day back, I already had one from shooting Reg. And I believed the Organization when they said they could make me disappear by selling me off to somebody in another country. I wasn’t sure how we could escape that fate if they decided it and snatched me when I wasn’t expecting it.
I walked to Reg’s side and let him lean on me while we walked to the couch. “I thought about you a lot when I was in the hospital,” he said in a low voice, barely above a whisper. “I thought about everything I did and how I wanted to say I was sorry.”
“I didn’t think about you at all,” I replied with ice in my words.
“Good, because after that, I came to my senses and realized I don’t owe you shit,” he hissed in a cruel way. “I realized you’re a little bitch who deserved it. You’re good for nothing else, Everly. You’re just like your mother. You’ve got nice tits and a nice mouth and a delicious little cunt, but that’s it. That’s all you’re good for.”
Rage snaked through me like poison in my blood. Reg didn’t know I wasn’t taking the pills to keep me numb. He didn’t know that I was finally clear headed and feeling everything I was meant to feel. He didn’t realize that I could react to him now, instead of holding it all inside until it burst out in one of my dark fits of anger or suicidal ideation.
I didn’t want to kill or hurt myself anymore, my malice was directed outwards now.
And even though the rules were the rules, they didn’t say a damned thing about keeping myself from hurting Reg. They dealt with me like I was still numb and obedient, they didn’t expect me to have my own intentions or darkness at that point.
So as we walked, I reached around and pressed my thumb into his back, where the bullet had exited. This would be a much larger wound than the one in the front, and I wanted to make him hurt.
It had the effect I wanted. Reg winced and sucked in a harsh breath before he said, “Fuck, Everly, that fucking hurts.”
“Good,” I replied and shoved him towards the couch. “I hope it fucking hurts like hell, you sick fuck.”
