84. Dollie—present day #2
“Do things that piss me off.” One of his fingers points into my face, the bitten-down nail harboring dirt below it. “Talking to him pissed me off. Him being around you pissed me off. But then what do you do? Drop your panties for that murdering scumbag cunt.”
“He’s not.” A broken sob leaves me.
“He’s not what? A killer? You know, I do wonder about that sometimes. Because I remember things you don’t. The two times you waved a knife in my face while screaming, you fucking clown!”
I almost ask, what? When? But the words stay trapped in my throat.
“Isn’t that what was on the wall upstairs?
Was it you, Lancie? Did you kill your parents?
Is that why brother dearest gets to have you anyway he fucking wants!
You’re as fucking broken as him. Waste of fucking space, the two of you.
That Colin guy would have been better off drowning the two of you in that shitty fucking basement.
Maybe he did, one of you. Maybe it was Ambrose…
maybe that time you revived him, you couldn’t really save him, and this is all just your broken mind? ”
“No. He’s not dead.” I shake free from Shane’s hold. “You need to stop doing this!”
Tears fall from my face uncontrollably.
“What?”
“Pretending I lost him.”
“Maybe you have.”
“No,” I choke out. “He’s here. He fed me avocado on toast earlier. He made it pink.” I sob.
“Maybe you did that.”
“No. He had Nyx fix the yard for me.”
“Maybe I did that.”
“No! Why are you lying!” I scream, agony wrapping around me.
Bubbles barks, siding with me again, wanting this monster out of our house.
“Maybe I just have fun breaking you. I even get tips from my mother on how to do it. Who knows.”
“Well, it’s fucking done now. I fucking hate you, and I fucking hate her. Get the fuck out of my house!” I point to the door, my arm, lips, and entire body rattling with nerves.
He laughs again, the cold and cruel sound lingering in my ears as piping bags fly across the room, hitting different areas of the kitchen.
Sealing my lips, I just stare, locking my eyes on the piping bag closest to us that sits on the floor.
Bubbles goes to investigate. “Don’t eat that.” I bang the wall with one hand. Shane, still gripping my other hand too tightly, pulls me through the kitchen. He opens the door and uses his free hand to drag her outside by her longer curls.
“Don’t do that! Don’t hurt her!”
“It doesn’t hurt the stupid fucking animal. Why do we even have her? We’re stuck here looking after a fucking dog we didn’t even get to pick.”
“There is no us. She’s mine. Ambrose got her for me, and I love her.”
“And him, right?”
He leans in, waiting for an answer, and I shrink in on myself.
To my surprise, he lets me go and turns away, and I do the same, walking on trembling legs, with tunnel vision to the empty workspace across the room. The more distance between us, the easier it is to breathe.
If I tell him I’m a killer, will he leave?
Will he fear me the way I fear him?
I set the perfect cake down in a safe space where it can rest.
I wish I had a safe space, too.
Ambrose. He’s that for me.
6:22 p.m.
Where the fuck is he?
As if Shane hears my thoughts, noise screams out behind me. The metallic echo lets me know the drying cutlery has hit the wall and descended to the floor with the piping bags.
With the cake no longer in my hands, their shaking worsens, and I can’t force myself to turn around, even as footsteps stomp closer.
Time to react is against me. Shane is too fast.
Harsh fingers grab my hair, ripping so many strands from the root. The unyielding grip sends me forward, my face smashing down into the cake I’d spent hours on and ruining the only thing that had brought me solace today.
Chunks of vanilla and white chocolate race down my throat, both attempting to choke me as my mouth opens instinctively for air. My nostrils clog with frosting, and my poor breathing only worsens my struggle as I try to detangle Shane’s fingers from my hair.
“All I fucking wanted was him out of your life.” He pulls me back until my neck strains. His mouth veers close to my ear. His hate is loud and clear and echoing as he slams me forward again.
Different ingredients stain my face as it plunges into the cake for the second time.
He pulls me back again.
“But you couldn’t fucking do that, you stupid cunt.”
I don’t get to lie to him, to pacify him with words that will remove his hands from me. I’m too busy choking on cake crumbs and tears. And that isn’t good enough.
Frosting smears my hair as he forces my head into the cake once more.
It hangs on my wet lashes, making it hard to see him as he forces me around.
Strands of hair are deposited into the cake box as Shane shakes them from his fingers.
Those fingers and blunt nails move to my face, cutting through the frosting on my cheeks, bruising me, and causing pain to my gums.
“Answer my fucking question. And with the fucking truth, or I’ll gut you, like you did Daddy.”
Sadness leaks out in loud wails.
There’s nothing inside Shane now that resembles the boy I once cared so much about. His pupils, blown with rage, make him the scariest thing I’ve ever seen. His tone is different—almost demonic. His look and actions are so manic.
I want to fight back, but I can’t move. My stiff legs betray me by not letting me run. My mouth betrays me by begging him to stop.
“Please...” I beg, and I feel a trickle of water spread down my legs.
The word angers him, the sight of my terror amplifies his feelings, and his fingers stab deeper into my flesh. My tears collide with them, but the cold stare he has on me tells me all I need to know. He does not care about me or what he’s doing right now.
He’s hurting me again, and he doesn’t feel a thing.
Would he go further this time?
Would he kill me?
I can’t find out.
Because finding out will result in me having to face my parents. Without Ambrose to hold my hand.
