Chapter 32 BETH
BETH
She wanted to control me. She wanted a puppet.
“Where the fuck are you?” Like an annoying, overprotective husband, Kenzo demanded over the phone placed on the armrest of the couch I was sitting on.
“I’m hearing the echo of my voice,” he pointed out warily. “Is this thing on speaker?”
I was bent over, trying to tie the lace of my boot so I had turned on the speaker when I took the call.
“Yes,” I replied, a heavy sigh breaking out of my lips.
I let go of the shoelace, then lifted the phone into my hand, turning off the speaker.
“Hi.” I placed the phone on my ear, holding it in place with my shoulder before I bent over again to finish up with the shoe.
“Where are you?” I could almost picture his brows pinched together in distraught. “Are you still with him? Girl, this is like two hours later. The fuck have you been up to?”
“Takahashi.” I pulled the phone into my hand again, then sat up, leaning my back against the couch this time. “Why did you call?” My voice was lazy, tinged with exhaustion.
“What have you been doing?” he demanded pointedly, trying to force whatever theory he’d whipped up in his head out of my mouth.
His question, however, dragged out echoes I would rather it be buried layers away in my mind; the memory of Zaghan’s skin scorching mine, the sound of his wicked voice whispering things that pushed me to surrender.
Then there was the weight of his hand wrapped around my throat, my life pulsing beneath the malicious press of his fingers.
I remembered how he made me tremble, how I came apart and hated myself for it.
And just like that, the anger and disgust I felt right after, washed over me all over again. Bitterness curled in my chest, hot red like iron over flame.
My fingers tightened around the metallic device pressed against my ear, my jaw hard as a throbbing sensation started at the back of my skull.
I hated him. I didn’t want him. Yet he ever so quickly disarmed me, left me defenceless and weak, fucking pathetic. I hated every wave of pleasure that coursed through me at his touch. I hated how in that moment, I leaned into the said pleasure, the touch, almost begged for it, even.
I hated the flicker of recognition in his eyes every time he looked at me.
I hated how familiar I felt to him. Who the hell was he and how dare he take control over my life like this?
Who was he to decide my fate? To push me around like a fucking puppet?
He didn’t know me. How dare he act like my life was in his palm, like he knew my beginning and my end?
Who was he? Who the hell did he think he was?
And why was he always winning? Why would I fight so hard, so desperately, and in the end, he still won?
Run. Yes, I could run. Should run. But…Callan. What about Callan?
I was lurking around for Callan. Because somewhere inside that crack, there was still the man I wanted, the man who held the universe in his eyes, the man who looked at me like I was worth everything, the man who thought about me before himself when he dove into the water.
I was waiting for that man. If I ran away, then I would lose him. In the moment when he would finally slip out, I wouldn’t be able to meet him. I needed to endure a little longer.
But what if this monster turned me into something else? What if Callan would return to meet a version of me he wouldn’t recognise?
“Hey, are you there?” Kenzo’s voice slid into my thoughts, distorted and distant, like a radio struggling to find a signal.
“Yeah.” I nodded, clearing my throat, fingers twisting around the loose thread at the hem of my skirt. “Yes, I am.”
I lifted my hand to my face when I felt something warm slide down my left cheek, salty and harsh when it slipped between the crack of my lips.
I lifted my head suddenly. There was a weight of someone’s stare pressing against my skin.
And indeed, there he stood at the end of the hallway that opened into the living room, leaning against the wall. He had a white towel around his narrow waist. Water dripped from his hair, beads of it clinging to his milky skin like dewdrops on glass.
I looked away quickly, pinning my gaze instead, on the lines on my left palm.
He had told me to give him a second to have a quick shower so he could take me back home. I had declined–on his offer to take me home. Believe me, I did.
With my cheeks sullen, eyes blood-shot red from crying a river, my body and spirit worn thin from a battle I lost woefully, I just wanted to go home, away from him. I just wanted the comfort of my room. I wanted to curl into a foetal position and never see the sun again.
But he looked at me then, eyes dark and cold, stripping me of all my powers. And just like that, I lost the fight before I even wielded a sword.
I had been waiting for 30 minutes.
“Your stupid ass mother is back,” Kenzo’s voice returned to me, and when his news settled into my ears, my pulse spiked.
Mother was back?
