21 Olivia
June 2nd, 2022
I released a slow breath and headed back for the porch where Evelyn and Baily were playing on the steps, Stella sitting in one of the chairs with a pitcher of lemonade and glasses sitting on the table.
I gave Baily a small smile and met Evelyn’s eyes briefly on my way up the stairs. “I’m sorry,”
I told Stella. “Stomach bug.”
I felt absolutely humiliated. I jumped to the worst conclusion possible and humiliated myself in front of them all. It was embarrassing, but the only thing I could do now was move on. Pretend it never happened.
Maybe mom was right. Maybe I did need to be put on medication.
She nodded, sympathy in her eyes. “Don’t worry about it, darling, it’s been going around. Are you okay? Here, some fresh lemonade, made this morning. My mama’s recipe,”
she smiled, pouring me a glass. “She always made the best lemonade.”
I sat across from her, thanking her for the drink. “Is that an accent I hear?”
I could do this. I could get whatever it was I was looking for and move on.
Her smile widened. “Yes. I’m originally from Louisianna. The accent never did completely fade.”
She cocked her head gently to one side. “Parden my pushing, but who are you again? Olivia? Have we met before? My brain sometimes gets a little foggy. I tend to be forgetful sometimes.”
Yeah, unfortunately, that was the side-effect of dating someone like Steven. I couldn’t help but wonder if he did the same things to her as he had done to me. It was hard to believe because they had been together for 10 years and she was still smiling.
I felt like I had lost the ability to smile a long time ago. I felt as if I would never get it back.
Everett took a seat on the wide wooden railing of the porch, watching us carefully, watching me, as if he believed I were in some sort of danger.
I didn’t think he had the capacity to care about something like that, let alone for me.
Even so, I studied those cold eyes for a few more seconds before slowly turning back to her, suddenly realizing the truth behind why I was actually here. “No,”
I replied softly. She didn’t know about Steven. Not one thing. Not about what he did or what happened just two weeks ago.
Where did she think he was?
“I’m a…I know him—Steven,”
I told her, watching as her eyes lost a little of their life. “I know him.”
I knew that feeling too.
Her smile slowly fell, and after a moment, she nodded, sucking in her lips and looking over to Baily. She watched her kid play for a long time before her smile grew and her beautiful eyes found mine again, the light reigniting slowly.
It was then I realized how she still smiled despite everything he must have done to her. She had found her strength.
“The day I found out I was pregnant he came to my apartment with a girl. She was…she was a pretty young thing, like you,”
she nodded, my heart falling to my stomach. “He thought it was his place. I had set up this small little…reveal, I guess you could say. A little box with a little bow, some tissue paper, the test sitting in the middle. I had always wanted a family. A big one with a whole litter of kids. I was so excited.”
I swallowed, hating him more than anything else in the world. “What did he do?”
She shrugged, her eyes filling. “He was drunk. He told me to get out and I did. I had to. He was going to do what he did no matter what I chose, so,”
another shrug as her eyes found Baily. “He missed her birth. My mama, though,”
she laughed, wiping away a tear, “my mama was there. Mama Anne Baily Voss. When I held that little girl in my arms, nothing else mattered. Not the rain or the shine, not the fact that the hospital was too cold or the blankets too itchy. Not even that my husband was off with some pretty little thing across town. All I cared about was those big ‘ole eyes staring right back at me. As if I were her whole world, because I was. I was everything to her and I decided right then and there that I would be everything to her for the rest of my days. She didn’t need a man like that in her life, and I didn’t either.”
The lump in my throat grew. God, she was a good person. She didn’t deserve any of this.
Was I the reason he missed the birth? Had he been with me that night or some other ‘pretty little thing’? Clearly, he didn’t have any qualms about cheating on both of us. Maybe that had been one of those nights when he had been busy with his friends. “Why didn’t you leave him?”
She shrugged again. “I don’t know. He was never cruel. Sometimes he said mean things when he was tired or had a drink too many, but I mean, he bought us this house. He filled it with furniture. He didn’t let Baily want for anything. The good days were awfully good. Too good, I suppose. Maybe he was making up for all those times he stepped out. I thought to myself that maybe dealing with it was better than trying to do it all on my own.”
It was never better. Ever. She thought of herself as being worthy of less than what she deserved, and I absolutely hated that. She deserved everything. She deserved a man who would put her on a pedestal and kiss her toes.
My brows furrowed a moment later though, and I glanced towards Everett, who gave nothing away, but I knew. That’s what the loan was for. For them. For Stella and Baily.
