Twenty Six
R I V E R
THE INCESSANT POUNDING IN my skull is what pulls me out of the abysmal darkness I’ve lost myself in. It was comfortable there. I felt nothing. Physically, or emotionally. And now I feel everything. Sharp pinpricks of pain explode across my head and if it wasn’t for the fact that I’ve woken up this way quite a few times in my life and have solid survival instincts, I’d groan aloud in pain.
Instead, I keep my face blank despite the pain and let my surroundings filter in. It’s completely silent. No shuffle of feet or rustling of clothing. No breathing.
When I feel confident I’m alone, I peek open my eyes slowly. This time, I do let out a little groan when the pain intensifies.
I stare at the cement ceiling above me, not bothering to look around until my memory catches up.
Everything starts coming back to me in quick, blurred images. I was home alone. Amelia had been gone for a few hours when Billy had come for me. We had fought—or at least I had—until he dragged me out of the house, to his car and threw me in the trunk. The last thing I remember is Billy’s fist coming towards my face before I blacked out.
Shit. Not good. I’ve no idea where he possibly could’ve taken me. And if I don’t know, no one else will either.
The cold realization that I’m well and truly alone settles in. I’ve always been fucking alone. No one has ever saved me before.
And no one sure as fuck isn’t going to save me now.
Mako wouldn’t know the first place to look for me. And even if Barbie did, she wouldn’t care enough about me to risk her life and tell anyone. Not when it comes to Billy.
Now I take the time to look around. I’m in a basement. Old and decrepit, with spiderwebs strung across every nook and cranny, accompanied by that old, musky smell. This basement has definitely seen a flood or ten in its years. Exposed wooden beams break up the open concept of the basement with an exposed light bulb in the center of the room, shining bright and burring dimly. And of course, there’s only one escape route—the rickety steps leading to a padlocked door.
Aside from myself and my demons, a single wooden chair and the thin cotton mattress I’m lying on, there’s nothing else down here.
Not even cameras, which surprise me. Billy’s pretty old school but not enough to not keep up with the times. He’s big on surveillance. His paranoia would never allow him not to keep an eye on all his operations at all times. Maybe there’s one of his goonies standing outside the door upstairs. If there’s any left.
Bringing me here wasn’t premediated. He chose this place last minute. Maybe he even decided to kidnap me last minute.
I settle deeper into the mattress until I’m sure I can feel the cold floor seeping into my shoulder
blades and wait for Billy to show up.
TIME BECOMES DILLUTED. I’ve fallen into a restless sleep when I hear the slam of a door. My body jolts awake. Just barely do I keep myself from bolting upright. If Billy doesn’t kill me first, the onslaught of pain from doing something like that surely would.
I crack open my eyelids, only to be met with muted light. Even with the softness of the glow, it sends sharp pinpricks of pain to my head.
“You’re awake,” he says coldly. The wooden stairs groan beneath his weight. Each creak radiates throughout my skull followed by piercing pain so sharp, I’m sure my brain is falling into pieces. Fucker gave me a concussion.
“No shit,” I groan, my throat dry and burning from dehydration. The moment the words leave my mouth, I brace myself for his trigger-happy fist. Billy never liked it when I talked back.
“Watch it,” he snaps. Thankfully, he keeps his hands to himself this time. When I muster the courage to look at him, he’s standing over me, legs spread and hands in his pockets. Blank-faced and well-dressed as ever, as if he’s used to kidnapping girls in a three-piece Armani suit.
That’s right. He is.
“What are you going to do with me?” I ask with a resigned sigh. It’s not that the prospect of how Billy is going to kill me doesn’t absolutely terrify me, it’s that I’ve resigned myself to this fate long ago, and now that it’s here, it’s almost a relief. No more do I have to look over my shoulder, hoping not to see the devil standing behind me.
I’ve grown tired and weary of this life. I’m not entirely sad that it’s getting cut short.
“I haven’t decided yet,” he murmurs, almost to himself. He sighs, plops the wooden chair directly in front of me and sits, the rickety wood groaning dangerously under his weight. I hate that I flinch away when he lifts his hand to my face, swiping a stray piece of hair out of my eyes. He picks up the errant curl and tugs on it until it’s straight. His eyes pick over the strand, fascinated with my
natural curls.
Billy always loved my curly hair.
“Do you know why I’ve always loved your hair?” he asks, picking up on my thoughts.
I don’t really care why. But I’d rather have Billy talking to me rather than him torturing or raping me.
“Why?” I croak, wincing from the dryness in my throat. He doesn’t make a move to fix my problem.
“Your hair has always been a symbol of your tenacity. You bounce back. It didn’t matter what I did to you. I stretched you thin, and no matter how hard I did it—you always bounced back from it. It was fascinating watching you grow up. It made me want to try harder to break you, but I never really could.”
