33. Chapter 32
Chapter 32
T he men had dragged Summer out of the room by the time she heard the last shot.
“Ramiro!” she screamed.
The pain ripping her open inside was so much worse when he didn’t cry out. His silence was terrifying, and her voice broke on her next scream.
Pain bloomed across her face, whipping her head to the side. The shock of it chased her voice away, and her body went limp.
She was naked, and the hands on her were making her skin crawl.
Ramiro was gone. No, he couldn’t be gone. He said he’d always protect her.
“Get her in the damn car.” It was the voice from before. The voice of the older man who had used her to hurt Ramiro. Ovidio Guzman .
The door to their home stood wide open. Only it wasn’t their home anymore, was it? It couldn’t be if Ramiro was dead.
She got a glimpse of the gate beyond the car she was shoved inside. The gate was bent and broken, just as she would be soon.
Summer let the thought skitter away. Ovidio Guzman got into the car with her. He didn’t reach for her. He sat staring out the window, barely looking at her at all.
She lashed out, scraping her nails down his face. The slap she earned in return made her fall back to the seats. A hand gripped her throat, and she couldn’t breathe.
“You’re fucking worthless to me now. He’s already dead.”
Ramiro was dead. The thought sucked out every part of her that mattered. She couldn’t breathe, but she no longer cared that she couldn’t. Her vision dimmed at the edges, and she willed it to increase. Let her die.
“But a promise is a promise.” Ovidio released her. Her breath whooshed back inside, where it stuck as his words washed over her. “I’m going to rape you, just like I told him. Then I’ll let my men rape you. After, I’ll carve that baby out of you. I promised Rodriguez I would, and I keep my promises.” His hand moved to her stomach, reminding her all over again that she was naked as he stroked over the slight bump.
She was pregnant. If she died, her daughter would die, too.
She scrambled for the door handle, only to be slapped again, the pain of it radiating up her cheek.
Summer let out a pathetic whimper, curling in on herself, trying to hide .
The man sucked air through his mouth in a rasping breath. “Drive,” he barked toward the front seat.
She tried to lunge for the door again, and this time he punched her. She welcomed the way her vision dimmed as the fight left her body.
She wasn’t strong enough to get away. She’d never been strong enough to take care of this baby. They’d both die. At least she’d get to be with Ramiro then.
She let the dimming vision take her. In the darkness, she dreamed about Ramiro. He was alive, not hurt at all. He had come for her, just like he’d promised. She was wrapped up in his arms, where no one could touch her.
The light smacks to her face took her from that.
“Wake the fuck up.” Ovidio’s voice dragged her back.
She was on a bed now, but she didn’t remember getting there. Ovidio lay over her body, pushing her into the mattress below, his hand shoved between her legs. The scrape of his fingers inside her hurt.
“Fucking hell. You’re still dripping his cum, aren’t you? That makes me so hard.”
She’d been with Ramiro earlier that night, right before he’d been called away. Was it still the same night?
The fingers were gone. Her skin went clammy as his erection pressed against her. Ovidio’s breath fanned over her face as his weight held her immobile.
“The thought of replacing Rodriguez’s cum with mine is going to get me off too fucking fast. ”
Tears filled her eyes as he shoved into her with a grunt and groan.
“I wanted to make him watch. Maybe he is. I hope Rodriguez’s ghost howls at the way I fuck my cum into you.” His laughter scraped at her insides, multiplying the pain of his thrusts.
Shadowy, taunting laughter joined his in her mind. “She’s not so pure anymore,” her memory whispered.
It was as if that night on the bridge never happened. Ramiro had never found her at all. He’d been a figment of her imagination. One she wanted desperately to cling to.
As the thrusts sped up, became even more painful, she dived into the part of her mind that no one could touch. Ramiro was there. Even if she’d made him up, he was there. She was crying in her apartment, and he’d shown up as always. He held her as she clung to him, burying her sobs into his chest.
Her body was being pushed into the bed as Ovidio raped her, his breath washing over her face even faster as he cried out and spurted inside her.
No. No, that wasn’t happening. Ramiro was holding her in her apartment.
“I’ve got you, baby girl,” he whispered to her. “I’m going to take care of you. I’ll always be with you.”
Tears leaked out of her eyes, but she made no sounds. The weight left her body, letting it curl in a belated attempt to protect itself. Someone else’s cum had replaced Ramiro’s .
She muffled her sob against her knees as her body tightened into itself, and she imagined it was Ramiro’s dress shirt catching her tears instead.
S ome of her favorite moments had been all the times Ramiro had curled up with her on the couch and held her as they watched reruns. He never seemed to get tired of holding her. Ramiro’s reactions to the shows were honest, his chuckles and snorts and murmurs rumbling in her ear. He was so big that his body surrounded her, but that felt safe because she was with Ramiro.
“Wake up.”
She shook her head, snuggling deeper into Ramiro’s body. If she left this moment, there would be pain. She needed to stay right where she was.
“Please wake up, sunshine. We need to get out of here.”
Hope bit into her chest. “Ram?” She wished with all her heart for her dream to be true. Her eyes fluttered open. “Ram?”
“Sorry, sunshine. It’s only me.” Ash’s face came into focus. He wasn’t smiling. He looked hard and cold, his perfect face carved out of ice, his thick, dark hair disheveled. “Can you stand?”
