by Anne Jolin
I turn to Kyle. “Is it supposed to be over that quickly?” He’s not paying attention to me, still talking with his friends, so I ask again, louder this time over the music. “Is the fight supposed to be over that quickly?” I borderline shout into his ear.
“Jesus Christ, Betty!” he scolds, pulling his head away from mine. “You don’t need to fucking scream.” The whiskey on his breath is so strong that my nose scrunches up at the smell of it.
I hate the stupid nickname he gave me. Betty was always the weak one in the comic books, never going after what she wanted and letting everyone walk all over her—Archie included. Kyle knows, but he uses it just to spite me anyway.
“I was just asking,” I huff, crossing my arms over my chest and leaning back into my crappy folding chair.
“Why do you care anyway?” he says snidely. “You don’t know shit about fighting.”
I fight the instinct to roll my eyes since that will only piss him off further. I don’t know what his problem’s been lately. His temper has been escalating and he freaks out over even the smallest things. The line between my being his girlfriend versus a possession he owns is getting blurrier by the day.
I don’t bother answering him—not that it matters anyway because his attention is already diverted back to his trust-fund buddies.
We stay for nearly an hour after that. I have the creepy-crawlies from the constant flow of perverted eyes taking their fill of my bare legs. I’ve never wished I were wearing a turtleneck and sweatpants so badly in my entire life, which is saying a lot for someone as fashion forward as I am.
The group of entitled assholes that Kyle calls his friends have been getting rowdier. Each of them, my boyfriend included, is drunk on scotch and high on violence from having watched the fight. I imagine that they all believe they are invincible. A bunch of power-hungry jackasses who think they are the next Rocky Balboa. I swear Kyle’s never as bad as he is when we are with them.
He drapes his arm over my shoulders, tucking the arm candy that belongs to him against his side. “Well, boys, it’s time I take this stunner home to bed.”
I ignore the slough of obnoxious comments coming from their mouths and put on my debutant smile. I’m far from a debutant. We don’t even have them in Canada, I don’t think, but nonetheless, it’s a persona I’ve become all too familiar with.
“Always a pleasure, gentlemen,” I coo sarcastically. One of them winks at me, and Kyle growls. “Come on. Let’s go,” I tell him, running my palm over the dress shirt on his chest.
He nods curtly and begins dragging me through the crowd. The only way out is the same way we came in—through the nasty, stench-ridden hallway. When we reach the end, the hulking bouncer with head-crushing biceps lets us out before firmly closing the door upon our exit. I’m flattening the seams of my dress from sitting for so long when I feel fingers snake around my bicep.
“What the fuck was that?!” Kyle hisses into my ear as he locks his grip around my arm.
I wince at the rough hold. It’s the same arm as earlier tonight and I think it’s already starting to bruise. “What the hell are you talking about?” I snap. “You’re hurting me again. Let go!” I yank my arm, but his hold is like a vise on my thin arm.
“Don’t play dumb. I saw you,” he grits out between clenched teeth.
“I don’t have a single fucking clue what you’re going on about,” I quip out, standing on my toes to look into his eyes.
“You wanted him!” he scolds. “I saw you flirting with him. Begging him to touch you with your eyes.”
My thoughts drift to the man in the ring in a panic. I didn’t think Kyle was watching.
“Did you really think I’d miss him winking at you?” He demands.
“Kyle, I—” I stammer before he interrupts me.
“Do you want to fuck my friends?” I blink in confusion. “’It’s always a pleasure, gentlemen.’” he says, mimicking my earlier farewell.
He’s talking about Brandon, the little brat who winked at me when we were leaving. Seriously?
I take the arm he isn’t holding and stroke the side of his face. “Handsome, you’re drunk. I don’t want anyone else. Just you,” I coo.
Then he closes his eyes tight. I think he’s calmed down when he rips his eyes open again, slamming me into the brick wall behind us.
“Are you saying I’m a fucking liar? I know what I saw!” He shakes my body again and my head smashes into the wall. My visions starting to blur and a tear slides down my cheek. “You’re mine, doll. No one loves you like I love you.”
