by Ivy Fox
Fuck, I’m a bastard.
Not a second ago I was considering a homicide pact with Rome, and now I’m acting like a scorned lover, wanting to punch him in the face just because he’s not being his usual dickish self. I’m all sorts of fucked-up. The booze, the drugs, and my assaulted ex on her knees, next to the cunt who is on death’s door, are bound to have burnt all the wiring in my brain tonight because I’m definitely not thinking straight.
Rome gets back up, his shirt now gripped in his hands, and I watch in confusion as he kneels once more beside our father’s head. Rome begins to soak the white material with some of the blood that continues to drip onto the carpet, making sure not to touch the wound directly with the fabric. I feel my brows pull together, wondering what the fuck he’s up to now, but without delay, he answers my unvocalized question when he begins to dab a bit of the red fluid onto the edge of the corner table above the unconscious body.
With the tainted shirt still in his hold, he picks up an object that I hadn’t even taken notice of until this very moment—a diamond-shaped crystal humanitarian award that dear old dad won last year. I scoff at the irony of how this was the object that almost cut his life short. The proof of his fabricated lies coming back to slice his brain in two as retribution for all the vile things he’s done throughout his life. Rome wraps the award up with his shirt and then walks over to the baby grand piano, lifting its lid and placing the impromptu weapon under the strings. It’s not like anyone is going to be using it anytime soon, so I guess it’s as good a hiding place as any.
“Roman!” Ollie belts, looking worse for wear.
Ollie isn’t built from the same fabric as I am. And he sure as shit isn’t made of the same ugliness that resides in Rome, so for our brother, taking all these steps while our father’s life hangs in the balance, is giving him a coronary. Like Elle, Ollie is light, while Rome and I are the shadows people stay away from.
“She can’t be here when the cops come,” Rome utters, slicing through any other reprimands Ollie may have.
“She has to. Snow has to give her statement,” Ollie replies, baffled.
“Oliver, I’m only going to do this one way, and it doesn’t involve her being here. Either she’s gone, or he is,” he explains coolly, pointing at the body on the floor.
“Fine!” Ollie relents, although he doesn’t seem convinced.
“Ash, you good with keeping an eye on her for the night?” Rome questions and I watch Ollie open his mouth once again to protest at Rome’s orders.
“Yeah. I’m good.”
I’m not.
I’m not good, but like hell, will I let anyone else take care of Snow tonight.
“Good. Keep her in her room and make sure she doesn’t come out until I say so. You got that?” Rome adds with a raised brow, letting me know he already has a plan in place, and Snow’s presence will only fuck things up for him.
I give him a half-ass shrug because, at this point, Rome is back at being Rome and calling all the shots.
“Ollie, you stay with me.”
“Why?”
“Because, between the three of us, you’re the one who looks honest, and I’m going to need that attribute for what I have in mind.”
“Great,” Ollie mumbles under his breath, not thrilled at being used as a pawn in whatever scheme our older brother is conjuring.
I, however, couldn’t give a fuck for my twin’s upset feelings right now. He’s the one who refused to let our nightmare end once and for all tonight. As much as I love Ollie, that shit is going to be hard to forgive.
Rome straightens his spine and gives Ollie his phone back while casting a shark grin—one that is likely to chill my blood but surely brings a conniving plan behind it.
But this is what Rome excels at—protecting us when we don’t know how.
It’s just not clear at whose cost yet.
But something tells me that everyone in this room is going to pay the price for it.
Chapter 3
Holland
Everything around me is loud and deafening.
Yet, the ghost of logic that still resides inside me tells me the room is eerily filled with hollow whispers. I can’t make out what’s being said since there are only two words my mind has latched onto and is unwilling to let go of.
He’s alive.
He’s alive.
I can’t move past those ugly words, and as much as I try to fight it, they’re all I seem to be able to focus on. In a loop, they plague me nonstop, overlapping the white noise ringing in my eardrums.
He’s alive.
