But he won’t let me. He won’t have anything to do with me. He doesn’t care, so I don’t see why I should.
I sink back, letting my anger enfold me again, willing everything else to disappear.
Sleep doesn’t come easily tonight. I toss and turn, cold sweat breaking out all over my body. When I finally succumb to an uneasy slumber, the nightmares takes over.
Only this time they’re different. The bloody hands are still there, but new scenes have been added to my nightly torment.
Cruel eyes gazing at me. A belt raised, over and over, brutalizing my flesh. Cold hands surrounding me like a blizzard. Coldness, everywhere.
And then the nightmares morphs into one I know by heart.
Beer on his breath, his face thick and covered in fur, his beady eyes glinting cruelly. He’s the Monster and he bends over me, giving me his nightly promise.You can’t escape. You have nowhere to go.You’re stuck with me.
Twenty-nine nights he said it. I counted. Twenty-nine.
The broken form of her, lying on the ground, her head cracked open, her eyes unseeing. Not my mama. Just a pile of dead cells, of slowly decomposing flesh.
The knife in his stomach.
The stain on the ceiling. The old, ripped-up book. Peter Pan.Oh, no, baby, he’s a man. All men are alike. They take what they want, and leave you lying in the dirt.
Peter Pan has disappeared, and the stain on the ceiling isn’t a bear anymore. Just a stain.
The Beast.
The nightmare always ends with him. The Beast.
At least it always used to. But that’s changed, too. Now, I hear a female voice.
Stop. Stop. Stop!
I sit up, my heart hammering in my chest, my body drenched with sweat.
The quiet woman’s voice. I know where I heard it before.
It was when I stole the perfume bottle. I never saw the person who called out to me. Who told me to stop. But it was the quiet woman. I’m sure of it.
She was there. She saw what really happened. She must have.
I don’t have the nanochip, I never did. They stripped me bare, they checked all my belongings. They know I don’t have it. But they don’t know I never did.
Only she does, because she saw the whole thing.
The nanochip was in the perfume package before, but it wasn’t when I took it. Someone else got to it first.
She witnessed it all, but she didn’t say one word to defend me.Why?
I massage my temples. I feel that I’ve got all the pieces, and if I were a bit smarter, they’d fall into place. I can taste the answer. But my brain feels slow, sluggish. I sigh, and although it’s only 4 a.m., I get up. I know I won’t be able to sleep anymore.
I head into the shower and let the hot water wake me up.
Afterward, I get dressed, careful to choose once more a dress with pockets, where I can conceal my only weapons: the knife and the key.
Then I grab the largest bag I can find and stuff it with a few outfits. The pink sparkly dress, although I can’t imagine it will be of any use to me. The heart locket. Some basic necessities and a few more dresses, though right now, I desperately wish I could find a pair of pants.
I have worse problems to worry about, though.
Problems such as somehow being involved in the disappearance of a nanochip that’s already left an entire family dead. And if they’re dead, I don’t even want to think about what will happen to me if I step out from under Damien’s protection.
