Chapter 13
Damn. I feel like a truck ran over me. My eyelids are so heavy I can barely lift them. It’s like somebody put scotch tape over them. When I do manage to get them open, the light streaming into my room only makes me flinch as my head starts to pound. I quickly squeeze my lids shut again.
Note to self: no champagne with painkillers. Maybe no champagne anymore, ever. That might be a smarter idea.
Shit. Today is the wedding. I’m not going to be able to lie around in bed much longer.
I’m surprised Mom hasn’t already come in and demanded to know why I’m still in bed.
I had better get moving before she does because I’m not sure I could handle her shouting at me when my head already feels like it’s in a vise.
I start to throw the blankets back, an old trick I learned for getting my ass out of bed back when I was training both before and after school, sometimes waking up as early as four in the morning to make it to the gym.
I don’t miss those cold, dark mornings, but they taught me a lesson.
The sooner I’m not so comfortable, the less reason I have to burrow deeper in the bed and fall asleep again.
Only there’s a problem, a big one that reveals itself as soon as the blankets are off. Why am I naked?
I yank the covers up around my neck, eyes bulging, my heart taking off at a sickening pace. Why am I naked? Wait. How did I get to bed, to begin with? Why can’t I remember?
Why can’t I…
Oh. No.
I don’t want to do this because I don’t want the confirmation. I reach down between my legs and confirm how sore I am. What happened last night wasn’t a dream.
I had sex with Colt. Or rather, he had sex with me while I was too out of it to know the difference between reality and something my drugged-up brain had concocted.
And now I’m going to throw up.
Once the wave of panic-induced nausea passes, rage quickly takes its place. He knew I wasn’t in my right mind. That was the whole reason I had to come home in the first place. I was totally out of it, but he had sex with me anyway.
Headache forgotten, I jump out of bed and hurry through getting dressed before marching down the hall. I’m going to kill him for this. After everything he’s done to me, this is the worst. How could he take advantage like that? How could he use me?
Unfortunately for him, he’s in his room with the door cracked, sitting at his desk with his back to me.
I wish it was as easy as sneaking up on him from behind and, I don’t know, plunging a knife into his back or his neck or something like that.
But then again, no, I wouldn’t want it to be quick.
I’d want it to be slow, and I would want him to know it was me.
Turns out, he already knows that. “Are you going to come in all the way, or are you going to stand there and watch me like a stalker?”
The smug prick. How dare he even have the nerve to speak to me? I fling the door open and storm across the room, folding my arms when coming to a stop beside his chair. “How could you?”
He swings around in his chair, and I see he’s wearing an easy smile. “How could I what?”
“How could you fucking rape me last night? Don’t act like you don’t know what I’m talking about.”
His eyes widen in a mockery of surprise. “Rape you? Is that what I did?” He even touches a hand to his chest like he’s shocked.
“Well, I wasn’t in any position to say no. I didn’t even know what the hell was going on. I thought I was dreaming!”
“It must’ve been a pretty nice dream. You sure seemed to enjoy it when you creamed all over my cock.”
I had an orgasm? Yes, now that I think about it, I remember coming. A thousand showers couldn’t wash off the filth I feel all over me. The way he’s looking at me doesn’t help. The way he smirks, like now we have a secret between us, one he finds extremely funny. “You’re sick.”
“And you begged for it.”
“What? I could barely speak. I couldn’t even string two or three words together.”
“Let’s go to the recording, shall we? It might clear up a few things for you.”
“You have a recording?” This is getting worse by the second. “A video?”
“No, I’m sorry to say because I would’ve liked to watch that. But the sounds are enough to help me remember the magic.” He takes out his phone and pulls something up, then places the device on the desk before hitting play.
Suddenly, the room is full of the sound of soft but rapid breathing. “Colt…” It’s a moan, and it’s coming from me. I know the sound of my own voice. A humiliated flush creeps up my neck and floods my face. “Yes… please.”
“Does that sound like I forced you?” he asks, lifting an eyebrow. “Because, to me, that sounds like a girl who’s about to come.”
“Stop it,” I whisper, my skin crawling as the sound of my moans grows louder.
“Oh, Colt, yes… yes, so good…”
Colt rubs a palm over his crotch. “I’m starting to get a little hard just listening to it.” He smiles triumphantly before stopping the recording. The silence that replaces it is somehow more chilling.
“Like I said, you know I didn’t know what was happening. You saw the condition I was in. I was half unconscious most of the time.”
“Not when it counted, or do you want to listen again to be sure?”
“I’m going to go to the police.”
He sits back, looking me up and down, narrowing his eyes. “You think so?”
