Secret Deception (Jonathan Black's Love Story)

Chapter 33: Never Be The Same

Jonathan found me sitting on our bed the next morning.
"What are you thinking about?" He asked sitting beside me wrapping his arm around me.
"I feel like a kid again. I'm broken and terrified." I whispered nearly silently.
"Do you remember the first time my father beat me after you moved in?" He asked nudging me so I'd look at him.
"Of course I do. How could I forget?"
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Sebastian had cornered me in a corner of the Archive. I have no idea how Jonny knew I needed him but before his father could touch me he'd pushed his way in between us and shoved his father backwards.
"Run, Lexa, go!" He said not turning to look at me.
I listened and ran towards the basement. Terror shot through me at the sound of fist meeting flesh. Jonny and Sebastian started screaming at each other for what seemed like hours as I hid under the staircase.
Eventually they went silent. I could hear my heart beating as I waited, nearly holding my breath. The door to the basement opened and glanced up in time to see Jonny get thrown down the stairs. My breath hitched as I tried to not make a sound. Jonny's eyes caught mine and he squeezed them shut telling me to close my eyes. I pressed myself into the corner of the area under the staircase and complied.
I heard fabric tearing and metal clanking before the crack of a whip before it smacked against skin. I winced back as his scream pierced my soul. Tears stung my eyes as I could do nothing but listen.
"Perhaps next time you'll stay out of my way." Sebastian hissed before stomping up the stairs.
He slammed the door behind him. I waited until the lock clicked before I ventured out to find Jonny.
He was hanging from his wrists in the corner of the room. The tops of his feet grazing the floor as his legs couldn't hold himself up in his pain and exhaustion. His exposed back covered in blood from the cuts and welts given to him.
"Jonny?" I whispered.
"Can you hear me?"
His head nodded weakly.
"I'm going to get you down but I need you to try to lean forward. We can't let your back hit the floor like this okay?"
He nodded again.
The key to the shackles hung on the wall at the bottom of the stairs. A moment later his knees hit the floor as his forehead rested against the wall.
"Can you walk? Just far enough to get to that table?"
He turned his head slowly glancing at it before nodding.
I'd grown since I met Jonny but I still couldn't carry him towards the table. Still he leaned toward me as he shuffled over the the table before falling against it.
"Can you lay on your chest on the table?" I urged softly.
He winced as he lifted himself up slightly to lay on the table. I noticed a giant bruise across his face before I made my way over to the cabinet at the back of the basement room. I found a couple clean rags, a small bowl, and some rubbing alcohol. I filled the bowl about halfway with cold water from the basement sink and walked back over to him.
"Jonny?"
"Hmm..." He murmured.
"This is going to hurt, Jonny."
He nodded again as I splashed the alcohol on one of the rags and began trying to clean the blood from his back. He winced as the alcohol hit his wounds. I let him squeeze my left hand while I continued to clean his back. I soaked the other rag in the cold water before laying it across his upper back where most of his cuts were.
He swallowed hard.
"You'll be okay, Jonny. Try to rest now." I whispered.
"Stay." He whispered, half asleep.
"I will."
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The memory stung even now with him sitting before me.
"I also remember how you looked when we found you that day. So much fear and pain in your eyes when you looked at me. I couldn't see a single part of your body that wasn't covered with bruises. When I got you out of the vent and you grabbed ahold of me so strong while you looked so frail.
"It didn't make sense to me when they said you were eight years old. You were so small. I could see your bones underneath your skin. I'd have said four or younger. At the hospital they told my father that your arms and ribs were broken and every bone in your body had been broken at one time or another, but the way you'd grabbed me I knew they had to be wrong.
"When they showed us the x-rays in your hospital room it occurred to me that this was normal for you. That you didn't feel the pain because you had felt it for so long that you didn't know any different. Even when my father cornered you that day, you didn't so much look afraid, but resigned. Like you'd expected it to come to this. I saw your eyes when you were tending to me. Confusion, like you didn't expect me to protect you. Then I realized you didn't.
"Your whole life leading up to that point no one cared for you or protected you."
He sighed shakily.
"I guess what I'm trying to say is that even when we were younger, you were a fighter. You never laid down and quit even when anyone else would have.
"No matter what happens or how this changes things, I will always be bu your side and we can get through anything."
I looked up at the love of my life; right into his eyes and saw my strength, my life, my future, my everything.
I reached across and cupped his face, leaning in to kiss him.