The Lie That Traps (Lies and Truths Book 1)

21. Izabella

IZABELLA

My body freezes and a chill settles over me, like just the sound of her voice actually lowers the temperature of the room.

“Come into the living room,” she demands, turning on her heel and walking away because she knows I’ll follow.

Swallowing thickly, I clench my hands into tight fists at my sides, pull in a sharp breath, and move. Delaying this conversation won’t change the inevitable outcome. My parents and Penelope are going to lose their minds. They’re going to accuse me of deliberately ruining their plans for Penelope and Gulliver, and probably suggest I seduced him, or drugged him, or hypnotized him into proposing to me.

The door to the living room is closed, and as I reach out to open it, my hand is shaking. I know this is going to be bad. If I thought they’d believe me, I’d tell them the truth, but it’s easier for them to assume I’m treacherous than it is for them to consider Gulliver just doesn’t want my sister.

Pushing open the door, I step inside, my head up, my eyes downcast. Mom and Penelope are sitting primly on the couch, and my dad is just inside the doorway, his posture angry. They all wait silently as I take two more steps inside, closing the door behind me.

I turn around just in time to see my dad’s fist coming toward me as he backhands me so hard I fly backward and hit the door. My head bounces off the wood, and my vision blurs as pain explodes across my cheek.

Pain radiates through my face as I slam back into the doorframe, my legs crumpling beneath me as the floor rushes up toward me. I knew they’d be angry; I knew they’d assume I was the one at fault, but I stupidly thought they’d at least give me an opportunity to defend myself. I shouldn’t have come back here. I should have run while I had the chance, because if I’ve learned anything in the last few years, it’s that money is the root of all evil. That stupid will altered the course of my life, but what none of us have ever said is that a will and the last wishes of a dead man shouldn’t have had the power to change everything.

“You just couldn’t stand to see your sister happy, could you?” Mom snarls, her teeth clenched together as she gracefully rises from her seat and slowly prowls across the room toward me.

“I…” I start to speak, clutching at my face as wave after wave of agony pulses through me.

Dad grabs me, lifting me up from the floor, before he strikes me again, the ring on his pinkie finger slicing across my cheek.

My vision blurs, and bells ring in my ears from the intensity of his hit. Mom has slapped me before, but they’ve never hurt me like this. My dad isn’t a huge man, but he’s strong enough that the third hit makes something in my face crunch, and blood fills my mouth.

I’m on the floor again and, blinking, I try to blink my eyesight clear, but by the time I can see again, Mom is above me. “I’m ashamed to call you my daughter. You’re a vile little mistake of nature. You’re the child we didn’t want but had to have, and look at you now, you traitorous little whore. How did you get him to do it? Did you offer up your dirty little whore cunt for him and then force him to propose?” Spittle rains down on me as she hisses out every nasty, poisonous word.

“I didn’t,” I cry.

Her sharp fingernails dig into my scalp when she fists a chunk of my hair and snatches my head back. Lifting her free hand, she slaps me so hard the sound of her palm hitting my cheek echoes through the room.

My head swings to the side from the impact, and I catch a glimpse of my sister. My vision is unfocused, but I think I see a flash of horror on her face, but I don’t get a chance to decide what it means before Mom shakes me using the hand full of my hair she’s still holding.

“You nasty, evil, ungrateful little slut. You’re no child of mine. You’ve always been jealous of her because she’s better than you. She’s prettier and smarter, and she gets everything. She gets all the money, and you get nothing!” she screams, her face so close to mine that all I can see is the ugly clenching of her snarling teeth in her red, angry face.

After what feels like an eternity, she loosens her grip on my hair and shoves me backward, causing the back of my head to bang off the doorframe.

Blackness curves around the edges of my consciousness, but I fight the urge to curl into a ball.

“Move,” Mom screams, stamping her heeled pumps into my stomach, ribs, and arms as she wrenches open the door, hitting me with it as I scramble and claw at the floor, shuffling to the side until there’s enough space for her to barge through it and leave.

Dad’s polished shoes land in front of me, and I lift my chin just enough so I can see him. His glare is hard enough to make me flinch, but he doesn’t strike me again. His lip curls in disgust as he shakes his head. “I told her she should have gotten rid of you, but the doctors said we couldn’t kill you without risking your sister.” Stepping past me like I’m not bleeding and bruised, he strides out of the door, slamming it closed behind him.

My entire face pulses with pain, my head is ringing, and my mouth is full of blood as the longest seconds of my life pass. I’d almost forgotten Penelope was still in here, and I flinch when she kneels at my side. A part of me braces for her to hurt me too, but her hands are shaking as she carefully grips my fingers.

“Come on, you need to get up,” she whispers, her voice trembling as she tries to lift me up.