Didn’t he, though? I almost argue that point. I suppose Billy’s version of breaking someone is pushing them to the point where they off themselves. I refused to kill myself, though I’ve always contemplated the idea like I’m deciding what I’m going to eat for dinner.
I don’t say anything. I’m sure the psychopath expects me to feel praised and offer him a thank- you, but I might be liable to spit on him instead if I open my mouth.
He sighs and drops the curl like burning coal, seemingly disappointed in my lack of response. A narcissist doesn’t like their compliments to go unappreciated. His hand travels back to my face, petting my skin softly. Shivers of revulsion travel down my spine, and I don’t bother to hide the reaction.
“I should’ve killed you when you were young,” he muses softly.
“You should’ve,” I agree.
He pauses, and when he does, it feels like the world does, too. Earth stops spinning on its axis, and for a moment, time stills. His hand whips to my hair in the next second, yanking me off the cot roughly. A startled scream releases from my throat. Fear pumps through my veins like poison as he drags me across the dirty floor and to the middle of the room. My hand curls around his wrist, desperate to pull myself up to relieve the sharp pain spreading throughout my scalp.
“Ungrateful bitch,” he spits, shoving my head away. My temple knocks onto the cement floor.
Stars burst across my vision, leaving trails of black spots in their wake. My face is then pushed into the ground with one hand while he tears at my pants with the other.
“What I really should’ve done,” he starts, his breath heaving with the effort of pulling my pants down my kicking legs. “Is push your mother down the fucking stairs when I got her pregnant with you.”
“Yeah?” I shout, hysteria starting to possess my body. “I wish you fucking would’ve, too, Billy! I wish you would’ve, too. At least then I would’ve never known a vile, pathetic man like you!”
“Shut up!” he roars, stopping his goal to punch me once in the back of the head. Stars explode in my eyes, and without my permission, my body slackens. Once I do, Billy finally gets my pants down.
The cool hair hits my backside, and something about that feeling makes my skin crawl. That was always when I knew it was going to get ugly while growing up. Once I felt my pants slip down my legs, my safety net was gone and what came after always hurt.
The fight in me rejuvenated, I wriggle hard, bucking to and fro but to no avail. His weight comes down on top of me, pinning me in place. I feel his hardness pressing into my bare backside, the zipper painfully rubbing against my skin.
He shoves a hand between our bodies, quickly unbuttoning and unzipping his pants in a matter of seconds. I gag when I feel flesh on flesh.
“You’re my father, and you’re going to rape me?!” I scream, outraged and disturbed by his lack of morals.
I still don’t want to believe he’s my father. But deep in my bones, I know Barbie and him aren’t lying. Little bits and pieces of memories flash through my head. Barbie spitting on me when I smiled at my worn teddy bear, telling me I smile just like Billy does. Or when I pushed another kid down for sticking his hand up my dress, cracking his head open, followed by her snide comment telling me I’m just like my father. Comments that never held enough weight at the time, but suddenly feel like a ton of bricks now.
Another punch to the back of the head is my answer. He doesn’t care that I’m his blood. Billy raping me was never about attraction or desire. It was always about power. About using fear to keep me in line. This time is no different.
Before, I’d stay quiet and let Billy defile my body. The harder I fought him in the past, the harder he fucked me. Even knowing that, I don’t stay quiet this time. I don’t stay still or docile.
No. Pent up rage is exploding from me, eviscerating any semblance of strength I had left inside of me. I scream when he enters me. And I continue to scream long after he finds his release. I scream and scream until my throat is raw and the cellar door is locked behind him.
Even when my voice gives out, the screaming continues to resonate through my head until all five of my senses are consumed by my pain.
DAYS PASS BEFORE BILLY visits me again. Wrapped food and a bottle of water was thrown down the steps before the door slammed behind him. Three times a day for the past three days.
I refused to touch any of it. Part of me dared to, just hoping that he poisoned the food so I could let my miserable existence fade. But that’s not Billy’s style. He’d rather let me suffer and agonize, sweating over the prospect of him murdering me. All I’m doing is anticipating it.
I lay on my stomach next to the cot, face smashed against the cool cement floor. A stream of drool stems from my mouth, pooling beneath my cheek and pruning the skin. I don’t care enough to wipe it away. I don’t care enough to do anything. Right now, he’s ignoring me. Letting me rot in this dank basement and be left alone with my thoughts. Bastard knows what he’s doing too because fuck, if
my thoughts aren’t spiraling down.
I don’t want to live anymore.
I don’t want to exist.
To be.
If there were anything to kill myself with in this basement, I would’ve done it already. And he knows that, too. He knows it and he’s dragging out the torture. That’s why he took the wooden chair away. He must’ve seen me eyeing it, already planning on breaking the chair and using the sharp end of the wood to cut my wrists. He walked away with that chair in his damn hand.
