Chapter 29 Power
Power
Déjà vu was a strange feeling. It could never be explained or understood, yet just about every human on the planet experienced it on more than one occasion. It didn’t creep up on you. Didn’t warn you of its approach.
It just…happened.
Suddenly, you’re reliving unsolicited memories you don’t recognize. And even though you tell yourself that you can’t possibly know them, there’s no denying the taste of familiarity that clings to your tongue.
I could feel it happening again, the beginnings of my brain being warped by something dark and sinister. That magnetic pull that forced my mind to stretch in directions beyond its ability, spreading me so thin that even the shadows could bleed through.
I recalled the agony of my heart breaking into pieces all over again, but my heart couldn’t understand why it felt different this time. Somehow, that familiar crack went deeper than before, the fractured fragments carrying serrated edges that ripped and sawed their way through me.
It allowed for an unusual kind of pain to seep inside, filling in the gaps that tore past the healed residual scar tissue from before. And now, it had made a home for itself in the ugly new cavern it had constructed deep within my chest.
I remembered what it was like to feel dead inside. To watch my soul being dragged from my body and left out in the cold to rot, deteriorating right alongside my pride and dignity.
It was the aftermath of a ruthless execution conducted by three venomous little words slicing their way up my throat and severing all hope of revival.
Every time I was forced to give voice to them, another arrow pierced into my back. And I didn’t know how many I could take before the agony finally knocked me off my feet and sent me face-first into a delusion that would paralyze me forever.
I had to figure out a way to prevent those lies from taking root—from trapping me in a cage I wasn’t sure I could always convince myself didn’t actually exist.
God, I was so tired. So tired of having to refashion another set of armor to fight a new battle that would still leave me battered and bloodied in the end.
I had considered too many times what it would be like if I just gave in, if I just stopped fighting. And it was a hideous image. Because even if I did, I knew damn well I’d still be just as fucking miserable as I was now, if not worse.
Every time I thought about it, I could feel myself drowning in a tsunami of self-hatred, and I often wondered if dying would actually be easier than this.
I just didn’t want to be a prisoner of war anymore. It was fucking exhausting and it obviously showed, considering the odd look Sid was currently giving me as I sat on the medical table in his office.
“You look like shit, Jaden. I’ve never seen your neck this bruised before. What the hell did he do now?” he asked, his tone more than serious.
Besides almost kill me? I didn’t want to remember.
I rubbed my tired eyes with the palms of my hands. It was nine in the morning, and I wasn’t prepared for the looming interrogation that Sid would undoubtedly hassle me with.
Stalling, I glanced down at the medical tray containing all the necessary items for today’s procedure. My throat was still hurting too much to speak comfortably after Darren nearly choked the life right out of me.
“I’m surprised he didn’t tell you,” I murmured, my voice cracking as my eyes scanned over the syringe containing the anesthetic.
As grateful as I was that Darren was allowing my expiring birth control implant to be replaced with a new one, it was oddly suspicious.
It had been over eight months since he had declared his intentions to get me pregnant, until a bullet to my ovary thwarted those plans.
And now he was delaying it even more. Had he changed his mind?
Maybe he finally realized that a woman rife with psychological trauma didn’t make for a very suitable incubator for his offspring.
“Tell me what?” Sid asked warily, apprehension coating his voice.
I avoided his insistent gaze, preferring to focus on the subtle scratches in the medical tray, cataloging every instrument on display.
“Well…after nearly strangling me to death—”
“That much is obvious,” Sid deadpanned.
My glare shot up at his interruption. Was it really that obvious?
“He took me back into the basement.”
Sid stood silent for a moment, but his eyes were so loud I didn’t even need to look his way. I could feel him studying me up and down for other visible injuries, but the only one that mattered was the one still festering inside my head.
“Why?” he asked.
I took a deep breath and admitted my crime. “I lied to him.”
He cocked a confused brow. “Must have been one hell of a lie to warrant that kind of reaction.”
I nodded.
“Why did you lie?”
I paused, wondering how careful I should be. “To protect a friend.”
Sid frowned. “You don’t have friends, Jaden. You know this.”
I nodded slowly in agreement. I didn’t have friends, not in this world at least. Not anymore. But at that particular moment, I had something worth protecting, friend or not. And I made my choice.