I’m terrified. It’s not the first time I’ve been scared of him, but tonight’s the first time he’s ever physically hurt me.
“Don’t touch me!” I hiss, smacking his hand out of the way as he tries to cup the side of my face.
The anger in his eyes flares again as he grips me around the throat. “How many times to we have to go over this?” he shouts.
I claw at the hand around my neck. The alley is empty and there’s not a single person around to help me. The grip he has on my throat tightens and the edges of my already blurry vision are turning black. I can’t breathe. I’m running out of time.
I move my hands to grab his shoulders, something I learned in a self-defense class I took with Hannah, and hold on tight. I use every bit of strength and leverage I have, connecting my knee with his groin.
“Fuck!” he groans, releasing me to cradle his wounded testicles.
I waste no time slipping out from my trapped position on the wall and try to run. The heel of my shoe catches in a crack on the concrete and I stumble, slowing down as I try to catch my balance. When I try to bolt again, I’m brutally yanked back by my blond hair.
“You’re not going anywhere, Betty,” he says, his voice higher than normal from the damage I managed to inflict. “You’re mine.” He drags me backwards until I slam into a dumpster. “Forever.”
“No!” I spit into his face.
I reach up, trying to press my thumbs into his eyes, another self-defense move. One I never thought I’d be using on someone I called my boyfriend. He curses as I succeed in starting to gouge one eye. I have tunnel vision on freeing myself so much that I don’t notice him rear back his right fist. My vision goes entirely black as he punches me in the eye. I’d have fallen to the ground if he hadn’t resumed his hold on my throat again. The fight is draining from my body the longer I’m deprived of oxygen.
He shakes me, my body moving limply like a rag doll. “I love you so much, Betty. Why can’t you see that? Why can’t you only want me?” he whispers at me, his voice eerily calm. “You’re mine.”
He’s psychotic. I’m going to die in a back alley because I was manipulated into loving a psychopath.
“I’ll never share you.” He hisses. “Not with—”
His voice is cut off and the hand around my throat brutally ripped away, nails catching on my skin as it is removed against its will. My body sinks to the disgusting alley floor, sucking in the putrid stench of pee. I don’t care though because at least I can breathe.
My right eye is swelling shut, but I force the left open. My vision is still blurry, but I can see two men struggling. The dark-haired man hits Kyle so hard in the face that he drops to the ground. He’s not moving.
I’m slipping in and out of consciousness when I feel strong arms lift me. I’m being carried, and it’s out of sheer will that I open my left eye. I gasp at the sight of the man holding me. He’s so beautiful, my dark savior, and terrifying all the same. Despite that, the feeling that overwhelms me most is safety. I feel incredibly safe with him. The Cinderella Man saved me.
We reach a black car. From what I can tell, it’s an old Charger, a muscle car. He rests me on his knee as he yanks the door open before softly laying me down in the back seat. I try to say something, but he hushes me.
“Shhh, babe. I don’t know what’s broken. I don’t want you to move, okay?” he asks. I nod. “Good girl. You’ll be okay. I promise.”
/>
I feel the car shake as he slams the door and then dip again as he slides into the front seat. Then the ignition rolls over and the car roars to life. I continue to drift in and out of consciousness again, my vision going black without notice. When I feel a rough hand slip into mine, I open my eye to see beautiful, grey eyes looking at me.
“We’re almost there. Try to stay awake, okay, babe?” He sounds so concerned.
I try to smile at him, to tell him that I’m okay, but I lose reality again, only seeing the stoplight in front of us turn green before I do.
I’m floating again—at least I think I am. I can hear beeping and faraway voices as I’m laid down onto something soft. I blink my eye open but quickly close it when it’s met by strong florescent lights. I wait a few seconds before trying again. There are nurses hovering around me, and I see him talking to them. As he turns to go, I grab his hand.
“Please,” I whisper hoarsely.
