Aerin had forced me to eat that much food, I think I might actually collapse by the time I get back to the apartment. I just want to curl up into a ball and sleep the food hangover off. Unfortunately, my plan is instantly ruined when I push open the door and the sound of loud music, off-pitch singing and banging reaches me from the kitchen.
Grudgingly, I stalk towards the source of noise, fully prepared to give Zeke and whoever he is with a piece of my mind about the noise levels when I stop short. Zeke isn't in the kitchen at all. Instead his detective friend is prancing around, using a wooden spoon as a microphone, in only an oversized shirt and a pair of male boxers.
"Shit! Fuck! Oh my god!" She screams when she sees me staring at her with cold indifference on my face. Silently, I raise one of my eyebrows and purse my lips before walking off. At least some one is comfortable here.
Her voice calls out, closer than I expected, as my reach my bedroom door, "wait! I'm sorry. Zeke said that you wouldn't be coming back". She sounds confused and slightly guilt and when I open my bedroom door I understand why. My room had been ransacked. My limited amount of clothes and belongings were scattered about everywhere.
"Zeke was looking for something in here. He wouldn't tell me what. He kept murmuring about you going back to Enzo?".
The name triggers something within me, sending me spiralling into a place of hopelessness and fear and I spin to face her with a animalistic snarl on my face, "where is he now?".
She pauses for a minute before reluctantly admitting, "he's in the shower".
Before the words have even fully left her mouth, I'm on the prowl towards the bathroom door, where steam pours from every small gap. The door collapses under the force of my foot. Zeke doesn't even blink as he takes in my clenched fists and storming face.
"How dare you!" I growl as I rip open the shower door and square up to all 6'4 nakedness that is Zeke at the moment. My nails dig into his broad, muscular shoulders as I shove him against the shower wall. He lets me do it as he observes my tearful eyes.
Zeke glances from me to Emry who has followed me in with wide eyes and an open mouth. Her astonishment only worsens when Zeke angles his head at her in a gesture that could only signify for her to get out. After a second, she does as she's told and his attention swings back towards me.
"How dare I what, habibi?".
"You know what I'm going on about asshole" I snap, shoving him back again with everything in me, "you had no right to go through my stuff".
Silence falls between us as Zeke tilts his head to the side and narrows his eyes. The look of a predator going in for the kill.
"Your mother called me and told me that Enzo was trying to find you again and it's a good thing that she did because I found the phone you had so carefully hidden. Didn't you want everyone to know that you were in contact with him again? Huh? I saw all the calls and texts he sent".
"Then you must have seen the lack of response from me".
"Is he the baby daddy? Is that why you got yourself all worked up?" Zeke questions, pushing me off him like I am a mere insect in his way.
"No" I whisper, the memories of everything washing over me in waves. God. This so easily could have been his baby a few years ago. Would he have done to my child what he did to me?
"No? Then why is he stalking you?" Zeke interrogates, wrapping one arm around my waist and roughly grabbing my chin with the other, forcing me to look at him as if he sensed the fact my skin is crawling with the need to flee.
"I don't know".
Zeke takes a deep breathe and his hold loosens slightly as he reigns in his temper. I recognise the habit from when we were teenagers when his anger got too much for him and he had to retreat into his own mind and count to ten. I flinch slightly and my whole body shakes like a leaf. My brain spiralling into a time that I feared men due to Enzo. That I feared everyone including my own brother and cousins.
Immediately Zeke's eyes open and he softens, "habibi I'm not going to hurt you. I would never hurt you".
His voice sounds so small and distant, paling in comparison to the sudden ringing in my ears. My vision blurs and my head spins. Tingles break out throughout my whole body. I have no air. I can't breathe. I gasp, my trembling hands grasping at my throat as I try to remember how to breathe. All my anger and adrenaline disintegrates within me and I succumb to the paralysing feeling that my PTSD and anxiety provides. My entire body feels too small for my mind all of a sudden and I'm claustrophobic. This is what I've amounted too.
I should be strong and powerful. I'm a Thomas for gods sake. My mother gave me her surname, gave us all her surname, so we would never forgot our strength and the fact that we are limitless. She would never break down like this despite everything she has been through. I'm an embarrassment. A coward. An outsider within my own family. A fraud. Gods help me.
"Useless. Embarrassment. Coward. Outsider. Fraud. Useless. Embarrassment. Coward. Fraud" a small voice chants in my mind. Over and over again.
"Make it stop. Make it stop. Make it stop" I manage to wheeze out.
"I'm here, habibi" someone whispers but I can't quite make out who, "can you hear me, Elisia, I'm here, baby".
If I can't even protect myself, how am I going to protect this small, innocent life growing inside me?
———
Hey,
I'm so so sorry for the lack of updates on this book. It's been a year since I last updated and that is genuinely insane but I promise that I had a reason for it. I'm going to try and get better with updating. I promise. Scouts honour.
I hope that this part coaxes you all into forgiving me and most importantly I hope you enjoyed it, especially Zeke being a softie at the end.
I love you all so much.
YOU ARE READING
Precious Sins
Romance"You act like you're indestructible, but you're not". "Guess you'd know best, huh?" - - - Elisia regina Thomas had a hard life growing up. Always in the spotlight because of her family but no one really knew her. She was just seen as another spoil...