He’s alive.
Oh, God, what will happen now?
Will I have to repeat all the vile words he hushed in my ear? Will I have to explain every touch, every unwanted caress to strangers? To the people I love? Will I have to relive tonight all over again, as if the haunting feel of his skin against mine, along with his hot whiskey-breath prickling the air, wasn’t torturous enough?
Oh, God, I’m going to be sick.
I can’t do it.
Please don’t make me do it.
I spent most of my teenage years being looked at as the sickly child, pitied for the way I would never have a normal life. But after tonight, that will be the last thing people will think about when they look at me. All they will see is the girl who was almost raped by her stepfather. It will follow me through all walks of my life. I will never be able to outrun it. Not when I look in the mirror and think the exact same thing.
I don’t want to be that girl.
Don’t make me be that girl! I scream inwardly.
“Holland… Holland… Snow?” I hear a soft voice call out to me, the same patient one that’s determined to raise me from my tumultuous nightmare.
Liquid-honey eyes stare into my abyss, promising they will make this all go away, and my greedy soul laps up the false promise like it’s the only thing that will keep it alive. Rome grabs my hands, tenderly caressing the top of my knuckles with the pads of his thumbs, and says, “Asher is going to take you to your room now. Do you think you can stand?”
I nod, not really sure if I’m capable or not, but Rome keeps his hold on my hands and unwearyingly helps me up to my feet. My eyes never leave his, because if they do, I’ll have to face Ollie and Ash again, and I don’t think my sanity can cope with that just yet. Both of them looked just as brutally broken as I feel, and that heart-stopping image will forever be engraved in my memory, increasing tonight’s sickening trauma.
“Can you take me?” I whisper to Rome’s ears alone. I don’t think I can deal with Asher right now. Not when I’m responsible for such pain. Rome wipes a stray strand of my hair away from my face and gently tilts my chin back, so he’s the only thing I see.
“I have to stay here,” he laments, and I witness genuine sorrow casting his golden eyes, saddened that he can’t continue to be my safe haven—my anchor.
I feel Rome’s back stiffen and another body comes into focus behind him, one that I have memorized by heart—every hard edge, each chiseled muscle and granite length of him. Up until this night, I thought he could protect me from every evil this world held. What a fool I was. He couldn’t even shield me from the cruelty that lives and breathes inside himself, much less prevent monsters from having their way with me.
“I’ll take you,” Ash announces, and Rome shifts to the side, fully revealing the boy I had given my heart to only for him to crush it to a pulp with his contempt.
My body involuntary begins to shiver, and it takes everything in me not to fall back to the ground. Ash tried to break me once. I thought he even succeeded. But I know now that’s a lie. The man lying on the floor—his father and my mother’s husband—is the one who accomplished that feat.
“Snow?” Another pain-filled voice cracks through the silence, alerting me to his close presence. “Let Ash take you to your room, baby. Okay? I promise I’ll check up on you as soon as I can,” Ollie insists besid
e me, his gentle features bringing me a small light of hope, naive as that may be.
Ollie has always had a knack at coaxing out whatever little bravery I had hidden within, and right now it’s exactly what I need. I give him a small nod, yielding to his request, and Ash takes full advantage of my submission. Without allowing me to go back on my word, he pushes Rome out of his way, gripping my hand in his, and rushes us both out the door.
“Ash!” I stammer, when I almost trip on my own feet, unable to keep up with his quick pace. My shaky legs can barely keep me upright, let alone run.
He turns around, his jaw sharp and locked in place, while his hazel eyes continue to hold a severity I’ve never seen them sullied with.
When I’m catapulted into his arms, I don’t even have time to explain that he needs to slow down or risk me falling on my face. I instantly wrap my arms around his neck, so he doesn’t drop me on the staircase in his haste to escape. I guess I can’t fault him for wanting to put as much distance as he can between us and the place where all our lives were forever changed.