With her help, I manage to get to my feet. The room spins as dizziness wars with pain, and my body threatens to collapse. Each step hurts, but Penelope doesn’t release me, supporting me as we slowly climb the stairs until we’re in my room with the door closed and locked behind us.

“You need to leave,” she whispers urgently, tears filling her eyes as she lifts her hand and carefully touches my face.

“What?” I ask, confused.

“Run. Use your trust fund and run away, as far away from them as you can get. They’ve…” She pauses. “They’ve lost their minds. This money; it’s corrupted them. It’s corrupted me too, but this…” A tear rolls down her cheek, but she swipes it away. “God, your face,” she brokenly rasps.

“What about you?” I ask, feeling closer to my sister in this awful moment than I have in years.

“I’ll be fine,” she says, a small, shaky smile tipping the corners of her lips. “God, Izabella, I’m so sorry.”

“What?”

“I should have stopped them down there. I should have?—”

“Did you know what they were going to do?” I ask, interrupting her.

“No,” she sobs brokenly. “No, of course not. I thought they’d shout at you, but that…your face,” she gasps, pushing my hair off my forehead and wincing as she looks me over. “You need to go. We’re eighteen, and they can’t take your trust fund, no matter what they said. You need to get away while you still can. If you stay, they’ll never let you go. I overheard her and Dad talking about making you have sex with someone in my place,” she whispers, covering her mouth with her hand as a ragged sob bursts from her. Turning, she rushes to the closet and drags out my large suitcase. Dumping it on the bed, she unzips it, then rushes back to the closet, grabbing handfuls of clothes and dumping them into the open case.

I want to argue, but I don’t. Because she’s right, I can’t stay here. I knew things were escalating, but what’s happened tonight and what Penelope just told me confirms it’s not safe here for me anymore. So, I carefully stagger to my feet and start to grab the things I don’t want to leave behind and stuff them into the case.

“Call Gulliver, ask him to come and get you,” she says, urgency lacing each word.

“No, I have someone who can help,” I say, not wanting to tell her that Mark has already offered to help me run. “But how am I going to get this case downstairs without them seeing?”

“We’re going out. We’re due at the Harvey’s at six, and it’s over an hour’s drive, so we’ll be gone soon. Lock the door once I go, then as soon as we leave, run. I’m sorry, I’m so sorry,” she says, shocking me when she pulls me into a tight hug.

Wincing at the pain that radiates from my ribs, I wrap my arms around her and hold her tight, sad that we’ve never had the relationship I’d hoped we would and knowing that now we probably never will.

When she pulls back, her eyes are glassy. “I’m so sorry, Izabella. Be safe,” she says as she walks to the door and leaves.

I lock it behind her and spend the next hour packing everything I need to run and never come back. I haven’t looked at my face, but my right eye has almost swollen closed, and the inside of my cheek feels like raw meat when I cautiously run my tongue over it. My ribs burn, and there’s several scrapes on my arms and stomach from Mom’s heels. The ringing in my head slowly starts to fade, but it’s replaced with a headache that makes nausea burn in my throat.

It’s Mark’s night off, so Dad’s driver, Tim, is taking them to the Harveys’, and I watch the car pull off down the drive with a mixture of relief and trepidation. My hands shake as I open Mark’s contact in my cell phone and hit Call.

“Miss Izabella, is everything okay?” he answers, worry lacing his voice.

“Mark, if that offer still stands, I need some help,” I say, my voice cracking.

“I’ll be there in twenty minutes.”

“Thank you,” I whisper.

“It’s going to be okay, Miss Izabella,” he says before he ends the call, and I sit staring at my cell and the huge suitcase that holds everything I own.

A knock at my door has me jumping to my feet, and I panic, terrified that one of my parents didn’t leave, even though I watched them climb into their car.

I freeze, not even breathing, as the door handle rattles. “Miss Izabella,” Mrs. Humphries calls.

Unsure what to do, I carefully pad to the door, unlock it, and pull it open. I doubt she’ll stop me from leaving, but it’s a risk I’ll have to take because there’s no way I can get out of the house without her noticing.

“Oh, Miss Izabella.” Her mouth snaps shut when she sees me, her eyes quickly darting over my face.

Pushing the door wider, I flinch as she reaches for me, carefully turning my head so she can see my swollen face and split lip more clearly. Her lips purse, and she inhales sharply. Her shoulders visibly slump when she looks past me and sees my suitcase. Smiling weakly, she marches across the room, takes hold of the handle of my case, and drags it to the door without another word.

I follow her silently, not sure what I can even say in this moment as our deceptively strong housekeeper lifts my case like it weighs nothing and carries it down the stairs, lowering it to the floor in the foyer.

“Do you need money?” she asks.

Tears fill my eyes as I shake my head. “No, but thank you,” I say, my throat thick with emotion.

