Running from hell isnʼt easy. Especially when thereʼs someone dragging you back down into it.
Belligerent, brash and always in shades of black, Freya is hardly a lady. Hidden away by her father, sheʼs lived a normal life despite being born into the...
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I’M ON MY THIRD shower of the day. Well technically, it’s the next day — around one a.m. — when I step into the guest bathroom downstairs. I needed a cold shower. It’s warm and sticky between my legs, and a sheen of sweat still clings to my skin from earlier, on the pool table.
I step into the shower, and the water sluices over my skin. It’s only then that I notice the purpling bruises coloring my inner thighs, and the smattering of bite marks in the shape of his teeth.
And I’m mortified when the sight only makes me more flustered.
I need to cool down.
I need to think.
I’ve hated this man for as long as I can remember. At five, when I first heard fear in my father’s voice at the mention of him. At sixteen, when he signed a contract to marry my sister without even taking a second glance at her. And now, at twenty-one, after he shot my father, claimed me like an object and broke my sister’s heart.
So why, now, are the lines getting blurry? Is it because I’m so sexually repressed? Is my mind so sex-addled it’s deciding to think maybe he isn’t so bad after all . . .?
I’m attracted to him.
That much I can’t deny. And maybe, if I get him out of my system, I can go back to the way it was.
I can go back to hating him.
Numb, I get out of the shower and dry myself before slipping on underwear and a black cami paired with a tiny pair of sleep shorts. It’s hot, and right now, I can’t afford to be any more flustered.
I walk across the hallway into my room and slide into my bed, tucking myself under the cool covers. And somehow, sleep finds me.
***
WHEN I WAKE UP, it’s dark. The room is empty, and in a blur, I walk to the kitchen. Everything feel’s heavy, like I’m hungover. There’s a knock on the door, and I walk up to it, opening up.
It’s Papa.
A frown touches my lips. “Papa? What are you doing here?”
He pulls down his hand to reveal a gaping hole of blood in his chest, blooming over his cream dress shirt.
I suck in a breath, my eyes wide as my heart kicks up its beat in my chest. “Oh my God. What happened? You need to go to a hospital.”
I take a step towards him, but he puts out a hand, pointing to the dining table behind me, where something small and blue sits.
“I need that,” he says. “Freya, you need to get it to me.”
I shake my head. “Papa, you need to see a doctor, or—”
“Freya!” he shouts so loud I startle. “You are not listening to me. It’s the only way out. Get it to me.”
My heart is pounding in my chest. “Fine,” I say, “Fine, I’ll get it.”
