AS I WALKED down the hallway to rejoin my best friend and my husband, I suddenly felt nauseous, sweaty, and very unsure of what to do next. I wouldn’t say or do anything here, or maybe I should, because he wouldn’t dare put his hands on me in front of all these people, and if he did, well I’m pretty sure Luther would pound him to a bloody pulp. I don’t want that either, so I’ll wait until the time is right, but I need to tell Trish what’s going on. What happened.
“Hey there. Where the hell have you been? I’ve had to sit here and drink more tequila without you since you disappeared on me!” she yells a little too loudly and then bursts out laughing. “Excuse me waitress can we get a couple more shots of tequila here please?” she shouts to a passing waitress who is now looking at her as if she is crazy.
“No, I’m sorry I think we are good here, she looks like she’s had quite enough. If she has anymore I’m afraid, she’ll start stripping on the table.” I give her an apologetic smile and she continues with her work and I focus my attention on my drunk friend. “Hey girl, I think it’s time to call it a night, where’s Gino?”
“Awe but why? I’m having fun! Don’t be a party pooper, Laney.” She whined and then scrunched her face sticking her tongue out at me like a fifteen-year-old child. Yep, it’s time to go.
“I’m not being a party pooper Trish, it’s late, and you, my friend, have had plenty of tequila tonight for the both of us.” Giggling a little, I put my arm around her. “As killer as your body is, I don’t really want to see it in all its glory on this table tonight in front of all these people, so before you do something you may or may not regret, let’s call it a night okay? Besides we have a hot girls date tomorrow remember? I don’t want you all hung over.”
Trish looked at me smiling now instead of fake frowning, “Okay you win, but only because we have a hot girly date tomorrow, but you have to promise you will go wherever I say without argument. We never hang out anymore and I miss you. I can’t wait to have you all to myself for a whole week!” I couldn’t help but laugh.
Trish couldn’t be more right. Gino leaves bright and early on a business trip, giving me a full, uninterrupted week to hang out and catch up with my best friend, just like old times and I couldn’t wait. I also hoped Luther wouldn’t wait to call.
“Deal! We can wherever you want. Girls day out. Now let’s get you your coat and get you an Uber. Hey, have you seen Gino? I haven’t really seen him most of the night.”
“This again?” she grumbled. “I don’t like talking to him, but no I haven’t seen him. I have no idea where he is.”
Her words from earlier about him in the coat check with another woman come back to mind, but I could care less now seeing I was doing the very same thing, which I was going to tell Trish about but now it’s going to have to wait until tomorrow.
After I saw Trish to her Uber car, I went looking for Gino, but I didn’t have to go far. When I walked back through the doors he was standing by the coat check, and the moment I saw him I felt this nervous sick feeling climb its way up my throat.
I started to sweat, and my hands started to shake. He was standing there rigidly straight, hands in his pockets, and my shawl already draped through his arm. I could see his jaw ticking from the other side of the room. He was mad, but why?
With no time to think about anything, I put my anxious feelings aside and pushed through it. I did my job, sliding my mask back into place, plastering a sickly-sweet smile on my face, and continued moving toward him.
“Hey stranger, I feel like I haven’t seen you all night.” I think I’m over playing this, being too sweet, oh god I think I’m gonna be sick. Shit I’m freaking out. I’m rambling to myself.
“I haven’t been far,” he replies cold as ice, and my skin is crawling. “You about ready to go now that your whore of a friend is gone?” My smile faltering briefly at his choice in language about my friend.
Smile right back in place, “I’m just going to pretend you didn’t say that, and yes, I’m ready to go, I’m beat. I would love nothing more than to go home, take a hot bath, and climb into bed.”
“Sure you don’t need to go visit the ladies’ room, before we go?” A cold chill ran through my body.
“No, I’m good, let’s go.” Still brightly smiling on the outside, but secretly afraid on the inside.
“Good, now I can have my wife to myself.” Sarcasm dripping from his tongue like venom. He walked past me, without another word.
With his back towards me now, the smile I was holding up vanished. A feeling of dread flooded my body, and my feet felt like a million pounds as we walked to the car.
He knows.
He said he wasn’t far.
He was watching me.
All night.
The car ride home was awkwardly silent. We don’t ever really talk all that much but it’s never usually that quiet and the tension in the air was so think it was suffocating. You could cut it with a knife, and I was truly terrified as to what was going to unravel the second we walked in the front door.
I stared out the darkened window, flashbacks of other nights that ended in broken bones, black eyes, sprained wrists clouding my vision. The nauseous feeling intensifying the closer we got to the house. I could feel the beads of sweat forming on my forehead, and my fingers wouldn’t stay still in my lap. Fighting to keep my shit together and showing no emotion even though I felt like I was about to come unglued at any second.