An unfamiliar car pulls up to the steps outside the house, and Mark climbs out dressed in jeans and a T-shirt. He mounts the steps to the house brazenly, like he doesn’t even care if my parents are in or not, and I’ve never been more grateful to have someone who cares about me like my loyal driver does.

Mrs. Humphries opens the front door, and Mark strides in. He takes one look at my face and starts to breathe faster, his eyes bulging. “Those evil motherfuckers,” he growls.

“I just want to leave. Can you please just help me leave?” I beg.

“I’ll kill them,” Mark hisses.

“No, you won’t. They’re not worth it, but I do need your help getting to a hotel. Penelope told me that they can’t take my trust fund, so I have plenty of money. I just need to leave,” I say calmly, despite the tears that are rolling down my cheeks.

“Tell the fuckers, I quit,” Mark shouts to Mrs. Humphries.

She nods. “I’m only staying to keep an eye on Miss Penelope, or else I’d quit too. I don’t trust them enough to leave her here alone, even if all I can do is watch. Take care of yourself, Miss Izabella,” she says, squeezing my arm affectionately.

“Thank you, Mrs. Humphries,” I say as Mark grabs my case and we leave, walking toward his car.

He drops my case into the trunk as I climb into the passenger seat, keeping my gaze fixed forward and avoiding even glancing at my family home until he’s sitting next to me and we’re driving away. Only then do I risk one last look back at the place my family fell apart, all because of money.

“I’m taking you to the hospital,” Mark tells me.

“I don’t need to go to the hospital.”

“It’s the hospital or the police station, your call,” he growls angrily.

“You know I can’t go to the police. I just need to leave. I’ll be fine.”

“Honey, have you looked at your face? I’m worried something might be broken. I’m taking you to the hospital.”

“Mark,” I say, begging him to understand.

His sigh is pained. “I have a friend who has a private clinic, he’s discreet,” Mark relents.

“Thank you.”

“I’d rather take you to the police,” he mutters. “Fucking assholes.”

Two hours later, we’re back in Mark’s car again. The doctor he took me to insisted on taking X-rays because he thought my jaw might be fractured, but thankfully it’s not. What I do have is a fractured rib, severe bruising, two stitches in my cheek from Mom’s rings, and a script for some painkillers.

Just like my sweet companion, the doctor tried to convince me to go to the police, but I’m not na?ve enough to think any charges would last long before my parents paid off a judge or called in a favor to make them disappear.

“Are you sure about this?” Mark asks for the fiftieth time as we slow to a stop outside the hotel I convinced him to bring me to. “Why don’t you come back to my house? My wife will fuss over you, and you can decide what to do next, where to go.”

“I appreciate the offer more than you will ever know, but I don’t want to impose on you and your family, and I shouldn’t involve you in my problems more than I have already,” I assure him.

“It’s no imposition. My daughter is only a year younger than you, and I’d rather you were somewhere safe,” he says imploringly.

“I’ll be fine. You’ve helped me more than you realize. I don’t know how to thank you,” I say, my voice cracking a little.

“You’re a good girl, Miss Izabella.”

“Please call me Izzy,” I say, offering up the nickname that Gulliver uses and that I’ve become fond of.

“Miss Izzy, please come home with me. I really don’t like the idea of leaving you alone and hurt at a hotel.”

“I promise I’ll be absolutely fine, but you have my cell phone number and I have yours, so maybe we can stay in touch?” I say, feeling silly for asking but needing a link to someone who cares about me.

“Sweetheart, I never had any intention of just leaving you here and not checking up on you. I want you to let me know once you decide what you’re going to do. If you change your mind and want to come and stay with me and my family, the offer is open indefinitely,” he says, reaching over and squeezing my hand comfortingly.

“Thank you,” I choke out, my voice cracking as tears fill my eyes. He squeezes my hand again and then climbs out of the car, opening my door like he has a thousand times before. He grabs my case from the trunk, then escorts me into the hotel.

The staff eyed me warily, politely ignoring the state of my face, despite their obvious curiosity. I’m sure I’m not the first person they’ve had check in who looks like she just went two rounds with a cage fighter, but I still haven’t seen my own reflection, so maybe I do look worse than I imagine.

With my room key in hand, I reach for my case.

“I can bring it up to your room,” Mark says.

I smile and sigh. “I can manage, Mark. This is your night off, you should be with your family.”

“I don’t like leaving you here, Miss Izzy. You need people to take care of you, and my wife…well, Ronnie, she knows how much I worry about you,” he says, his brow furrowed and his lips turned down into a worried frown.

Pressing a soft kiss to his cheek, I smile shakily. “Thank you, Mark. Tell Ronnie I said thank you to her too.”

Nodding, his lips are turned down into a frown as I take the case from him and head for the elevators, smiling and lifting my hand in a small wave as the doors close on me, leaving me all alone.