Chapter 14 Dove
DOVE
The door is ajar when I arrive home. My mother always took pride in keeping the white door pristine. She had a thing about cleanliness, but there are muddy prints all over it.
That isn’t the only thing that I notice that is wrong, it’s the deathly silence.
The house was never silent. She hated silence; she said if it was silent she was sure to go insane, so she always had some noise in the background whether it be the radio or some show playing on the television but this was deathly silent that I was sure you’d hear a pin drop.
Swinging open the door, fear shoots through my body. I know something is wrong. I can feel it. The tapping of my footsteps on the ground makes me shudder. It shouldn’t be this quiet.
Opening the door to the living room, the scent of copper and dread fills my body. The door squeaks as it pulls open. Blood pools on the ground. It’s thick and red. It reminds of something out of a horror movie.
There’s nowhere to walk that I wouldn’t step in the pooling crimson blood that is laced across the floor, I look at walls because the scent and sight of blood is turning my stomach but that’s no better, blood is smeared across the usually light patterned walls.
I half expect to see my father in the corner reading the morning paper and sipping on a black coffee and my mother playing whatever classical music gets her creative flare going as she paints her next masterpiece at her easel but all I can see is blood, it’s everywhere. A mist of red clouds my thoughts.
I dare not walk any further into the room that no longer looked like the happy home I remembered.
Then I see a bundle of what would be body parts stationed on my mothers floral rug, I’d think that it was fake, it didn’t seem real but I spot her shawl that she always wore around her neck in a mass of the blood and bones.
The pain shoots straight to my now breaking heart but I don’t even have chance to mourn them, heavy footsteps come closer, I look up at the six foot shadowy figure in front of me, dressed in black with eyes as black as night staring back at me and that’s when it finally happens.
I crumble, a sharp piercing scream rips from my throat full of pain and agony.
The memories haunt me even in my dreams. I can’t escape them. They follow me around like a dark passenger that won’t let me be free.
I wake shaking, with tears falling down my face. The nightmare feels like I’m reliving the last moment I saw my parents, and it breaks my heart all over again.
I feel warm arms wrapped around my body. I don’t even try to fight him; I need this. It’s comforting, so I just lay there in his embrace, waiting for the shock of the memories to disappear back into the darkest corners of my mind until they decide to resurface again.
“What gives you such terrible dreams, little bird?” He whispers in my hair.
“Bentley James.” I regret the words as soon as they leave my lips, but I can’t take them back. I’ve finally said his name out loud, and it’s like poison on my tongue.
He strokes my hair and turns my body towards his, offering comfort. I almost forget that he’s holding me against my will as he soothes the last drops of my nightmare out of my body.
“Feeling better, little bird?” It’s almost like he cares, but I know better. I’m just a toy he likes to play with.
I sniffle and nod my head in response. I’m scared if I try to speak that my voice will break and I will once again be a blubbering mess.
“Do you want to talk about it?” I shake my head because I didn’t want to talk about it. What was there to say that my parents just drew the short straw that day when the madman that got his kicks from torturing and murdering people chose our house.
It had been eight years since that fateful day and even though I knew he couldn’t hurt me, he still haunted my dreams and my memories. I wouldn’t be free of him until he was six feet under.
“Are you hungry?” He asks me, and I scrunch my nose up.
“More cum for breakfast.” I groan.
“No.” He stalks out of the room, leaving me with my thoughts and even though he is gone, for the first time in eight years, I don’t feel alone.
A few tears and he had turned into a teddy bear. What was happening? Had I been sucked into a black wormhole? Perhaps I’d entered the twilight zone because this couldn’t be the same man that had kept me locked in a dark torture chamber where he fed me nothing but his cock for three days.
The door swings open and he’s carrying a tray, but I can’t help the giggle that falls out of my mouth. I even kick my feet a little.
“Something funny, little bird?”
I look at him, this manly, tall, tattooed scary man who walks in with a serving tray wearing a floral apron that you’d expect your grandma to wear while she was baking cookies.
