Chapter 9 #3
“You are the worst, you bastard,” I said tightly.
“You made Stanton believe until his death that you thought he was the traitor and you hurt Kjertan deeply.” And you wanted to kill me!
I remembered how much strength he must have had even though he was no more than four inches taller than me.
And now, only now, when I saw him again with the cowboy hat, did I realize why I had estimated my attacker to be so tall.
The hood. The fine netting. They had deceived me.
There had probably never really been eyes behind it!
Maybe he had seen much further down through tiny slits.
“I hate you,” I heard myself say because I couldn’t stop what was coming anyway.
For a moment, there was silence. Like that snow-white, comatose silence in my head only real.
And trapped in that terrible void, I stared at Noah’s hands, now clenched into fists as he strode toward me.
I saw his engagement ring glinting in the light and then someone in the basement turned on music. Roaringly loud. Some Pink song.
I backed away, but Billy and Maury suddenly held me firmly.
I tried desperately to think of something nice like Dad always preached to me when I was afraid of thunderstorms. I thought of Nathan and his laughter, and about the Palace of Shards, but the pain that struck me was all-encompassing.
Noah’s first punch to my stomach made my legs buckle, but they held me upright, and he struck again while I was still gasping for breath.
Red panic flashed before my eyes and the feeling of not being able to breathe rendered me defenseless.
They shoved my head against the wall hard, but not too hard and they hurled me across the room, causing me to lose my balance and fall over the rickety table.
Repeatedly, they slapped my face and ridiculed my attempts to defend myself.
And when I was lying on the ground, whimpering with fear, they mocked me before kicking my arms and legs with their boots.
For a while, I didn’t know whether I was awake or unconscious, everything happened as if behind a black-red veil of pain.
At some point, I heaved myself onto all fours and tried with my last strength to get out of their reach, but Noah grabbed my arm, pulled me up, and pressed me against the wall by my neck.
“She suffered,” he screamed. All I could see were his huge pupils, which were bubbling like oil.
“Like a damn animal in a damn laboratory.” His hot saliva sprayed my face.
“She was bleeding from her eyes and ears and there was nothing I could do to help her! No one could! Not even the damn doctors at the damn hospital in Portland. They had never seen anything like it. All I could do was rock her in my arms until she finally died. That fishing net would have been a merciful death for you.” Grabbing me by the neck, he yanked me from the wall and shoved me away, but I couldn’t catch myself, and I fell and hit the floor with my back and head.
I screamed and my field of vision exploded in sparkling colors.
I lay there motionless, blinking weakly, but my senses were no longer working as they should be. I couldn’t see anything clearly. Pink sang something about “90 Days” as Noah continued yelling.
“That’s enough for now!” I heard someone say in the immediate vicinity.
Isaac.
A fear I had never known before crept into me.
I lay there almost unable to move, my body filled with pain.
Blood collected in my mouth, which I repeatedly swallowed.
At some point, there were flashes, one after the next, but that might also have been my burned-out synapses.
Then, a rough hand turned my head. I couldn’t do anything about it.
The next flash was so bright it pierced my skull so deeply that I almost started to cry.
But I shouldn’t cry because it would cost me too much strength, even breathing was strenuous so that it almost ruptured my lungs.
As if through a tunnel, I heard Isaac send the men out.
When the door shut, a faint light burned, stinging my eyes.
It became quiet and I heard footsteps. A shadow covered me. I recognized Isaac. He sat on the floor next to me and raised his hand.
“No!” I hated myself for begging, but he didn’t hit me.
He gently brushed a chin-length strand of hair from my face, but his eyes still held that terrible desire that wanted to destroy me—body and soul.
I want you , whispered his topaz-colored gaze, the only thing I could truly see clearly.
And I knew then what he would do, that horror rising inside me like a writhing snake.
Without me realizing it, he rolled me onto my side for a moment and tied my hands behind my back even though I was already defenseless.
No. No. No . I reared up, but he climbed over me and ripped off my old t-shirt, which immediately gave way because it was threadbare.
Then he took off my boots and pants. I wasn’t wearing any underwear because we hadn’t found any that fit in the cabin.
My heart was pounding from fear, pain, and shame.
Because of the feeling of absolute helplessness.
I lay completely naked under him, unable to move, every breath torture.
I couldn’t do anything, so I turned my head to the side, tears streaming from my eyes.
He knelt between my legs and pulled the dark green shirt over his head. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a gigantic tattoo emblazoned on his torso, a green-and-black crocodile or some other monster, its mouth wide open as if it wanted to devour me.
