Saving Avery
ANGELA SNYDER
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
Copyright © 2015 Angela Snyder
Cover art by Paper & Sage Design http://paperandsage.com/
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ISBN: 1507677553
ISBN-13: 978-1507677551
DEDICATION
Sometimes in life we are lucky enough to meet someone who influences us so greatly that it helps to shape our talents and the person we ultimately become.
Saving Avery is dedicated to my former English teachers who helped to shape and mold me into the writer I am today. Without your encouragement, praise and feedback, this book would not exist.
G.F.M.
L.G.
M.H.
You were so much more to me than a teacher. You were a friend, a mentor and even a confidant. You made me strive to be a better writer. You encouraged me years ago and still continue to do so today.
You listened. You cared.
Thank you.
SAVING AVERY
by Angela Snyder
Avery Mason had it all: the nice house, the fancy clothes, the expensive cars and the perfect husband. On the outside looking in, her life appears to be perfect. But inside, Avery knows her life is far from perfection as her husband's carefully constructed façade slowly starts to crumble.
Forced to fake a happy marriage while enduring physical and mental abuse from the man who had once been her whole world is taking its toll. And ever so slowly, Avery finds herself slipping into an existence where she is gradually becoming a shell of her former self.
When Dr. Max Harrison transfers from Chicago to North Carolina, his world is flipped upside down the moment he sees Avery. With one glimpse into her blue-gray eyes, he can see the pain she is so desperately hiding from the rest of the world. As Avery attempts to push him away, he becomes convinced that there is more to her than meets the eye. And when he finally uncovers her darkest secret, the pieces of the puzzle slowly start to click into place.
Max and Avery want to be together, but nothing in life is ever that simple. It's not going to be easy to get her away from the powerful Mason family, but Max will risk everything to protect her. His only concern is Saving Avery.
AUTHOR'S NOTE
Saving Avery is a work of fiction; but, unfortunately, domestic violence is very real. If you or someone you know is suffering at the hands of another, please get help.
You are not alone.
Due to strong language and sexual content, this book is not intended for readers under the age of 18 and not intended for people with any triggers.
PROLOGUE
AVERY
I think the biggest mistake of my life could be chalked up to naiveté. I was barely eighteen when I had first laid eyes on Nathan Mason. He had all the qualities that a girl my age should have wanted for a future husband. He was rich, handsome and perfectly charming. And on the night we met, his piercing blue eyes captured me in a way that threatened to keep me there forever, never letting me go. If only I had known back then how true that would ultimately become.
As I sit on the patio overlooking the ocean, I think to myself how perfect my life must appear to an outsider. I'm twenty-three years old. I have a handsome husband, who is one of the country's top plastic surgeons. I have an enormous house on private beachfront property, an array of expensive cars at my disposal, all the designer clothes a girl could ever wish for and more money than I could ever spend in my lifetime. I have the kind of life women dream about. I have the kind of life that women envy.
Anyone on the outside looking in would say I have the perfect life.
But they couldn't be more wrong.
*
FIVE YEARS AGO
AVERY
My father was hosting my high school graduation party at our estate. He always threw the most lavish affairs, so my party was no exception. The house and grounds were large enough to accommodate quite a crowd of guests, and so my father invited as many people as he could. Being that he was the mayor of our city, most of the attendees were his colleagues and people I had never met before and, quite frankly, didn't care to meet.
However, I had promised my father that I would make an appearance and at least try to pretend to be enjoying myself. Little did he know that I was planning to secretly ditch early to join my classmates at Becky Weston's party. All of my friends would be at her house, and it was one of the last hurrahs before everyone started to move away for the upcoming college fall semester.
I had been accepted to several colleges, but ultimately decided to take a year off to travel Europe, much to my father's dismay. He fought me tooth and nail at first about my plans for foreign travel, but eventually I wore him down. He told me I was as bullheaded as my mother and that he never won an argument with her either. Having lost my mother at the tender age of eight, I always loved when he told me how much I reminded him of her, even if it was about our similar temperament that he seemed to disagree with.
After getting sucked into a twenty-minute conversation about economic woes with a group of older men, I was desperate to leave and join my friends. My cell phone vibrated in my hand, alerting me via text that my best friend, Samantha, had just arrived at Becky's party. Sam would be leaving for UCLA on the other side of the country soon, and so I wanted to party it up with my best friend as much as I could up until that time. We have been inseparable for almost our entire lives, and I was going to miss her like crazy.