He leans down, brushing the hair from my face. “I’m not going anywhere, Beth.” He softly kisses my forehead. “Your family will be here soon, okay?”
I nod. I’m not sure how he knows who I am. He must have picked up my clutch before he brought me here.
Something sharp sticks me in my arm before my body starts to numb. It feels amazing. The last thing I see before I go again is my dark savior’s handsome face.
When I wake up hours later, surrounded by loved ones, he is gone. If the nurses hadn’t seen him, I’d have felt as though I dreamt the entire thing. He didn’t leave a name. Only the paperwork detailing an in-progress restraining order was left on my bedside table.
Cinderella disappeared into the city night, and I owe him my life.
1 Month Later
“SO WHAT EXACTLY are you going to do there?” Lennon asks from her perch on the couch.
“Are you going to get to go to court?” Hannah, my little sister, says brightly while eyeing my bottle of Budweiser. She’s pregnant, so looking at beer is as close as it gets for her these days, and she couldn’t be happier about it.
I raise a blond eyebrow at her. “Han.” I raise the beer to my face so she’ll look at me.
“Yeah?” she says, her green eyes locking on mine.
“I know there’s that whole”—I make bunny ear quotations with my fingers—“’pregnancy brain’ thing, but you have to remember that I have never, at any point in my life, gone to law school,” I tease her.
Hannah glares at me, tossing a pillow at my head. “Smartass.”
“Takes one to know one, butthead,” I quip back, dodging the flying couch missile.
Lennon starts to laugh. “You’re both a bunch of buttheads.” She smirks, taking a pull from her bottle before setting it down on the coffee table.
“I missed this,” Hannah says softly from beside me.
I instantly feel a pang of guilt at my absence. During my six months under Kyle’s thumb, I pulled away from the girls and my family. They all saw the monster he is long before I did. I was blinded by what I’d thought was love. Looking back now, I can see that it wasn’t love, more an infatuation of sorts. He was charming and exquisite, and for a long time, when I was with him, he made me feel like I was his world. He was my Prince Charming. Well, until he turned into the villain instead.
“I know. I’m sorry,” I sigh, looking down into my lap. Then I feel the couch beside me dip and a round belly press into my side.
“Don’t be sorry, Beth. You’re back now,” my sister says, resting her auburn head of hair on my shoulder.
“We’re just glad you’re okay,” Lennon says, dropping down on my other side.
The tears in my eyes start to pool and I blink them back. My time with Kyle made me weak and dependent—two things I’d never been in my entire life—and I hate thinking that I allowed myself to become that way. He might have only hit me that one time, but that was one time too many in my book.
“I am,” I say, looking at Lennon, resting my head on top of my sister’s. “I am okay now.”
And I am okay—for the most part, anyway. I suffered a concussion from when Kyle bashed my head into the brick wall and a few stiches, but other than that, it was mostly an array of cuts and bruises. It took me almost a week before I could look at myself in the mirror, and even then, it was an atrocious sight. The punch I’d taken to the face had left me with a massive shiner that had descended down onto my cheek, but the bruises on my neck were the worst to look at. I could distinctly see the marks of his large hand around my neck and the scratches from where his fingernails had ripped through my flesh when he’d been pulled off me. The way I looked naked for those few weeks of healing made me feel sick. My boyfriend had done this to me.
I shudder at the memory, but I am jolted into reality as the front door opens.
“Hey, you guys,” Peyton says softly, dropping her purse on the kitchen island before coming to sit down across from us.
Hannah snickers and I swat her on the head, knowing exactly what she’s thinking.
“What was that for?” she scolds, sitting up.
“Oh please.” I roll my eyes at her. “Like you weren’t giggling at The Goonies reference.” When she feigns innocence, I decide to drop my voice as low as I can before repeating, “’Hey, you guys!’” in the voice of Sloth from the movie.
My sister’s large belly shakes as she laughs, and the somber mood lifts from the room.
“How was work, Pey?” I ask my roommate. I originally used to share the condo with Hannah and Lennon, but they’ve both since moved in with their guys. If it weren’t for Peyton, I’d be living here alone.
