Total pages in book: 70
Estimated words: 66732 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 334(@200wpm)___ 267(@250wpm)___ 222(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 66732 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 334(@200wpm)___ 267(@250wpm)___ 222(@300wpm)
I shudder and I’m not sure it’s the words themselves, his delivery of them, or him. The way he’s looking at me, the flatness in his eyes, the deadness inside them. It’s a deep, dark place.
He blinks, and it’s gone. The Ethan I recognize is back. I exhale, relieved, but I know it’s false. When he smiles, that dimple appears on his cheek, deceptive in its almost childlike innocence. “Don’t look at me like that,” he says. “Because if you knew the truth, you might hate yours too.”
A sick feeling settles in my stomach. I don’t know if it’s the drugs he’s been giving me or that sense of dread, that feeling of foreboding, that’s doing it. I pick up the glass of water beside the bed and drink the last of it, aware all the while of Ethan watching me. My heart is racing. I’m at a loss for what to do. How to act. And I’m not in control of what is coming. All I know for certain as I glance up at this man I’ve known for most of my life, is that I don’t know him at all.
“Get up, Phee. You heard Dad. Doesn’t want me fucking up.” He laughs an ugly laugh. “We have a schedule to keep.”
I get up out of the bed. I don’t know what else to do. I’m slowly shedding the weighted, drugged feeling. Keeping the sheet around me, I pad across the room, my tread as light as possible. I wince with each step. When I get to the bathroom, he lets me pass without touching me. I’m grateful for that as I close the door. His phone rings and he answers, moving away.
I lock the door and walk over to the large mirror over the vanity. What I see is scary. I look ghostly pale, my makeup from the gala mostly gone apart from my smeared eyeliner making me look ghoulish. The bruises across the fronts of my thighs and those spots where the belt wrapped around are purple and dotted with broken blood vessels, but it’s when I turn around that I see the true extent of the damage he did. I reach my hand back to touch a tender spot on my side, my back, ass and thighs marked with thick red welts, some of which opened and scabbed over. I’m swollen in places. Looking at this, feeling it, remembering when he beat me, when he put my legs up on that stool to whip the bottoms of my feet raw, I think Ethan hates me, too. He must.
“Phee?” he calls out, trying the door. “Unlock the door. You’ll need help.”
“I’m fine.” I switch on the shower and am grateful the lock holds. I step under the flow of the water, instantly wincing when the hot water hits my skin. I cool it as much as I can stand before switching off the water and gently wrapping a towel around myself.
I use the hotel provided toothbrush and toothpaste, along with the soap to wash off the last of my makeup. I feel a little better but not much because I know what is coming and I don’t know how to get out of it.
I open the door and find Ethan sitting on a chair, one ankle crossed over the opposite knee in conversation with someone on his phone. He disconnects as soon as he sees me and stands and for the first time in all the time I’ve known him, it’s like I see how big he is. How threatening.
“Who are you talking to?”
“No one. Here.” He takes the dress his mother had sent out of the plastic bag hanging on the closet door. I’m glad to see she included a bra and a pair of panties. I put them on, still slow to move, my skin tight and tender.
Ethan’s eyes follow my movements. I don’t so much see it as feel it. There’s a hostility I’ve never known with him before.
“You’ll heal soon,” Ethan says. “You know I did that on my father’s order. I’m not a violent man.”
I pull the dress over my head and snort. “No? Really, Ethan? I think this is evidence of the contrary. Why did you do it? If you didn’t want to, why did you?”
“My father can be very controlling, as you’ve seen for yourself. And like I said before, better me than him.”
“Better no one.” I sit down on the edge of the bed to put on the shoes, a pair of heels I know will be excruciatingly painful especially once I slip them on and realize they’re a half size too small. Mira knows my size. She’s sending a message.
“Go on, Phee.”
“They’re too small.”
“Well, barefoot isn’t an option.”
“You can’t make me do this.” I get up and cross the room.