“Answer me.” Evil still leaks from his tone, and his face changes before my eyes. A heinous-looking clown snarls in my face, and I sob.
“No,” I whisper, struggling to get the sound out as his hand squeezes my cheeks. “I couldn’t stay away from him.”
Shane doesn’t let go.
The sound of the front door slamming indicates the man I love is home.
The fear that this is all about to get worse fades away as Shane’s hold finally drifts away, sliding down my jaw to my arm.
“Oh, look. He’s home.” Now, he’s whispering, too.
My skin promises a big purple bruise where his fingers once again dig into me.
Not another word leaves my mouth as he drags me toward the bathroom and whispers a little more hate. “So, let’s make sure he’ll never want to touch you again.”
Shane keeps dragging me, my socks sliding over the tiles, until we reach the toilet. He throws me down to the ground, my knees crunching on impact.
I wince, but he doesn’t even glance my way. Forceful fingers yank up the toilet seat, and the other hand grips my hair with even more force, plunging me into the toilet.
“There’s probably a fucking mess down there. If you were in here last with your chronic little illness. Let’s wash it down.”
“No. Please, Shane. Please.” I choke again, this time on toilet water as Shane pulls the lever while holding my head down. He yanks me back up once the toilet finishes gargling, and he tosses me toward the shower.
I fall to the floor and stay there, huddled in the fetal position on the cold tiles.
A heavy blow catches me in the stomach, stealing my breath. My hand moves there, barely shielding me as Shane’s foot kicks me again.
“Now, stay in here with your dead fucking parents, while your brother and I have a chat.”
His words are a heavy punch to the gut. His mentioning my parents, just as they appear, makes me wonder if Annabelle was wrong in saying he doesn’t see them.
Daddy looks so mad… but his stare isn’t on me. Until the door slams, it stays on Shane.
My heart pounds. Tears drop to the floor where I lie.
“Get up, princess,” an Irish voice encourages me.
I do as Dad tells me, forcing myself up into a sitting position before kneeling, all my joints protesting loudly, needing me to sit back down.
Struggling on, I crawl to the door, both parents in tow. A loud plop on the other side tells me the mushed pieces of my hard work just made it to the trash.
Tears, dozens of them fall all at once. My head pounds like my heart, hurting with each drop of sadness.
Hopelessness settles in my soul. Guilt is still there, too. It stabs into my heart, and the pain stays there, twisting harder and deeper.
My own pulse is all I hear when I feel both of my parents’ hands on my shaking shoulders.
“I’m sorry, Daddy, Mom. I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry.”
And in the tenderness of their touch, I feel forgiveness.
“We love you, Princess. We know you’re sorry.”
Turning, my parents are nowhere to be seen.
Another Irish voice comes from the other side of the door—the one I love hearing so much.
“Where’s Dollie? What the fuck happened in here?”
Turning back to the wood, I sob against the door at hearing the concern in Ambrose’s voice.
He’s right there, the person I need most.
I swallow down the thought, but press my hands flat to the wood, trying to get a little closer to him.
“You say something?” Shane asks, pottering around the kitchen to clean the mess he made while trying to mask the shaking of his voice.
“You heard me, and you heard my question. Where is Dollie?”
“She’s fine. In the bathroom.” Shane adds the last part only after I hear Ambrose near the door. “She really is fine.”
“Why wouldn’t she be? Why the fuck are you here?”
Something is said between them that I miss, but I catch the next part in a thick Irish twang.
“I’ve told you once before that you shouldn’t touch my fucking girl. If I find out you have, I’ll cut each stubby finger from those tiny little hands of yours and shove them down your throat.”
“Your girl?”
“Did I stutter?”
“I was just thinking, don’t you mean your sister?”
“No, you heard me, and we both know what she is. My fucking girl.”
A knock comes on the door.
He’s just on the other side.
“Dollie?”
My teeth chatter, my body shakes, and I sniffle that bit too loudly, but I can’t talk. There’s a pressure in my throat that words can’t seem to get around.
“Are you okay?”
“She just needs some privacy,” Shane butts in. “Stomach problems.”
Please, don’t go. He’s lying. Please, don’t leave me, I beg silently.
Ambrose’s boots move across the kitchen floor, and then the winding noise of the back doors and Bubbles’ barking follows. “Pissed off my dog, too, huh?”
“She was trying to get one of Dollie’s piping bags. So, I put her outside.”
“Oh, was that used on the cake you tossed in the trash?”
“She did that herself. Her hair got in it. You know what a perfectionist she is.”
Whether Shane continues talking or Ambrose replies, I don’t know. All I can hear on the other side of the door is Bubbles, clawing and barking and pawing the handle to get in to me.
Impatience rattles against the wood beyond the barking as another knock comes.
“Hey, unicorn,” Ambrose’s tone is sharper than usual, showing that same emotion. “I’m coming in.”
The door opens slowly, muffling whatever Shane says under his breath.
I slide myself back on the tiles, placing myself directly under the light as Ambrose turns it on. I’m rocking when he takes a single step forward.
The hate on his face shifts from my view as he gives me his back, turning back to Shane. It lasts only a second before he turns back to me.
The tightness in his jaw shows he’s torn between following Shane’s weasel-like footsteps, creeping through the house, and coming to me.
My hand reaches out, and I don’t care that I look desperate. There’s no hiding how terrified I am, my body still quaking.
I need him.