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My feet move quickly, fear motivating me to dart toward the door. It’s so close, mere feet away. An anxious scream rips from my throat as cold fingers wrap around my wrist. A sudden jerk and I stumble to meet the hard tile floor.
His eyes are so similar to mine and they shine down at me with a hint of something vile living inside him. With my free hand I claw at the fingers tightening on me.
“You know, Violet, this is not how I wanted our first meeting to go.” He forces the words out as he drags me forward.
A servant walks from the kitchen stopping abruptly as they take in the scene. Ronan holds up a hand and the servant looks away before walking to the foyer to continue casually dusting.
“Let me go. Please, just let me go.” I struggle to pull away, kicking my feet against the floor to slow every movement as much as possible. To delay the inevitable.
“It seems my son has put a certain sort of fear into you.” He pauses, continuing to ignore my attempts to untangle myself from his harsh hold. Lowering his face to my own, he hisses, “Reyes’ do not fear anything. You’ll learn that.”
I swallow, freezing under his disgraceful watch. Nails dig harshly into my skin, his hand feeling impossibly tight on my arm.
And then he starts to drag me across the slick tile floor.
He opens a door I’ve never went in to. It leads to the basement. The air cools as we descend into the dark stairway.
The shaking and screaming leaving my body only gets more wild, frantic, as if I’m falling down a deep dark hole and the only thing that could save me is to find something to hold on to. I lose sight of Knox’s limp body in the kitchen, his breathing barely visible, as my body painfully smacks and bounces off of stairs that lead down into the uncharted territory of the mansion.
At the bottom of the stairs, he opens the door to a room where darkness seems to eat away every bit of light that enters it. His fingers let go only when I’m falling into the blackness ahead of us. Throbbing pain slices into my temple as I hit the cold floor.
The door swiftly slams closed, the clanking of two locks clicking into place.
My eyes widen as my breaths shake out into the total empty darkness.
“No, don’t do this.” I pant.
“Don’t do this to me.” I gasp.
“You don’t understand!” I scream.
Small wood splinters dig underneath my nails as I claw at the door. I see nothing. I hear nothing. Cold air licks against my skin in this indistinguishable space.
The piece of me that wants for a father, that one smidge that dreamed of being loved by someone, anyone who wasn’t my mother sobs this one question now.
Begs it.
“Daddy?” My shaking voice is almost unrecognizable. The sound coming from someone who isn’t fully me.
“Violet, your mother hid you from me for too long. We have a lot of catching up to do. After you learn what it means to be a Reyes.” Ronan’s voice is a humming steady sound.
Then his footsteps fade away.
This time, the terror rises and falls like a giant wave of the ocean meant to seize me and drown me in its deadly hold. It grabs hold of me and drags me down, back to the old shower room of my youth. I have the dirty scent of unwashed hands and the sharp tang of urine caught in my nose. Hands grip at my arms. My teeth jaw together, my whole body shivering with fear.
I’m not that little girl any more. I’m not that little girl any more. I’m not that little girl any more.
I scream out those constant fears that live inside me. I scream and pound against the door but no one ever comes.
Short clipped breaths hit my lungs. Anxiety claws at my chest. Tears rush down my face,
In the end, the darkness wins.
He wins.
Part Two
Love Me Like You Can’t