I tried to crack wood off the wooden steps, but I had nothing to use and my body was too weak to even get a splinter.
What point is there in life anyways? Amelia has her own family, and though I know she loves me
dearly, she can also live without me.
There’s Mako.
But he hates me.
I close my eyes tightly. I can’t keep the onslaught of memories flashing through my mind, despite my desperate attempts to push them out of my head. Images of Mako flicker through my thoughts like a slide show. Of his smile. His determined expression anytime he’d try to knock some sense into me.
His sexy smirk when I said or did something he liked. And his acceptance when I told him about my sordid past.
He’s done so much for me. Given up so much. Risked everything for me. And I couldn’t open my mouth and give him one piece of information that could’ve changed everything. He could’ve caught Billy, and I’d never be in this stupid fucking situation. Once again, I got myself here.
I was too selfish. Too weak. Too scared. All I could consider is that Billy would come for me if
I snitched.
Look where that got you, dumb bitch.
I could laugh at the irony.
A stream of light shines on my body before I hear the groan of wooden steps beneath his weight.
I clamp my lids shut, too tired and weak to lift a hand to block the light. Each step feels like a thud of my heart.
“You look pathetic,” he sneers, his fancy black shoes appearing in my line of vision. I don’t move, hoping, praying, he kicks out that shoe just one time, hard enough to knock me out completely.
Once I’m out, he can keep kicking for all I care.
His shoe can snuff my life out like he does to his cigarettes.
“I am pathetic,” I correct weakly, sucking in my lips to stop the stream of drool.
“No fight? No will to live? How boring.” A wad of spit lands on my cheek. I recoil, causing every ache in my body to flare to life.
See, this is why I stayed still. The cement numbed my pain as long as I didn’t move.
With an angry swipe, I fling the spit off my cheek. Asshole.
“I’d rather not trade diseases with you,” I mutter snidely. He laughs. Laughs at my words. At my anger. Everything about this situation is funny to him.
“Ryan was right about you. You’re so easy to kick down, it’s boring.” The breath in my lungs
seizes.
“What did you say?” I whisper.
“We became good friends, him and I. He was practically frothing at the mouth to have a drug lord on speed dial. So desperate, in fact, that he made a deal with me. He wanted my connections.
Little boy wanted to play with the big boys and start dipping his hands in my operations. And guess what his collateral was?” He leans in closer. “You,” he rasps.
A sob breaks free from my throat. His words, his truth, it hurts. I was always expendable to Ryan. He’d trap another girl in no time once I was gone.
“He was willing to trade you into the Ghost Killer if it meant moving up in the world. I was so happy to oblige.” An evil laugh trickles from his throat. “You know what the best part is? He didn’t know I already own you.”
His foot kicks out, but not where I need it. It lands right in my ribs, sending shockwaves of pain throughout my body. I roll from the kick, my arms lolling out sloppily as if he just heaved over a drunk person.
My tormenter’s face appears above me, sneering down at me like I’m dirt. “Can you tell me apart from the rest of the dirt on the floor, or do I blend in?” I tack on a little grin for extra measure.
From this position, his foot will hit my temple and knock me out quicker.
His lip curls and just for a second, I imagine his foot lifting up and coming down on me, filling my vision with blackness.
It doesn’t though. He just shakes his head at me and sighs pitifully. That sound makes me angrier than anything. Pity. He could’ve said or done anything else to me and I wouldn’t have batted an eye.
But pity makes my skin crawl.
I growl. “What the fuck are you waiting for, old man? Didn’t make a big enough impression
scattering your little Ghost’s around so you gotta come pick on your daughter?” I spit the word at him with all the disgust I can muster.
He smirks at me. “You always were a daddy’s girl.”
Time stills, just for a moment as the words wash over me. And then I’m up, screaming and clawing at him with unpracticed movements. But I don’t care. The white-hot rage overwhelms my senses until I am is just rage.
I hate him. I hate him so much. It’s all I can feel. The hate growing inside of me like a tumor, so deep, it’d be impossible to cut out without bleeding me dry.
His laughter filters through, even as my nails make contact and rake across his dried-up skin.
Even has blood pools from the scratches and leaks down his face and neck. With one backhand swipe, he knocks me flat on my ass. I hit hard. My tailbone taking the brunt of my weight before my head crashes down next, bouncing off the floor like a rubber ball.
I accept every bit of the pain the follows suit. Even as it blinds me, rendering me completely invalid and useless, I accept it. I welcome it with open fucking arms. If all I can feel is physical pain, maybe I won’t feel the proverbial claws ripping apart my mentality.