Her body still curled into itself. Every part of her ached, and she tried not to remember what had caused the aches. Vague memories of what Ovidio had done, not just once, slithered in her head, and she whimpered. Time had melded together, enough time that they’d tried to feed her, food she’d refused more than once.
“I’m sorry.” His hands hovered over her. “I’m so sorry.” He wrapped the blanket around her still curled-up, naked body, and his hands shook. She’d never seen his hands shake.
Summer didn’t care. She shut her eyes. She only wanted one thing. “Ramiro,” she whimpered, wishing she still slept. She could see him in her dreams.
“He’d be here if he could.” Ash lifted her from the bed like she weighed nothing.
His words reminded her of reality, and a sob escaped. “He’s dead.” Her voice broke on the word. She shouldn’t say it. If she said it, it’d be true.
“He’s not dead.” Ash’s words made her eyes open. “The doctor is working on him, but he hasn’t woken up yet. So you get me.”
She stared into his dark gaze, searching for the truth.
“He’d be here if he could,” Ash repeated. He wiped at the tears flowing down her aching cheek, but even his gentle touch made her wince. “Sorry,” he murmured, focusing past her on the door.
She wished she could tell him it was okay, but even his arms holding her sent spikes of needles through her skin.
“I-I can walk,” she said .
Summer needed Ramiro. She would have let Ramiro carry her. His arms would be safe, but he wasn’t there. He was alive, just not there. The hope that flared made her lightheaded.
Ash grimaced. “Not a good idea. We’ll move quicker this way.” His hard, worried eyes focused on hers. “Did they…” He swallowed, staring out at the dark hall beyond the door. “Never mind. Let’s get you out of here, sunshine.”
He slipped out of the bedroom and into the hallway. He only made it about halfway down when a gunshot rang out, and they fell. The blanket unraveled as Ash shoved her away. She stared into his panicked face.
“Run!” he shouted, his next shove weaker.
Summer found her feet and ran right into the last person she wanted to see. Ovidio’s hands clamped on to her shoulders.
“Rodriguez’s boys are loyal. I’ll give them that.”
Summer tried to pull free, but his hands were too hard, too tight.
“Dump the body,” Ovidio ordered one of his men before dragging her away. Not toward the bedroom, like she expected. No, he dragged her the way she’d tried to run. She wanted to look back, to thank Ash for trying to save her, but she was too weak to pull away. She stumbled over her feet when Ovidio shoved her into a room.
There were men in the room. Men and a pool table. From her sprawled position on the floor, the view of the pool table was eerily familiar .
The room where her whole life had changed had looked similar to this. She’d been dizzy from whatever the boy had spiked her soda with, and she’d fallen, and more than one boy had laughed. She hadn’t known anyone else was in the room until she heard that laughter. The memory had always been vague before, but now it felt clear, much too clear.
“Teach her what happens when she runs,” Ovidio said.
There was laughter in the room. They were laughing at her. Taunting her.
The high school boys took everything from her. They’d left her broken and ashamed and pregnant.
That’s how she’d ended up on that bridge.
She tried to find that small space in her mind where Ramiro waited, tried to imagine he was with her again.
Instead, she sank into another memory, one that she’d avoided for so long.
“Fuck, she’s crying again. Shut her up.”
A hand covered her mouth, muffling her sob as pain sliced through her from the way the next boy pushed inside.
“Not so pure anymore, are you?” the boy holding her said in her ear.
The one grunting over her held her shoulders down as he moved, making her hurt even more.
Behind his shoulder, the room blurred through her tears. The wood of a pool table was closest, but there were couches nearby, and a dartboard over his other shoulder, the darts sticking out from places other than the bullseye .
The boy on top of her shuddered and slumped.
She couldn’t breathe. A hand covered her mouth and nose, and weight pressed down on her lungs. She saw someone else hovering, but her eyes slid away. She stared at the wood of the pool table instead, stared hard at the swirl in the wood.
“Roll off. Let me have a go at her.”
The hand left her mouth, and she sucked in air, too empty of breath to scream. A new hand clamped down, this one damp with sweat and tasting of salt.
“You’re a slut now. You’ve had more dicks than most of the girls in our school.” The new boy laughed as he tore her open.
That’s what it felt like. She felt ripped and sore and aching, and it wouldn’t stop. It would never stop.
These moments of being unable to move or beg or scream, they were all that she would become.
“You did this to yourself, coming here.” The boy covering her mouth laughed. “This is what you wanted when you snuck out, isn’t it?”
The voice was no longer his. It was her mother’s. “You’ve already spread your legs in sin. God gave you consequences. In order to not lose your soul completely, you’ll have this baby. God wants you to. It’s divine retribution.”
Her feet perched on the edge of a bridge, the idea of jumping calming the panic inside.
Summer opened her eyes to a dark room. She could still feel their hands on her body, pain radiating everywhere. She huddled in the corner near the wall where they’d discarded her like the trash she was.
No one could love her. She’d thrown away God’s offer of forgiveness. All she had left was sin and shame and a brokenness that would never mend.
Ramiro had promised to come, but he hadn’t come. Even he knew she didn’t deserve to be saved.
She closed her eyes, dreaming about the bridge again. Ramiro found her there.
“You want someone to take care of you? I’ll fill that role.”
Summer let him lie to her. Her body shook with pain, and she cried as she clung to that lie.