Chapter 33 Valentina
THIRTY-THREE
VALENTINA
“Michael, what’re you doing here?” Panic, familiar and yet more potent than ever, pumps through my veins like sludge. How’d he find me?
Why’d he find me?
Michael sneers at me, and I notice the dark bags under his bloodshot eyes, deep purple and so heavy, they could be weighed down by rocks. He’s thinner than I remember, and his clothes are ratty—far less put together than when he worked for my father as a security guard.
“I’m here to get what I’m owed.” He steps toward me, and the ground tremor beneath his feet.
I shake my head, looking over my shoulder, praying for a miracle.
But like always, I’m alone.
I face him again, offering a placating smile. “I’m sorry, I don’t know what you mean. It’s been years since I’ve even saw you—”
“Don’t play stupid.”
“I’m not sure what happened with you and my father, but that was many years ago. And I no longer run the casino, so I’ve nothing to offer you.”
He barks a laugh, his hand swiping through the air as it points to the house and land around it. “Nothing? You’ve always been a spoiled little bitch.” His eyes pin me, face reddening as he barks another evil laugh. “Sorry, baby. Spoiled little baby girl. Isn’t that what they called you?”
Bile crawls up my throat. I can’t keep it suppressed, the acidic taste coating my tongue as I gag on the memories. Slamming my eyes shut, I try to repress them, but even with my eyes closed, their faces are as vivid as their voices are loud.
Suddenly, the overwhelming smell of gin permeates my mind, and I’m beneath them.
There’s no escaping, and so like when I was just a girl, I don’t even try.
They swarm around me, drowning me in their scent, their feel and sound. No longer do I know up or down, good or evil, soft or hard—I’m simply me, clinging to an existence where I know in my heart I deserve more.
I deserve more.
I don’t know where the thought comes from, but as it forms, it fills me with such confidence, I snap my eyes open and square up against an advancing Michael.
“Touch me, and you’ll fucking die,” I warn, my voice unwavering.
He rolls his eyes, “is playing hard to get your newest trick?”
“I’m not a helpless little girl anymore.”
His arms cross his chest. “That’s a pity. I would’ve loved getting a piece of that innocent fresh ass instead of the used up slut.”
“I was a girl,” I reiterate, consumed with rage as the confession fills me with a dawning understanding.
I was a girl—an innocent girl whose only goal in life was pleasing my father. Was what happened to me my fault the way I’ve always thought, or was it someone else’s? Was it my father’s? Was I taken advantage of, used and then tossed aside?
“Yes,” he mocks. “A girl. A sweet little girl who had a whole bunch of daddies.”
I draw myself up at his crude words. “How fucking dare you?”
“How dare I? You were nothing but a pawn, a play thing, and you killed my son because you thought you deserved some kind of prince charming instead.”
My mouth flops open. His son? I stare at him, completely lost.
Michaels eyes flash. “Yes, you whore. You killed my son. Took me many years to figure it out, but it was you who killed him in that bathroom—you who burned his body like some kind of common criminal.”
A shiver races down my spine. I don’t know how I could have forgotten—Michael was Seth’s father.
“He attacked me,” I state, raising my hand between us to stop his advances.
Michael slaps it away. “You can’t attack a slut.”
It’s Michael standing before me, but it’s my father’s words ringing in my ears.
Something irreversible cracks in my chest, every harbored and hidden hurt flooding out of me.
The memories I’ve clung to for twenty years pour from my heart in a black flood so thick, I feel my heart slow with each exserted pump.
I don’t know when I pull the gun from the waist of my jeans, but I hold it in the space between us, my hand steady as I point the barrel at Michael’s decaying face.
“You can attack a slut. He attacked me, and he died for it. You move, and you’ll face the same fate.”
He laughs, his shoulders shaking with the force of it. “You’re going to kill me? Really? You don’t even know how to wipe your own ass, much less fire a gun.”
And then, he lunges.
I’ve only a split second to decide who I am: the girl who finally succumbs to the horrible circumstance of her life or the woman who wants to be more than the circumstances of her life.
His hand wraps around my wrist with such determination, I feel the bones threaten to snap. I scream, yanking with the full force of my weight, but it’s not enough. He grapples with my gun hand, trying to twist me and, in turn, twist the gun from my grasp.
But for the first time in my life, I feel prepared for this.
To save myself.
I scream again, not out of fear or pain, but out of pure, unfiltered rage and heartbreak. I scream as my knee connects with his balls just the way Faith showed me to only days ago.
Then, I thought I was incapable of protecting myself. Now, I know I have no other option.
He groans, dropping to the ground, his hands gripping the space between his thighs.
“You slut! You’ll fucking pay for that,” he roars, the adrenaline or alcohol making his body seemingly numb to the pain. He lunges again, this time taking out my knees.
I fall to the ground with a sickening crash, my head reverberating against the sand. His weight presses down on me, the full frame of his body settling like a boulder between my thighs. I flail, my free hand scratching at his face, my gun-wielding one gripping the handle with everything I have.
“Give me this fucking gun,” he bellows in my face, spittle spraying.
“Get off me,” I scream back. Finally, I find purchase in his skin, sinking my fingers deeply into his neck, drawing blood. One of his fists connects with my jaw, making the sky fade for the briefest of moments.
When I open my eyes again, he’s reaching for the gun again, a desperate look filling his eyes.
He’s never going to stop.
This is a man with nothing to lose. I’m not the target, just the thing standing between him and his oblivion. I understand him, his rage, his uncontrollable hatred.
But I won’t be him. Not anymore.
I kick up again with enough force that he rolls off me, clutching his stomach. I scramble to my feet, holding the gun up, readying for whatever comes next.
“I said if you attack me, I’ll kill you. This is your last warning.”
He chuckles, the sound sending a fresh wave of goosebumps skittering down my body.
His head lulls side to side in the sand.
“I’ll never stop until I get what I’m owed.
You’ll give your body over, or I’ll fucking take it.
One way or another, you’ll be giving me the flesh you so unashamedly took. My son was everything I had.”
For a second, my heart stutters with renewed understanding, and then his leg sweeps out, knocking me to the ground.
This time, he grips my ankles, pulling me beneath him.
Instead of reaching for the gun, like he’s confident I won’t use it, he rips at the button of my jeans.
The fabric gives way easily, exposing the flesh beneath.
I scream again, pushing at him, but he doesn’t budge as he nudges my thighs wider, making room for his grotesque frame. “You’ll wish you were dead when I’m finished with you,” he growls.
What he doesn’t know is he’s way too late for that. I’ve wished I was dead every day since I was fifteen.
But I won’t go down like this. I haven’t survived what I have to give up now—not for anyone.
If I’m going down, it’ll be on my own terms. “I said, get off me,” I whisper a final time, and as he raises his hate filled eyes to mine, I fire.