Tears track down my cheeks. Normally, I’d wipe them away before they could even think to fall.
Showing weakness in front of Billy is the same as willingly opening your legs for him. Either way, he’ll be forcing himself inside of you, whether it’s with his pain or his dick. Or maybe even both.
This time, I let them fall. I just don’t care anymore.
A clatter of metal rings throughout the room and into my skull. Just barely, I’m able to lift my head enough to see the tray of food. An apple rolling off the tray and into a dark corner to join the spiders, a ham sandwich, a fruit cup, and a small water bottle. Nothing that would require utensils, of course. Though I suppose it’s a pretty nutritious meal for a prisoner.
“Eat up,” he chirps before walking back up the stairs, whistling a low tune as he does.
For the longest time, I stare at that food. I stare until more tears form in my eyes, blurring everything into one blob, and eventually until everything takes shape again and my eyes dry completely.
I don’t stop staring, not for a long while.
I SCARFED DOWN THE food and water, pacing myself enough so I didn’t get sick.
I did the same for the next several meals. I can’t be sure exactly when I decided to escape. It feels like I’ve always known I would, even when I was deluding myself with the prospect of death. My entire life has been ruled by this man. And when I finally got a taste of freedom, it was snatched away by another abusive prick. I’ve never actually gotten much of a chance to rule my own life. Forge my own path. Decide my own future. All of those things were constantly taken out of my hands.
I refused to let Ryan have the privilege any longer, I’ll be damned if I let Billy have it, either.
The groan of wood beneath heavy weight immediately sets my heart into overdrive. Adrenaline surges, leaving my hands shaky. Billy will be coming down to talk to a completely different girl than what he left three days ago. He would throw the food down the stairwell and slam the door behind him. Three meals, three rotations. Three days. The same amount of time he made me wait last time.
Which means I’ve been down here for at least a week.
I’ve been waiting for another moment with him, and now that it’s here, I’m not sure I’m ready.
But I don’t think I’ll ever be quite ready. Standing up to Billy is something I’ve never successfully achieved before. Anytime I’d try, I’d get kicked down and I was always too weak—too scared—to get back up and try again. In efforts to conserve my life, I just ended up handing it over to him on a silver platter.
“Are you going to let me shower?” I ask calmly, before he can utter a word to me. He looks down at me, his face arranged in his usual blank state.
It takes him a moment before he responds. “Do you think you deserve a shower?”
I hate Billy’s mind games. “Yes,” I answer confidently. Not because I’ve been a quote-on-quote good girl, but because I’m a human fucking being and I deserve basic rights like using a fucking shower.
He smirks at my tone. “Do you, now? And why’s that?”
I lick my lips, aiming for a new tactic. “Because I’m your daughter.”
His head tips back and a full bellied laugh sounds from his throat. The sound irks me, but I force the tension to leave my body. If I snap at him in anger, it’ll just make it worse. And I need to get out of this basement.
“Can I watch?” he asks, a smarmy smile on his face.
With all the control I can muster, I force my face to stay relaxed, shrug my shoulders and say, “Sure.”
Sure, dad, you can watch me shower. That’s not fucking repulsive or anything.
His blue eyes glide over me, calculating and shining with mirth. This is another game to him, and it seems like I’ve been lucky enough to catch him in a good mood. When Billy’s in a good mood, he loves to play games.
He nods his head once, the small grin still on his face. “Let’s go then. Daughter.”
BILLY TURNS THE SHOWER water on for me, adjusting it until he’s satisfied with the temperature. I’m not sure if it makes him feel as if he’s taking care of me, I don’t really care either way. Him taking me to the shower was my only excuse for getting out of the basement. He gave me a bucket and a roll of paper-thin toilet paper to take care of business and threw my food at me.
What else could a girl ask for other than a nice hot shower?
My eyes tracked over every inch of the house as he led me to the bathroom. I’m in some type of
trap house. In the tiny living room, there were beer bottles and needles scattered across the coffee table, boarded up windows, stained brown carpet and rotted curtains that reeked of mothballs. The kitchen looked almost identical to Barbie’s, purely based off of the gunk caked into the cheap, cracking linoleum floors, moldy fridge and more needles on the table. Down a short hallway, and into the bathroom is where my fancy shower awaits.
It’s just as dirty as the rest of the house.
I don’t actually plan on getting in that disease-infested thing. Billy can hand over all the soap he wants, I’d still come out the other side smelling like must. He shoos me further into the bathroom, closes the door behind me and locks it. Sidling past me, he holds the plastic curtain open for me, silently prompting me to undress and get in. A nervous sweat breaks out across my skin as his face darkens. Shadows are pressing in around him, and the cold detached look he gives me has the temperature dropping in the room by several degrees.
“Get in the fucking shower, River.”