“How long were you down there?”
I shrugged, then grimaced, my back still aching from Darren’s onslaught. “Maybe eighteen hours, give or take.”
It wasn’t like Darren had just automatically released me from my trauma-inducing confinement. The results of his objective had to be cemented in at least two more times before he was convinced that my performance was genuine enough to fall for.
I couldn’t remember the last time I had spent that many hours in his arms like that, reciprocating the tenderness and passion he tried to suffocate me with.
And when the last of my energy had been spent on reinforcing his gratification, I woke up to the blissful relief of my dog licking my face in our bedroom.
Sid’s eyes sharpened as he watched me reminisce. “That’s much shorter than I would have expected.”
Apparently, I was a better liar than I thought.
I nodded. “I did what I had to in order to get out.”
“And what was that?”
A kind of liquid fury settled in my veins as I recalled what it felt like to hang myself with those three little words. What it felt like to choke to death on them. And it gave me the strength to finally meet Sid’s gaze.
“A lie got me in there. So Darren thought it fitting that only a lie could get me out,” I said, keeping my eyes trained on him, ignoring the pain in my throat. “But I had to make him believe it.”
His jaw started to clench, his lips folding into a thin line as his brain began firing off potential lies that Darren might favor. But there was only one true conclusion.
“What did you tell him, Jaden?” he asked, his voice suddenly becoming rough and raspy.
My fingers subconsciously glided over the wedding rings on my left finger. Those bands that wrapped tightly around my skin and bones were the catalysts for the entire shitstorm I’d recently endured.
If I hadn’t sent Kayla off with them, would Darren have had the same suspicions? Would he have ever really known? I doubted it, which made the whole situation entirely my fault.
“I told him exactly what he wanted to hear,” I replied, my voice grave. “What he’s always wanted to hear.”
Sid visibly tensed, worry glossing across his eyes.
I lowered my gaze and nodded. “That I loved him.”
Sid’s chin snapped up at my words, a deep frown in his brow as he processed my revelation. I couldn’t imagine all the medical and professional opinions he was forming in his head, but I was willing to bet it would be fascinating to comb through.
After a few moments, he shook his head and slid his eyes back to mine.
“And how did he react after you said those words?”
My body involuntarily shuddered at the memory of the most sickening smile I’d ever seen split Darren’s face in two. He’d come so hard after I said those words, the animalistic roars from his throat bouncing off the walls and ravaging my ears.
I’d never seen him come apart like that—to unravel so viciously from his triumph over me. And it terrified the absolute shit out of me.
“Like a seasoned cocaine addict experiencing his first taste of meth.”
Sid sighed as he pinched the bridge of his nose, quietly cursing under his breath.
“I get what he’s trying to do,” I added. “He thinks if I say it enough times, eventually I’ll start to believe it.”
Sid nodded. “It’s a fair theory.”
His choice of words didn’t go unnoticed. Theory. And that was all it was, just a theory. It didn’t mean it would come true. Saying those words felt like I was swallowing battery acid, but I knew eventually my tongue would adapt to their taste whether I wanted it to or not.
My only hope was that my emotional response would never grow any further than passive indifference to those words rather than the hopeless desire I knew Darren was gunning for.
“Yeah,” I murmured, looking back down at the medical tray. “And it’s going to remain a theory.”
Sid followed my vision, frowning slightly at the tray like it had offended him. I watched as his hands turned into fists at his sides, his knuckles turning white as he clenched them. He actually looked…angry.
Shit.
“They’re just words, Sid. They can’t have that much power,” I offered, hoping to resolve some of his clear discomfort.
He tilted his head to gaze over at me, his brow softening as he looked at me with obvious pity and concern. And I fucking hated him for it.
“Sid. Don’t,” I warned. I didn’t need his fucking pity. In fact, I didn’t even know why I said anything at all. Maybe I just wanted to know what he thought about it, and now I had the answer I never should have asked for.
“Jaden, I—” Sid abruptly turned away as another one of his aggressive coughing fits interrupted his words, his elbow covering his mouth as he stumbled halfway across the room.
“Jesus, Sid, are you okay?” I asked, my feet ready to hit the floor to help him.
He nodded but continued to cough a few more times before he finally caught his breath with an odd wheeze and straightened.