My eyes quickly scoured the crowd and eventually settled upon my father. He was engaged with a few of his colleagues in a cloud of cigar smoke, so I figured my chance to escape had finally arrived. I sent a quick text to Sam to let her know I was leaving. As I made my way to the front door, it suddenly opened before I could reach for the knob. A group of three people stood on the other side under the yellow haze of the porch lights. I recognized Mr. and Mrs. Mason right away. They were long-time family friends, and I had met them on numerous occasions. Mr. Mason was the chief of police, and Mrs. Mason was a lawyer. Together, the Masons were a power couple at the highest rung on the social ladder. Rumor was that they controlled the entire city, including everyone who lived in it. If they wanted something taken care of, then it would be. They were the it couple, the couple everyone wanted to be and the couple everyone adored. My father was one of their closest friends, and he undoubtedly considered himself very fortunate about that fact.
"Avery," Mr. Mason said with a smile. "Congratulations."
"Thank you, Mr. Mason."
"Your father told us you're forgoing college and instead going to travel Europe. How exciting," Mrs. Mason said with a smile, but it didn't touch her eyes. I thought she was being sarcastic, but the woman was the queen of masking her true intent. She stepped aside and motioned to the figure in the shadows behind her. "I don't believe you've had the pleasure of meeting our son. Avery, this is Nathan."
Before that night I had only heard of Nathan Mason. In fact, I had heard so much about
him, I felt like I already knew him. I knew that he had graduated high school two years earlier than his peers and then from medical school at the top of his class. I also knew that he had finished his residency under the wing of one of the best plastic surgeons in the world and was currently enrolled in one of the country's most prestigious fellowship programs.
His mother never missed an opportunity to brag about her son; and when he stepped forward into the light, I understood why. He was exceptionally handsome with a classic face, blond hair and piercing blue eyes. The dark suit he wore was impeccable, and his blue eyes glittered in the light as they landed on me. With his hand outstretched, he plastered a smile on his face that made my insides quiver. "Hello, Avery," he said with a deep timbre.
I placed my smaller hand in his and watched with rapt attention as he brought my hand up to his mouth. When his lips brushed against my knuckles, it instantly felt like a shock of electricity coursing through my body from his kiss. The party at Becky Weston's house and my friends were completely forgotten in that instant. The rest of the world seemed to blur around us as we stared at each other. I knew at that moment that it would have taken a team of wild horses to drag me away from the company of Nathan.
Mr. Mason took his wife's hand and grinned. "Let's leave these two alone to get acquainted," he said before they walked away.
Nathan stared down at me. "You weren't leaving, were you?"
I shook my head, incapable of speech at that moment.
"Good," he said with a soft smile. "Well, since you're staying, let's go somewhere a little more private, shall we?" Nathan asked.
All I could do was nod. He acted and spoke like he was from a different era, and I was truly captivated by him. I didn't even realize my hand was still in his until he pulled me along after him, leading me outside and around the back portion of the property.
With noise from the party and chirping of crickets in the background, Nathan and I spent the rest of the evening on the verandah talking and sharing stories. Even though a little over a decade separated us in age, we had a lot in common and immediately hit it off like we had known each other for years. The more I got to know him, the quicker I started to fall for him. He exuded confidence in everything he said and did, and we shared an instant connection that couldn't be explained. And when he told me about his love for traveling and how he was planning a trip to Europe, it almost felt like fate had intervened that night and brought us together.
Like most girls, I imagined my future being much like a fairytale. Who wouldn't want to meet the perfect prince and live in a big castle? Nathan was everything a woman would dream about. He was smart, funny, well educated, charming and certainly wasn't lacking in the looks department whatsoever. He was mature and ambitious, with a dream of opening his own medical practice in North Carolina. He had a bright future, and I found myself just wanting to be a part of it.
He stole a kiss at the end of the night right along with my heart.
After my graduation party, Nathan and I began to date exclusively. He was my first steady boyfriend, and I fell head over heels in love with him all too quickly. He soon became my everything, the center of my universe.
Nathan lavished me with expensive gifts and a love that I think I had been craving for most of my life, having lost my mother at such a young age. His parents and my father wholeheartedly encouraged the relationship and couldn't have been happier when we announced our engagement. We were married shortly thereafter and ready to spend the rest of our lives together.
It was like a real-life fairytale, but only to those on the outside looking in. It took some time, but the façade that Nathan had carefully constructed slowly began to crumble…
CHAPTER 1
SIX MONTHS AGO
AVERY
My body slowly sinks into the warm water of the bathtub. As the steam billows up around me, I feel content. There is a false sense of security within the confines of the mist, and I wish I could hide there forever.
My eyes flicker to the razorblade resting between my fingertips, and I release a shaky sigh from my lips. Anyone who says suicide is the easy way out clearly never tried it. This is the hardest decision I've ever made in my life, and I'm still not even sure if it's the right choice. I just know right now it's my only choice. I'm tired of fighting. I'm tired of the pain. I just want to be done with it all.