“It was okay,” she answers quietly. Everything Peyton does is quiet.
She’s been a godsend these last few weeks since the assault. She always knows exactly what to say and she seems to understand how I feel. I imagine it has something to do with her nightmares, the ones I didn’t know she has until recently. I was gone so often at night to see Kyle that I must have missed them before. I’ve tried asking her about it a few times, but she always seemed to evade my questions. We’ve taken longer to bond than she did with Lennon and Hannah—somewhat a combination of my being gone all the time and her thinking I had a sexual relationship with Jayden.
“Are you excited for tomorrow?” Peyton questions, pulling her caramel hair out of its chiffon bun.
“Yeah, butthead.” Lennon punches me playfully in the arm. “You never finished telling us about your debut in court.”
I roll my eyes at her.
Tomorrow is my first day of work. I lost my job a few months prior but never got a new one. Kyle liked that I spent my free time with him instead and bought me more things than I could have ever dreamed of having on my own salary. I was too caught up in our whirlwind romance to pick up on the red flags—the distancing of me from my loved ones and the cutting off of my independence.
“I thought it was an assistant position?” Peyton says, confused.
“It is. Ignore John over there.” I nod towards Lennon. “She’s talking out of her ass,” I quip, tossing the use of her nickname out in playful retaliation. Everyone likes to tease Lennon about being named after The Beatles superstar.
She glares at me before winking. “Touché.”
“Get on with it already!” Hannah groans, pressing her hand on her lower back. “Before I have to pee again, will you.”
It’s only August and she isn’t due until October, but my little sister is carrying a massive beach ball.
“I’ll be the executive assistant to a partner at the firm,” I tell them. “It was the best I could find.”
I have a degree in business, but despite a thorough search, I couldn’t find anywhere that was hiring right now. This was the only decent job I was able to find, and even then, I didn’t find it alone. Our cousin, Wyatt, is a photographer in the city. He shot the photos of the firm’s new office space and mentioned that they were hiring. Was I overqualified to be an assistant? Probably. But it pays well and has benefits, and if I am
lucky, I hope I’ll be able to find something else soon.
“Forgive my ignorance,” Peyton says, “but what does an executive assistant do?”
I smile at her, kicking my feet up on the coffee table. “Your guess is as good as mine.”
“You really don’t know what you’re going to be doing there?” Hannah asks, horrified.
I finish off my beer before answering her. “Well, I have a rough idea. I mean, I Googled it and everything,” I tease, earning another scowl from my sister. Pregnancy is making her emotions run haywire. Poor Greyson. “I’ll be answering phones, managing the partner’s calendar and appointments, get coffee… I don’t know. Something like that.”
“So basically you’re the partner’s bitch?” Lennon snickers.
“Pretty much,” I laugh.
Standing up to get another beer from the fridge, I hear my phone buzz on the coffee table. The mood goes somber again as I bend forward, flipping it over to see the screen.
“Is it…?” Hannah asks.
“Yeah,” I say, shoving the offending device into the pocket of my jeans. “Does anyone else want another beer?” I try to avoid the looks they’re tossing around. Deflection has always been easy for me.
“Sure,” Lennon says.
“I’m good,” Peyton replies, her eyes seeing right through me.
I walk over to the fridge and hear someone slide up beside me. “What did he say, Beth?” Hannah asks me.
I sigh, leaning against the open refrigerator door. “Nothing new.”
“Show me.” She holds out her palm.
I pull out my iPhone and drop it into her outstretched hand. “It’s an unknown number, but it’s him.” I shake my head, yanking two bottles out of the fridge and then slamming the door.
“Ugh!” Hannah slaps the phone onto the kitchen counter. “I can’t believe he’s walking around,” she hisses, pinching the bridge of her nose.
I pop the tops off the beer bottles. “Please don’t stress yourself out over it, Hannah. It can’t be good for the baby,” I tell her, rubbing my hand on her massive belly. “I wouldn’t want to upset my little niece or nephew.”