“I know so. I don’t need to be screaming the word ‘no’ for it to be rape. I’m sure there are still traces of narcotics in my blood, and anybody at the party last night would have seen me drinking champagne. I even left because I wasn’t feeling well.”
I don’t know what I expect. An apology? I should know by now that will never happen.
I could hold my breath until I dropped dead without hearing a single apologetic word.
“You know what? Go to the cops,” he decides with a shrug.
“Tell them what happened. Tell them you were out of your mind and not yourself. But if they come to me, and I play them this recording, who do you think they’ll believe? ”
Now I feel filthier than ever. Used and discarded. “What is wrong with you?” I whisper. After everything I’ve seen from him, after everything he’s done, this is by far the worst. He’s evil. Not even the slightest bit sorry for how I’m feeling now.
“You knew I was a virgin. How could you do this to me?” Most of the anger has left my voice, and sadness and denial have taken its place. “How could you take this away from me?”
Colt loses his smug smile. His expression turns somber, and something like empathy flashes over his pale-blue eyes. For a fraction of a second, I think he might actually apologize. That must have been wishful thinking.
“Be glad this was your first time. You should be thanking me for providing you with such a pleasant experience.”
Because I can’t pummel him to death with my fists, and I don’t want him to see me cry, I run back to my room and slam the door hard enough that the walls shake.
That’s not enough. I want to tear the place apart.
I want to break every piece of furniture in this room and then throw it through the windows, so they break, too.
Same thing with the bathroom. I want everything shattered, in pieces, the way I feel inside.
How could he do that? How could I let him? He stole my virginity. Yes, stole like a thief. It was mine to give, mine alone.
And nobody will believe me. I don’t even think my mother would.
She’d blame me for mixing alcohol with one of my pills—if she believed me at all that Colt used me, which I doubt.
Colt would never play that recording for her, and that’s the only real proof anything happened last night.
He could just as easily say it’s something I made up in my head.
No, I’m not safe anywhere—with anyone. And in another few hours, we’re going to be family.
“Leni. What the hell is going on up here?” Mom is already berating me before she’s even opened the door.
She’s wearing a white satin robe, her face devoid of makeup, her hair freshly washed and still damp.
“Here I am, expecting you to come down to meet with the hair and makeup people, and you’re slamming things around.
Have you forgotten what today is?” She snaps her fingers close to my face, something I’ve always hated.
It’s not easy resisting the impulse to slap her hands away.
“I was about to come down in another minute or so.”
“Well, you had better. We have a schedule to keep.”
“Wait a second, please,” I blurt out when she turns away.
She sighs heavily before turning back around. “What?”
“Something bad happened. Something I need to tell you about. I swear, I didn’t do anything to bring it on. But it happened for sure, and I didn’t want it to.”
She holds up her hand, closing her eyes. “For God’s sake, please, could you let something be about me for once? Why do you insist on making everything about you?”
“I wasn’t trying to, I swear.”
“Right. Tell me another good one.”
“Please, please listen to me.” For once, be my mother. Care about me, love me. I can’t say any of those things, of course. She would probably laugh at me if I did.
“This is my day. Do you hear me? My day. For once, I will not let you make this about you. I’m sorry if you have a difficult time handling that, but that’s how it is.
” She runs a hand through her hair, scowling.
“It’s bad enough I’m going to have to explain to everyone why my mother didn’t see fit to come to my wedding.
I won’t have you screwing this up for me, too, just like she has. ”
My shoulders slump, and I look at the floor, dejected but not surprised.
“You can tell me about it later, okay?” she adds, but I know better.
She’ll conveniently forget all about this.
“But it’s going to have to wait until my big day is over.
Now come on. We have a lot to do and very little time to do it in. ”
What else can I do? I can’t make her care.
I’ve spent my whole life trying to make her care about me, to really care about something other than what I can do for her.
She’ll never let me live it down, all the money she spent on my training, conveniently forgetting the fact that she was the one pushing me, always on my back, insisting I be the best.
So even though my heart is aching, and I would rather do anything else than face the world today, I follow her down the stairs, where sure enough, an entire team of hair and makeup artists waits for us.
Now she’s every bit the happy, blushing bride, accepting a mimosa that one of the makeup people offers.
They offer me one as well, but I shake my head. “No, thank you. I had a little too much at the rehearsal dinner.”
I wish more than anything I could blink and magically be transported to tonight after all this is over.
Instead, I take a seat and let the professionals get to work on me. With Mom chattering on and on in her excited way, at least nobody will expect me to join in the conversation. I can sit here and be miserable alone—which in the end, is not so different from my normal life, anyway.