Swallowing hard as tears stream down my face, I grip the blade hard and cut into my flesh. I wince as pain, which five glasses of wine obviously can't mask, shoots through my arm. I hiss through gritted teeth and manage to carve a jagged line into my left wrist. After I'm finished, the blade falls and clatters to the tile floor. I watch intently as dark red blood begins to bubble to the surface of the wound, seeping out onto my ivory skin and gently dripping to the floor. My arm grows heavier and heavier until it eventually slips from the ledge and into the bathtub. The water gradually turns from crystal blue into a deep red. So much blood, I think to myself.
My eyes grow heavy, and my mind begins to wander over the past few years of my life. There is a sharp line between the point of before Nathan and after Nathan. Before Nathan, I was so carefree and vivacious. And after Nathan, I became just an empty shell of my former self. He changed my life so drastically that it sometimes feels like a nightmare that I so desperately want to wake up from.
The abuse started out slowly, gradually growing worse and worse as time went on. The first time he ever hit me, we were newly dating and in the honeymoon phase, as people like to call it. In the midst of an argument, he leaned over and slapped me across the face. I'll never forget the look in his eyes. It was as if he had transformed into a whole other person entirely. He had so much anger built up in him that it seemed to exude from his every pore. It was like he had been waiting an exceedingly long time for that very moment just to snap and lash out.
After the initial shock wore off, I broke up with him, wanting to have nothing to do with him ever again. But Nathan did what he always does best --- he apologized and made excuses for his behavior. He talked me into staying in a relationship with him. He told me he was going to go to anger management classes. And being so young and naïve, I truly did believe that he could change, that he would change. I thought therapy could fix him. Little did I know that the wrathful monster inside of him was patiently waiting for a chance to escape. There was no help for him. He couldn't be cured. He was irrevocably broken.
For the next several months after that first incident, our relationship really was perfect. Nathan never laid a hand on me again, and he pampered me like a complete princess. Many of the girls in our social circle were envious of me, and I didn't blame them for their jealousy. We were the ideal couple, and everyone wanted what we had. And for a while, I actually felt lucky to have found such a great catch.
After a while, however, his carefully constructed mask began to slip, and the cycle of abuse became a regular routine with us. We would fight and break up. Nathan would apologize, and I would take him back. I didn't know it then, but somehow I had unknowingly allowed him to slither his way into my life and control every aspect of it. I no longer had any friends or family to turn to. He made sure that he was the only one I could turn to. And so I did.
We soon became engaged. And before I could even blink, my father and Nathan's parents were planning the wedding for us. It became an arranged marriage in every sense of the word. I didn't even have a say in what kind of flower arrangements or even what type of cake I wanted. And the more I protested, the quicker the wedding date got bumped up. They didn't realize that I wasn't suffering from a simple case of cold feet. I was afraid to marry Nathan. In fact, I was downright terrified.
My life felt like it was tied to a speeding runaway train that I couldn't stop or control no matter how hard I tried. I pleaded with my dad that I didn't want to marry Nathan, but he wouldn't hear of it. He wanted the marriage to take place, saying it would solidify my spot in the social world with the phenomenal reputation of the Mason family. And
deep down I knew my father's real reasoning was because it would benefit him to have ties to the Masons to further his career in the political world. With feeling like everyone was against me, I stood idly by while everyone around me took the reins to control my future.
After Nathan and I were married, everything changed for the worst. He demanded power over every aspect of my life. The physical and verbal abuse and threats steadily became more frequent, more sinister. He was mean and outright cruel at times. I became one of those battered women that I had heard about and had always promised myself I would never become. And no matter how many times I tried to leave, he always found me. I would come back to even more abuse, worse than the last, as punishment for leaving him. My dreams of a brighter future, a future without him were always quickly extinguished and disintegrated a million times over. And then finally…I just couldn't do it any more. I didn't want to run any longer. I just wanted to be free.
"Avery, what the fuck have you done!" Nathan roars as he runs into the bathroom, coming to a halting stop at the side of the bathtub.
His voice shakes me from my thoughts and chills me to the bone. The only thing I can think about is that he's home early. He wasn't supposed to be home this early.
Feeling too weak to move, I stare through heavy-lidded eyes as Nathan bends down and appears in my line of vision. Weariness takes over, and my head slumps forward onto my chest. With the force of the movement, my body starts to slip down into the water. Nathan quickly grabs me and pulls me out of the bathtub. He positions me down on the floor and uses a nearby towel for a makeshift tourniquet on my wrist. "What have you done?" he asks again in disbelief, his voice cracking.
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