Chapter 15 #4
Andreas’s eyes light up in a disturbing way.
Before I can react, he seizes my shoulder, throws me face down on the bed, and strips off my robe in one violent tug.
My cry of surprise and pain is muffled by the blanket.
I lift my head to scream for help, but before I can, Andreas plants a hand on the back of my head and forces my face into the mattress.
He clambers on top of me, pinning me down.
He’s not very athletic, but he is heavy, and that’s all it takes to keep me trapped beneath him.
I can’t process what’s happening to me. It doesn’t feel real. I don’t even feel scared, just shocked, until I feel Andreas trying to unfasten my lingerie. “Sick and twisted. That’s what you are. A nasty little slut who needs to be taught a lesson.”
As I struggle ineffectually, I try to scream or make any noise at all, but the only thing that comes out is a muffled buzzing noise.
Over my struggling, I hear the sound of a car engine outside.
I instantly recognize Damiano’s car. The engine races and then grows quieter as he drives out the gates.
I sob in despair. He can’t have known that Andreas was still in the house.
I picture the red taillights disappearing, and a desperate, smothered cry rises up my throat.
Damiano, please.
Don’t leave me.
But he’s not coming to save me. Andreas’s fingers are ripping viciously at the fastenings on my lingerie, and any second now, they’re all going to come free.
He’s manhandling me like this in my own house, in my own bed.
I feel my corset come off first, and then he yanks at my suspender belt.
I need to stop panicking and think. What did my kickboxing trainer teach me in the several self-defense classes he gave me?
If I’m pinned face down, I can’t kick or scratch or bite.
I can’t thrust my fingers up my attacker’s nose, or gouge his eyes, or knee him in the balls.
But I can roll to one side beneath him and try to tip him off me.
Using my right elbow and knee as leverage, I fling myself to the left as hard as I can.
Nothing happens. I try again, but still I barely move him.
Andreas swears and shifts his weight so he can get a better grip on me.
At the same time, I screw up my eyes and twist to the left a third time, and Andreas is momentarily off-balance.
I feel his weight shift off me for a fraction of a second, and it’s all the chance I need. I fling myself off the mattress and stumble across the room, tears blurring my vision. I wrench open the door and run down the corridor, screaming at the top of my lungs.
“Help me. Someone help me.”
Mom and Dad’s bedroom door opens, and Mom appears, staring at me in shock.
My hair is sticking to my tearstained face, and I’m crying so hard I can barely get any words out.
I’m so grateful that there’s someone in the house that I fling myself into her arms. “H-he was trying to hurt me. He’s in m-my room. He was going to force himself on me.”
“Lucy, what on earth?” She puts her hand on my shoulder and pushes me away from her so she can get a better look at me. I’m wearing only the thong and the suspender belt. The little clips have all been ripped off the stockings, which are now laddered, and one is falling down to my knee.
She looks past me, and I realize that Andreas is coming down the hallway toward us, his clothes rumpled and his face red with anger. With her hand on my shoulder, she asks him, “Did you do this to my daughter?”
Andreas glares at me as I try to stop crying. Every breath is painful. I wish Damiano would come back. I need Damiano.
When she doesn’t get any reply, Mom raises her voice and calls. “Carlucci, come up here, please.”
But Dad is already at the top of the stairs. When he sees that I’m nearly naked, he frowns in disapproval. Ashamed, even though none of this is my fault, I cover my breasts with my arms and wish that I could sink through the floor and disappear.
“What is going on up here?” he asks, his voice ringing with authority.
Speaking quickly as though he’s anxious to deflect blame, Andreas accuses, “Lucy was wearing her bridal lingerie for her brother. They were practically screwing. You’re trying to marry off a defective woman. You promised me a virgin.”
Promised him a virgin? They’ve all been talking about me like I’m livestock.
Dad’s severe expression doesn’t change as he glances at me and then Mom. “I’m ashamed to admit my youngest daughter can sometimes be disobedient and provocative. But that is all it is. Provocation. Marriage to a strong and steady man like you is all she needs to settle down.”
Andreas stands up straighter hearing Dad take his side.
“Dad, he tried to rape me,” I cry.
“Lucy, be quiet,” he snaps. Mom’s nails dig into my shoulder, reminding me what will happen if Andreas rejects me.
“Maybe I was too forceful,” Andreas says, with a guilty glance at me. “But a husband has to be able to correct his wife.”
“You are absolutely right, Andreas,” Mom agrees.
“Mom, please,” I whimper.
“Lucy, you are being dramatic and emotional. You were mistaken about your fiancé’s intentions, just as he was mistaken when he saw you and Damiano talking in your bedroom.” Mom glances at Andreas. “Weren’t you, Andreas? Isn’t this all just a misunderstanding?”
I look to Dad for help, but his expression is closed, and he won’t meet my eyes. Of course they don’t care if Andreas tried to rape me. Dad’s men will be eager to do the same thing if they’re given the order.
“Maybe you’re right,” Andreas says finally.
Mom smiles placatingly. “We all need a little time to cool off. Tomorrow Lucy will apologize to Andreas for all this upset, and we will continue with planning your wedding.”
“If she’s sincere in her apology,” Andreas says.
“She will be. Won’t you, Lucy?” Mom prompts.
My near nakedness is making me shiver from cold and humiliation. Apologize for nearly being raped? They want me to put on a sweet smile for Andreas and beg him to forgive me for not letting him painfully and violently force himself on me.
From the vile, gloating expression on Andreas’s face, my parents taking his side has thrilled him.
After we’re married, he’ll force me to perform my wifely duty, and no doubt he’ll make it as horrible for me as he possibly can.
If I complain to Mom and Dad about it, my cries will fall on deaf ears.
The gun hidden in my wardrobe is seeming more enticing than ever.
But why should I and Damiano be the only ones to suffer?
A new idea is forming in my mind. A better one than a swift bullet of self-obliteration, or even of retaliation. I can have revenge.
Beautiful, devastating revenge.
At the wedding, in front of everyone—Montonis, Barones, all of Malus—I’ll expose him. I’ll show everyone what he really is. A traitor. A spy. A violent predator who tried to rape me in my own home.
But first I have to convince everyone they’ve broken me.
I turn my face upward to Andreas and beseech him like a broken Lucy would. The Lucy who huddled in misery in the dirt because she was abandoned like a stray dog at ten years old.
“Of course I will apologize. I will be the bride you’ve always wanted, Andreas. I promise.”
He smiles, victorious. He thinks he’s won. He thinks he’s broken me.
He has no idea what’s coming.
At our wedding, I’m going to destroy him in front of everyone.