Fear, loss, anxiety, anger.
I’ve settled on the last. Why the fuck does this keep happening to me? Why can’t they let me be? I never asked for a thing. I just want to be with Quill. That’s all I want. Why can’t I just be happy?
I don’t give a fuck about the mafia. I’m not a threat. I don’t want to rule anything, so who cares if technically I’m a Moretti descendant? I certainly didn’t ask to be one.
And yet, I’m in the center of an absolute clusterfuck, hunted by the men who forced my mother into marriage with her rapist, while also being hunted by their enemies, who want me dead, and not even able to trust my stepfather’s best friend, because he sees me as a threat too.
Goddamnit, I want to die.
I guess that’s what’s about to happen anyway. Though this time, I have a ring on my finger, and the certitude that Quill loves me.
The reason I’m scared this time is different from the last. I can’t imagine the old Quill letting me get taken like this. The old Quill was invincible. The only reason I was taken before was because of my own stupidity. Because I allowed myself to believe two people I had no business believing, and ran away.
This time, I was taken right from under his nose.
The old Quill would have whipped out his gun and killed the soldiers before they could take me. The new Quill just watched, helplessly. I saw enough, before that handkerchief, imbued with chloroform or something, was clamped down on my face, to know that he stood there, frozen, as I was taken.
Has he grown soft?
I hate myself for even letting my brain form those words. I used to fear his bloodthirsty nature. I used to hope that his vengeful harshness would soften. That he would give in to love and let the rest go. And now he has, and I resent him for it.
I’m sure he’s feeling guilty enough for the both of us. I hate how anger twists in my stomach, anger at him, for allowing this thing to happen. For allowing our perfect happiness to be cut short. I’m going to die, just when I started feeling more alive than ever.
This time, it feels certain. Because Quill is soft, and if Logan didn’t send that message, it means he’s still off searching for Seraphina. Searching for his best friend’s girl, because that matters a lot more than his own stepdaughter.
More resentment. More anger. Not directed at my kidnappers, but at the people who care about me. I’m all kinds of fucked up.
I sink my head into my knees, which I’ve succeeded in folding up to my chest, feeling pretty fucking hopeless.
After a while, that hopelessness is tempered by something else. Something purely physical. We’ve been in this van for what feels like hours, and it probably has been a long time, since I spent the first part of the trip unconscious. An uncomfortable sensation in my bladder deepens with every minute, and by the time the van rounds a sudden, sharp corner, making me topple over onto my side, it’s become undeniable: I really fucking need to pee.
What the hell am I supposed to do? If they don’t stop soon, I’m going to piss myself. Maybe that wouldn’t be such a bad idea. Maybe that would keep them from raping me. I shudder at thethought of what could await me. Or maybe it wouldn’t stop the rape, it would just make it all the more humiliating.
I shudder harder. Regardless of whether peeing my pants could save me from the fate that terrifies me, I just can’t bring myself to do it. I’m definitely going to die of a ruptured bladder before they even have time to shoot me. I groan with every bump of the road, my belly throbbing.
This definitely never happened to Nancy Drew. I don’t think she ever faced the bad guys while also facing nature’s needs.
Fuck. Me.
Self-preservation has been making me keep as quiet as possible, though I know all it can possibly do is delay my fate, not prevent it. But desperation now pushes me to bang on the wall behind me with my head. I can’t move, my limbs are firmly zip-tied so there’s not even a chance of finding some random sharp object to cut through them—I guess they’ve learned from their past mistakes—and I’m gagged, so the only way I can get their attention is to bang my head.
And fuck, it hurts. But I keep doing it, until at last the van pulls over, and I breathe in relief.
Then dread, when the backdoors open and light floods in. But my pressing urge takes precedence over all the rest.
A man I haven’t seen before is standing there, with long black hair, a thick, equally black moustache, and eyes that glint at me furiously.
Then his mouth twists up in a cruel smirk. “Well, well, well. Aurora Moretti.”
Two of the soldiers who took me, still bemasked, step up behind him, blotting out the sky behind him. Just a few triangles of light allow me to look upon his face.
“I’ve been waiting a long time to meet you,” declares the man. “Or rather, to see you again. The last time I laid eyes on you, you were a four-year-old toddler with an attitude.”
Okay, I don’t care. Just let me pee, please.
“I was one of the first ones to hold you when you were born. Did you know that? Moretti’s loyal and trusted righthand man. The underboss. But my anger runs deep. He’d fucked me over once too many times. I remember giving you your first bottle, as you lay helplessly in my arms, and making myself a promise. I’d be the one to kill you.”
I swallow nervously, my pressing urge momentarily forgotten, because what the fuck.