He doesn’t say anything to me, and maybe that should upset me, but I’m grateful for his uncharacteristically tight-lipped front. The jostling chaos in my head is clamorous enough, so having to have any form of conversation just doesn’t seem like something I could do right now, especially with Ash. But when we step into the corridor leading to my room, I’m the first to break the sacred silence, warning him that he can’t come in because his sister is blissfully asleep inside.
“Elle is sleeping in my room,” I whisper close to his ear, and I am gutted to see the cold shiver that pricks his skin.
He’s repulsed by me.
I repulse him now.
“Doesn’t matter. I wasn’t going to take you there anyway,” he explains evenly, not showing one ounce of the tumultuous emotion that I’m currently experiencing.
He continues to charge ahead, passing by my door and a few others at hazardous speed. We come to an abrupt stop in front of a door at the far end of the hall. Without placing me down, Ash is able to open it and usher us into a darkened room, which I conclude can only be his. He doesn’t turn the lights on, but closes the door behind him with his foot and leans against it, as if he just ran a marathon. I hear him take a long, deep breath, and I wonder if this is the first time he allowed himself to breathe.
At first glance, Ash had looked so distraught, like a troubled boy who’d lost all hope. But then he transformed himself into this robotic persona, going through the motions without letting himself actually feel anything, nor letting anything touch the interior of his arctic façade.
My lips are itching to ask him if he can teach me this neat trick, too. If I could, I would put barbed wire around myself, and build a tower so high and solid that no one could see the destruction inside its steel walls. But before I declutter through my jumbled up thoughts, he pulls himself away from the door, indicating he’s not finished with me yet. He takes a few more steps, albeit more leisurely this time, to the corner of his room, and only then does he place my feet on the varnished wood floor.
“I’ll get you something to wear,” he informs hoarsely, his strained tone the only indication that his iron-clad shield isn’t as stealthy as I assumed it to be.
He opens the door next to us, turning on the lights and revealing a large bathroom inside. It suddenly dawns on me just exactly what he expects me to do—clean every last vestige of his father off of me.
So it is as I thought. I do repulse him. But can I really blame him? The thought of my skin bearing that monster’s imprint for one more minute repulses me too. The only hold-up in his request is that I don’t want to look myself in the mirror. If I do and verify for myself my devastated reflection, I’m sure it will be my ultimate undoing.
“Can… Can you help me?” I stutter, and I hate how broken I sound.
I am not this weak thing. I am not fragile or breakable.
So why does it feel like I might shatter at any moment?
Unfortunately, Ash isn’t quick enough to hide his reluctance, increasing my shame of having asked him in the first place. Still, he takes my hand gently in his, guiding us both inside his bathroom. I target where the mirror in the room is located and quickly turn my back to it, not wanting to see the tangible proof of how I’ve fallen. Ash turns on the shower, and I hope I was strong enough not to need his help. I wish I didn’t crave his affection and understanding the way I do. I wish I didn’t want him to tell me that none of this changes anything in our lives, to repeat the lie over and over to me until I believe him.
I wish…
I wish…
How many futile wishes will I waste my time on, though? Knowing full well that none of them will ever come true for me. Wallowing in self-pity is bad enough, but add wishful thinking to the mix, and I’m an even bigger fool than my perverse attacker made me out to be.
Ash leans in closer, tenderly taking off the leather jacket that my nails have been clinging on to for dear life. Without delay, the cutting expression on his face immediately falters when the piece of clothing falls to the ground beneath us. I look down to see what has pierced through his well-guarded emotions, only to be reminded that the left side of my tank top is ripped wide open, revealing most of my bare breast to him. I swallow down my humiliation, my prickling tears threatening to make their appearance once more.
“Snow,” he murmurs, his voice thick with an unnamed emotion I can’t quite identify, but it hurts just the same to hear.
“Snow, you don’t have to tell me anything about tonight. Not one goddamn thing if you don’t want to. But I just need to know. I need to know. Did he… Did he…” he struggles to let out, but he doesn’t have to finish the question for me to know what his true fears are. What my fears were up until an hour ago.