When we finally made it home and were behind closed doors the blood in my veins turned to ice and my skin crawled the minute he pawed my ass.
“I can’t wait to see those black lace panties you wore that I like.” Stopping me in my tracks.
Halfway up the stairs I took a deep breath to calm my raging nerves before turning to look at him.
“I’m gonna take a nice hot bath first if that’s okay.” I replied, managing a small smile.
“I’ll join you.” His eyes still shooting daggers, with his cocky smirk. He wasn’t asking.
“Sure,” was all I could say, turning, making my way to our bathroom.
I could hear him following behind me, feeling his cold beady eyes all over me.
Oh god what am I going to do?
My shaky legs only got worse with each step I took toward the bathroom.
This is it.
He knows I put those on, and when he goes to look for them they won’t be there, because they are now in the ladies’ room garbage after Luther ripped them off.
I hit the doorway and froze when Gino’s hand slithered over my shoulder.
“Something wrong…Laney?” he growled with his rough voice in my ear. The emphasis on wrong. “You seem tense.” He was so close I could smell the Walker on his breath and it made my stomach churn.
I didn’t bother to look at him, instead I continued, tossing my things on the bed, before making it to our en suite bathroom to run my bath water. The bath that may very well be my last.
Leaning over the tub I turn to him, “Not at all, why would anything be wrong?” I actually managed to give him a small reassuring smile. Focusing my attention back to the faucet I continued, “I’m just tired and can’t wait to soak my bones.”
Then I felt it. His icy hand slowly sliding up my leg from my ankle, under my dress. My back to his front, startling me, I couldn’t help my body’s reaction to him. I could normally contain the impulsive jerking my body feels the need to do every other time he touches me but not tonight. Tonight, my guard is down, and I feel tremendously vulnerable and open.
Exposed.
Maybe he didn’t notice.
I’m praying he didn’t.
He’s going to be furious.
“Why? You give ’em a hard workout today?” His voice growing darker each time he speaks.
His hand continued its journey toward my sweet spot in search of something specific. I stood up straight in an attempt to slow down the inevitable, my back still to his front, but to no avail.
“Don’t be silly.” A nervous giggle making its way out, “You know I didn’t go anywhere today except for the reunion with you. It was probably just all that dancing.”
The higher his hand got the more anxious I became.
I’m so cold, but I’m sweating.
Can he feel me shivering?
Shivering from fear.
Terror coursed through my veins at lightning speed.
“Right. The dancing.” His voice was tight with sarcasm.
I think I’m going to vomit.
My fingers and toes numb.
My breathing accelerates.
I’m going to faint.
His hand is an inch away from its destination, has my brain racing for an excuse.
“Hmmmm… just how daddy likes it.” His hand reaches between my legs, his fingers gliding over the clean-shaven landing strip. “But tell me, did you lose your panties with all that dancing too?” I gasped.
To anyone else his voice would have sounded calm and controlled, but I know different. I know him, and the tone of his voice left my stomach falling to my feet, and the tears ready to fall. I was holding my breath searching, racking my brain for an answer to give him, but there isn’t one. He knows and there’s nothing I can say. I don’t know what’s coming next, but my answer was very simple.
“No.” My answer coming out barely audible. My insides trembling with terror.
A split second after my answer fell from my lips my nightmare started.
His hand quickly withdrew from between my legs, only to forcefully grab a fist full of my hair, yanking my head back with such brute force, his lips were just barely touching my ear. My wincing cry echoed through the small room.
My neck felt like it was going to snap like a twig, under his force. The hot tears rolling down my cheeks hoping he will have mercy on me, but the horrible feeling in my bones tells me that’s false hope.
“Gino,” a pleading cry, but it was useless.
“Then how did these,” and he dangled my torn panties a breath away from my nose, “get in the garbage, YOU FUCKING WHORE?!” His saliva on my face, from him spitting those last words at me, burning my flesh like acid. His extremely lethal voice was my only warning before he reared his hand back even more, taking my head with it, his grip on my hair tighter than I ever thought possible, I thought my scalp was going to separate from my skull. All the while my pleading cries turned into begging screams of terror for him to stop.
It did nothing to stop what was about to come next.
Before I knew it, my head was flying in a downward forward motion, as he bashed my face full force with all his might into the metal faucet.
Crack….
In that moment my face made contact with the faucet, the earth shattered under my feet. Everything went eerily silent. The only sound being from hearing my own bones break under such force. My knees buckled on impact, leaving me partially slumped over the tub, with my hair still in his murderous grasp, afraid for my life.
Everything happened in a blink of the eye, and before I even had time to process what was happening, I heard him bellow again. To me it sounded muffled and a million miles away through the fog of searing pain, from my head being yanked back, yet again, with such vigor. “YOU’RE MY WHORE!”
Crack….
Again, the only sound being more of my bones breaking when he smashed my face into the faucet for the second time. He is going to kill me this time. I won’t make it out of this bathroom alive.