“I’ve been waiting for this for so long.” His voice sounded dark, impatient, and throaty, almost lustful like that of a lover. “Do you know what happens when someone like me ends up in prison? Young. White. Not necessarily ugly.”
I couldn’t even shake my head.
“No idea what other inmates do to someone like that?”
I barely heard what he said. I smelled his sweat, drowning me as if he was already inside me, leaving me feeling sick.
Isaac leaned forward, grabbed my jaw, and turned my head so I had to look at him.
“Handsome, they called me. Sometimes Yellow Eyes or Prince.” As if through a poorly adjusted lens, his outline was blurred.
Unyieldingly, he stared at me as he shoved a handful of nuts into his mouth and chewed thoroughly before swallowing.
“Maybe I’ll kiss you today, maybe not.” He leaned even lower, his thin lips almost brushing mine as he squeezed my breasts.
“Do you think this kiss would kill you, little lady?” His tongue drew wet circles on my cheek, leaving a burning trail of fire. “Would you choke on it?”
Even I felt my eyes widen.
“So that means yes?”
I wanted to push him away as I tugged at the restraint, but naturally, it didn’t give way. I shook my head, again and again, briefly and quickly, dazed by fear, powerlessness, and the pain of the blows. “No…please…”
He laughed, sat upright, and rubbed my nipples with his thumbs until they hardened from the purely physical stimulus.
“Seven hundred and twelve times the men in prison had fun with me. Sometimes, several times a day. Sometimes, they even flipped a coin to decide who I belonged to for a week. I want you to know how that feels…because it was your dear daddy who made sure they locked me up. Innocent. Completely naive.”
My head was pounding and my ears were ringing. I heard the clink of a belt and vaguely noticed him taking off his pants.
Desperate, I reared up one last time, filled with the deranged hope that he would stop at the last moment, but he just slapped me brutally across the face. Then he forced himself into me. Raw and with all the hatred he had accumulated over the years.
Blood and tears covered my cheeks. The pain was like nothing I had ever known. It burned, tore me apart inside, but when I screamed, he covered my mouth.
I tried desperately to shut off my senses, but couldn’t.
I was frozen, unable to move but aware of everything, disjointed and distorted.
It seeped into my brain like acid into soft skin: His moist, hot breath, heavy on my face, his hands grabbing my bottom, and squeezing my breasts, pulling at my hair; my body scraping the wood from the impact, that subtle scraping and the sounds of sex.
I could smell him. I could hear my breath being forced out of me in spurts and I could feel how much my fear and helplessness excited him.
Again and again, he almost brushed his lips against mine, deliberately gasping into my mouth and thrusting harder and deeper as my fear grew.
I didn’t want to die, not today, and at the same time, I wished I were already dead.
Repeatedly, I closed my eyes to escape him, but then he hit me and demanded that I look at him.
When he sat up a little, I looked closely at his crocodile tattoo that stretched across his upper body.
The green-and-black head ended above his belly button and the body and tail stretched up over his upper arm.
My daze brought it to life. Every time he thrust, the yellow eyes flickered like flames and the dark mouth widened, black bursts of fire shooting out like a dragon.
Burning with heat. Burning inside me. The hard scales spread and stung my skin, and when Isaac came inside me with a rough, triumphant sound, the crocodile pulsed and twitched in time with his body.
It was over. His muscles relaxed and he pulled out of me.
Briefly, very briefly, he drank moonshine that was brought to him, smoked, and left me on the floor like an empty shell only to rape me again.
It lasted all night and it only stopped when the sliver of light peeked through the window again.
It was little more than a premonition, a forewarning that I would not survive the next night if Isaac repeated this.
I lay on my back on the floor, staring at the ceiling, feeling nothing but pain while he pulled on his pants. Pain in every fiber of my being.
As Isaac approached, I flinched. “I’ll let the others come now,” he said.
I cried. Unable to hold it back any longer, I only heard the deep sobs coming out of me like thunderbolts.
“You really believe that,” Isaac said at some point before he untied my bonds.
“There, put this on!” He threw me a t-shirt, the dark green one he had worn hours ago.
I didn’t dare resist, but I couldn’t manage to sit up either because it felt like my ribs were piercing my lungs.
He knelt over me again and put it on me. It smelled disgusting, soaked in his scent and sweat. Suddenly, I also felt sticky and damp between my legs. My stomach cramped and Isaac patted my cheek.
“Thanks for the night, little lady,” he said before he left.