“No, I hit him before he could.”
His jaw tics furiously, and his hands curl into fists at his side, clenching every so often.
“Good. That’s good, Snow,” he affirms, his gaze shifting behind me, no longer brave enough to witness what I’ve been reduced to.
“Do you want me to… Fuck!” he bellows, finally caving to his volatile feelings and backing away from me. He thrusts his fingers frantically through his hair, pulling on the strands, desperate for the small tinge of physical pain to be a reprieve from the emotional one that is destroying us both.
“You can go. I can do this without you.” I lie, trying desperately not to fall down the same rabbit hole of madness. I can’t do this—any of this—without him, but I’m not sure if Ash’s presence will do my frail heart more harm than good.
He shakes his head vehemently, not wanting to give in to his anger, and pushes his rage aside so he can help me as I asked him to. Ash has always been stubborn and never one to quit or back down from any decision he’s made. It’s one of his best qualities, and one of the reasons that I fell in love with him in the first place.
But that’s finished with now.
He’ll no longer be able to look at you, much less love you.
I bite my inner cheek again, feeling the barely healed gash pry wide open. But I invite this type of pain in willingly, taking a page out of Ash’s handbook.
This won’t end me. This doesn’t hurt me.
Because true pain is watching the boy you love more than life itself, wanting to scratch his eyes out just because he can’t stand the sight of you. Pain is what I found downstairs in that nightmare of a music room. Anguish and misery are what I’ll be living with for the rest of my days. This throbbing little gash is heaven compared to what awaits me from here on out. And I’d prefer to live with this type of hurt on my terms, rather than the pain of his hazel eyes—that held nothing but adoration at one time—now set on me in revulsion.
I’m about to ask Ash to leave when he pulls the hem of my shirt over my head and then falls to his haunches, taking my shorts and panties off as well, without giving me any opportunity to stop him.
/> I used to fantasize about the moment this would happen—baring myself completely to him. He would cherish me. Make me feel beautiful and special. He would shower me with words of praise and affection, and I’d feel loved just by the way his eyes would sparkle for me. But that’s not what I get. This is the first time I have ever been fully naked in front of Ash, and never, in my whole life, have I felt uglier in my own skin. His eyes scream out his disgust, and I can’t take it anymore.
“Asher! Please leave!”
“No!” he shouts feverishly, mimicking my own irate outcry. “I can’t leave, Snow. Don’t ask me again.”
Not wanting him to see the tears that are seconds away from falling down my face, I rush to the rainforest shower and put my whole body underneath the scalding hot water. I let the intense pressure falling off the showerhead camouflage my tears, and the searing temperature loosens the knot in my chest, allowing me to breathe in the steam while it scorches away every memory of this night my body might hold.
“Jesus, Snow!” Ash censures when he finally follows me in and is hit by the blazing heat.
I tightly shut my lids as he adds cold water, ending the little moment of clemency I was able to obtain. I stand still, even though my flesh is blistering raw, as Ash leans in against me, retrieving some liquid soap that smells like ocean breeze—a scent that I will forever identify as belonging to him.
“I’ll wash your hair, you do the rest,” he orders, squirting the liquid into my open palms.
I don’t counter back or beg him to leave again. It’s useless at this point. I begin to scrub at my flesh as he gently lavishes my hair with a chamomile scented shampoo—another fragrance belonging only to him. I wonder how he can switch from hot to cold just as easily as he did the streaming water pouring down on us.
Once he’s finished with his care and I’ve tired myself out from rubbing my skin clean to the point of pain, he lifts me off my feet and envelopes me in a towel large enough for two. I begin to feel a gentle pull on my hair, and I realize he’s brushing it, so it’s not a tangled mess in the morning. That’s when I force my eyes to open, and I verify that he still has his boxers on, albeit soaked to his body and doing a poor job of concealing how repelled by me he is now.