I know I should be screaming, but I’m not, or at least I don’t think I am.
Shock.
Numb.
Shock.
My face drenched with my own blood.
Shock.
I need to get out of here. Need to run, but I can’t feel my legs.
Shock.
There’s a loud ringing in my ears.
Shock.
Blind. I’m blind, I can’t see.
Shock.
Panic. Terror, but I can’t get up, can’t move. Why?
Shock.
I’m supposed to have a fight or flight reflex. Where is my fight or flight? I should have a fight or flight. I don’t understand.
Shock.
I’m dead. I’m dead and that’s why I don’t have a fight or flight. I’m dead, that’s why I can’t get up. I’m dead, that’s why I can’t move.
I know I’m not dead when I feel him get on his knees behind me, and his sleazy body pressing on my back. His vial words in my ear, while he hovered over his prey, jump-started that fight or flight instantly, but as hard as I try my body just won’t move. I’m completely defenseless.
“You are my whore to do, what I want with, when I want, and how I want. Understood?” He seethed in my ear.
In my head I screamed no, repeatedly, but a small gargled groan is the only sound that would come out in response.
“And you better remember that,” he growled out before leaning back, forcing my dress up so that everything from my waist down was fully exposed to him.
NO! NO! NO! I screamed again…but again, it was just in my head. It still wouldn’t come out as words, but I started to feel my fingers and toes coming to life. As if they had been resting to prepare for the biggest fight of their life, and now was the time for them to come to the front line.
My arms and legs now slowly on the move, I tried to push my body up off the side of the tub, but they were still too weak and buckled under my weight. Frustrated and terrified I had to do something, so I kept trying as hard as I could to yell, scream, kick, anything to try and get him to stop what he was about to do.
They were weak movements, and didn’t faze him at all, but I could make noise. My face was horribly swollen, I couldn’t see, and I could barely move my jaw, but I could make noise. So I did. Over and over. They were loud gargled, painful, pleading noises. Part cry, part scream, part groan. They only got louder and wilder, with each passing second.
“Don’t worry my little whore, lover boy won’t want you anymore, anyway, by the time I’m done with you, and that’s a promise.”
Panic shot through my system, that good old fight or flight, evident in my actions as I tried desperately to get away from the monster, when I heard the jingle of his belt coming undone and he unzipping his pants.
This time when I opened my mouth to scream NO it came flying out in all its glory.
“NO, NO, NO …Gino…please… no…no…please.” Pleading for my life, tears mixed with blood streaming down my mangled face, frantically trying to swing my arms and legs, but he had me pinned on my knees between him and the tub. I was trapped. There was nowhere to go. No way out. No matter how hard I tried, I wasn’t making it out. No matter how hard I tried to kick. No matter how hard I tried to swing, or how loud I begged and pleaded, he just overpowered me.
“No one will,” he said with an evil chuckle.
The nail in the coffin was the moment I felt him rub his dick roughly through my lips, and he buried the head of his dick at my entrance, while his other hand had a bruising grip on my hip holding me firmly in place. Ensuring I wasn’t going anywhere.
Hysterically begging, pleading, screaming, and crying.
“Gino… Gino no…please…please…no…don’t… You don’t have to do this… please… I won’t do it again… I promise…please…please don’t… Please stop, PLEASE!!!!” I screamed through my sobs, frantically trying to wiggle my body free from his hold, like a person on fire.
“Ever!” he thundered and
SLAM
“AAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH…” The loudest blood-curdling scream ripped through my body filling the room as he slammed himself deep inside of me like a freight train, shredding my insides as he went. “AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHH…” I screamed out in horror as he forced himself into my entrance with brutal force over and over again. My insides were on fire, as he ripped his dick through. I was burning from the inside out and could feel something warm and wet drip down my thighs.
He continued to reign his onslaught of terror down on me repeatedly, for God knows how long, until he was done with me. The pain so severe, my screams were caught in my throat, strangling the life out of me.
Defeated, my body went limp.
Numb.
Shock.
I laid there draped over the side on the tub completely limp, no sign of life emanating from me at all. I’m sure, if someone were to walk in, they would think I was dead.
All sound leaving again, but I’m numb, so numb, and tired.
I give up. I have no more fight left in me. He has shattered me beyond repair. I can feel myself slowly slipping away, the life fading out of my body little by little.
I’m dying. I don’t want to die yet, but I am.
So cold
I can’t hold on anymore.
It wasn’t supposed to end like this.
Slipping further into the darkness.
A vision of Luther’s handsome smiling face, that beautiful sea of green, a bright vision in my mind, eerily comforting me, like being wrapped in the arms of an angel, before succumbing to the blackness that was adamantly pulling me under.
Now I can be at peace.
Until we meet again.
To be continued…