“The bitch has been blowing up my phone,” he added, irritated. “I blocked her, right? How did she find me again?”
My heart was racing. I didn’t know if it was because of the information Kenzo just shared or because Zaghan was suddenly moving forward now, towards me.
“I’ll head home in a minute,” I murmured, my eyes not shifting from my palm, as if I could read it just like a story, the jagged lines that ran across the pale skin.
My body became aware of his presence with every languid step he took closer to me. It felt like the room was narrowing down on me.
“This is the highest number of calls I’ve received from a woman in years, and that includes Mrs. Takahashi,” Kenzo murmured bitterly, the echo of his voice the only thing keeping me grounded in my suddenly dizzying world.
I could hear the sound of my heart, a vicious drumbeat when Zaghan stood in front of me, clouding my mind, suffocating me with the darkness that curled around him.
“Hey, let me–”
Before I could finish, he had plucked the phone from my grasp, the brush of his fingers leaving behind a familiar, wicked burn.
“Hello?” Kenzo’s voice rang.
“It’s my friend.” I felt the need to confess. But he didn’t even spare me a glance as he scanned the content of the screen, fire burning behind his iridescent eyes, while his jaw remained set in a hard line.
“Beth?” Kenzo called out, almost nervously. “What’s going on over there?”
My fingers clenched the hem of my skirt tighter, my teeth digging into the wall of my cheek until I could swear it bled.
I watched his slender fingers click around the phone still, wandering to places I didn’t know.
Then, some seconds later, I saw the rigid muscles of his face slowly begin to relax, the storm in his eyes clearing. He worked his jaw, ran a hand through his damp hair, then placed the phone back in my hand.
I looked down at the screen immediately. It was displaying Kenzo and I’s chat. He had scrolled all the way up to the conversations of three months ago.
He was searching for something, of course.
He had come out of nowhere and staked a claim on me all of a sudden, forcing me to declare that I belonged to him every little chance he got.
He wanted to know if this thing with Kenzo was platonic indeed or there was a hidden secret.
A secret he wouldn’t have appreciated at all.
“We’ll leave in 15,” he announced in a monotone voice. Then he turned without another word, walking away, hips dipping with every step he took.
“Um…what was that?” Kenzo’s voice echoed from the other end of the line again. But my gaze followed the man hell had placed in my life now, watching the taut muscles of his back flex.
I traced the dark ink sprawling across his back—a double-edged circle that had its borders lined with intricate temys symbols.
Between the twin edges of the circle and at the very heart of the design, the markings intertwined like an ancient script.
A sword was driven straight through the circle’s centre as if piercing the insignia itself.
The tattoo had been there all along, probably as long as the one of a snarling python crawling from his shoulder blade to his neck.
I had caught a fleeting sight of it, and my nails had probably dug into it once, left a mark perhaps, drawn blood right across it.
But this was the first time I was actually taking my time to really look at it.
I wondered what it meant. Both of them; the snake and the symbol on his back.
They seemed detailed and intentional…cruel, when looked at intently.
“Beth?” Suspicion sharpened Kenzo’s tone now. “What did he want? Is everything okay?”
“Uh, nothing.” I shook my head. “It’s nothing. Everything is fine.”
I always told Kenzo everything. I had never left any stone unturned, especially when it involved any relationship I was in.
But for some reason, the thought of him knowing the kind of entanglement I had been in lately terrified me.
I didn’t know why. My heart would start racing the second the thought of telling him crossed my mind.
But it wasn’t Kenzo I was afraid of, that, I knew.
It wasn’t his possible reaction to this that terrified me.
It was something else. I wasn’t sure what it was.
All I knew was, this thing…this rotten thing I couldn’t explain yet was my secret.
I didn’t want anyone else to know. It felt like everything would crumble the moment the truth came out.
“Sure?” Kenzo asked again as I failed to convince him enough. “Are you okay?”
“Yes.” I nodded. “Everything is fine, Takahashi. I promise.”
“Very well then,” he sighed in defeat. “Call me when you get home. That woman seemed pretty pissed that you weren’t home. I told her we were doing homework and you slept off. So go with that.”
“Alright,” I said, hanging up.
My mind drifted to the thought of Mother. I wondered if she bought Kenzo’s lie. And if she didn’t, then I knew what would happen tonight.
I knew what I would wake up tomorrow to see in the mirror.
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