He doesn’t look amused but I don’t care, I haven’t laughed since he thought it was a good idea to kidnap me and if I was stuck here, I might as well find my kicks where I can get them.
He sets the tray down on the bed and my eyes widen. There’s a bowl of porridge, toast with marmalade, fresh orange juice and oh—my—god; coffee.
“You did all this—for me?” I choke out.
“You’ve been a good girl. Good girls get nice things and bad girls—.” My eyes widen and I tuck my teeth between my bottom lip. “Don’t do that.” He scolds.
“Do what?” I ask innocently.
“You know what? Now open wide.”
He tilts a spoonful of porridge toward me, honey-drizzled, just the way I like it. My lips hover just shy of the spoon.
“Go on,” he says, and a glint in his eyes dares me to resist.
“Did you lace it with something?” I ask, my voice sharper than I intended.
A slow smirk. “If I did, little bird, would you even know?”
The hair on the back of my neck prickles, but I’m not sure if it’s from fear or… something darker, something that almost feels like a thrill. I’m disgusted with myself, and yet, as the warm taste of honey spreads over my tongue, a part of me is… grateful.
And that terrifies me more than anything.
I chew on the last spoonful of porridge as he watches, his eyes lingering in a way that’s unnerving. My stomach twists, half from hunger, half from anxiety, and part of me wants to spit it out just to break this strange power he has over me. But I don’t. I swallow and he pushes the tray away.
“Good girl,” he says, leaning in so close that I can feel the warmth of his breath against my skin. There’s a softness in his tone that feels like mockery, but there’s something else, too. Something that makes my skin crawl and shiver at the same time.
“Why am I here, Ashton?” I manage, keeping my voice low and steady, despite the fury building up inside me. “What do you want from me?”
His gaze shifts, dark and unreadable, and he just stares for a long moment, studying me like he’s deciding how much to say.
“I want you to understand, little bird,” he finally says, tracing his thumb down my cheek in a way that’s almost tender. “Sometimes it’s easier to see the world for what it is when everything you thought was real is taken away.”
The words linger in the air, leaving a heaviness that makes it hard to breathe.
I want to slap his hand away, to scream, to do anything to shatter this strange, twisted intimacy between us.
But something inside me hesitates. There’s something in his eyes, something haunting and broken, and for a second I see a flicker of vulnerability in his expression.
“I don’t want to understand you,” I reply, my voice wavering. “I just want to go home.”
He chuckles, a low, humorless sound. “Home? Do you even know what that is anymore?”
His words cut deep, stirring memories I’d buried long ago—the fighting, the loneliness, the feeling that I never really belonged anywhere, not even in my own family.
It’s almost like he knows things he shouldn’t, things he couldn’t.
A pang of anger rises up in my chest, twisting my grief into something dark and furious.
“Don’t pretend you know me, Ashton.” I glare at him, my voice dripping with defiance. “You’re nothing but a sadistic coward hiding behind your twisted games.”
A spark flashes in his eyes, and his mouth twists into a hard line. For a moment, I think he’s going to lose his calm, maybe even lash out, but instead he reaches forward, brushing a strand of hair behind my ear in a way that’s almost… affectionate.
“Oh, but I do know you,” he murmurs, his voice a low rumble that sends a chill down my spine. “I know you better than you know yourself, little bird. And soon enough, you’ll see it too.”
Before I can respond, he stands up, leaving me alone with his words and that unsettling gaze that seems to follow me, even when he’s gone.
I lie back on the bed, the ache of his words sinking in.
There’s something dangerous in him, something terrifying—and yet, a part of me is drawn to it, like a moth to a flame.
I close my eyes, replaying the past few days in my mind, feeling the anger, the fear, and—most terrifying of all—the strange, inexplicable pull toward the man who’s holding me captive.
I can hear his footsteps echoing down the hall as he leaves, and for the first time since I was dragged into this nightmare, I’m left wondering what terrifies me more—the thought of escaping him, or the thought of being right here, under his watchful, dark eyes, forever.