They must have waited a little while before they went after him for the money, but that was a lot. It was a lot of money. To buy a house, to fill it with furniture, to spoil them?
“When did you meet him?”
I turned back to Stella, her eyes wide, a napkin in her hand that she had used to dab her tears. “Three years ago,”
I told her, hating each word as I said them. “I had just moved to town. He was kind.”
Stella smiled softly, a light laugh escaping her light pink lips. “Yeah.”
She cleared her throat. “I’m sorry,”
she told me, causing me to straighten. “I’m sorry you had to find out about it. He’s been gone for a couple of weeks now on business, I think, but if he was here, I’d make him apologize, I would, I am so sorry.”
“You’re sorry?”
I asked in complete disbelief. I leaned over the table. “No, listen to me. You have nothing to be sorry for, he’s the f—”
I stopped myself, glancing to Baily and back. “Jerk,”
I finished, causing her to laugh again. “Look at you. You are beautiful. You have a beautiful daughter and a beautiful house, and you live on a beautiful street. You have a good life. You’re going to have an amazing life,”
I whispered, my eyes filling.
“Your life is going to be filled with such laughter and such light, and you’ll have so many good memories, you won’t even know how to handle it. You’ll run out of space on the walls to put all the memories.”
Tears spilled down her cheeks and I immediately reached out my hand, taking hers in both of mine. “The future is bright for you, Stella Voss. You are going to cook pancakes on Sunday mornings and dance in the kitchen late at night and play music way too loud. The walls will be covered in crayons and your house won’t be clean for the next 15 years, but you know what else it will be? It will be filled with laughter and shouting and such unending love. Every ounce of love you have will pour into that girl and she’ll grow up to be the light of the world, all because of you. Don’t ever apologize for the darkness in this world, we can’t stop it. All we can do is fan the flames of the fireflies,”
I went on, glancing over to Baily as she laughed so loud, the squirrels stopped to stare, “and hope they will shine bright enough to keep the worst of it away.”
She was beautiful.
Why couldn’t mom love me like Stella loved her?
Why couldn’t there be crayons on my walls and pictures on my fridge and laughter in my halls?
Why couldn’t I burn too?
“Wow,”
Stella breathed out, pulling my attention back. “You sound just like my mama.”
I gave her a warm smile and took my hands back, sliding them under the table. “I’m a writer. Words are kind of my thing.”
Why couldn’t I have had a mom like Stella? I wouldn’t have cared if we were living in a simple house with simple clothes. All I wanted was to be loved. I just wanted to be noticed and loved. A hug, a kiss, Jesus, even some advice. I wanted that. Why couldn’t I have had a present mom like Baily?
I was so happy that Baily had what I never got. Happy and relieved. She deserved that. She deserved to be happy.
Her eyes lit up. “You write? I love to read, what kind of books do you write?”
I searched her eyes, not wanting to tell her the truth. To tell her what happened to Steven. To tell her anything terrible. She had lived through so much, far more than me. Far worse. I wanted to protect her from it all. I needed to protect her from it all. Whatever that meant for me, I needed Stella and Baily to live a good, joy-filled life. “Psychological thrillers,”
I told her. “Under the name Abigail Ross,”
I confessed quietly.
She gasped, sitting straight up. “No way,”
she laughed. “I own all of those books. All of them. Would you mind…could you sign them for me? I would be so honored. Please?”
I nodded without hesitation. “Of course. Absolutely, I will.”
She clapped once and stood. “I’ll be right back.”
She headed for her house. “I’ll be out in a second, Baily!”
Baily barely paid her any mind, too engrossed with playing with Evelyn to even bother hearing her mom.
My false smile fell as soon as she disappeared.
I fell back into my chair and closed my eyes. Don’t think. Don’t think. Don’t think about anything but the warm breeze and the laughter of the child. Don’t think about how many times he touched you. How many times he beat you. How many times he stuck his cock in—
I gasped and stood, my chair clattering backwards. My heart was thudding against my ribs, and I couldn’t breathe. The air had disappeared. It was gone. I was outside and there was no air. The world suddenly seemed far too small, and I was far too big, and I couldn’t breathe.
Everett appeared in front of me, grabbing my jaw, forcing my eyes to meet his. “Focus.”
“He f-fucked me,”
I panted, pulling at my shirt. “He w-w-was inside of m-me. I can’t…I can’t—”
He grabbed my wrist and slammed his other hand over my mouth. “Shut up,”
he ordered, his eyes flicking behind me.
He searched my eyes, his own anger growing, his grip tightening. He bared his teeth. “Fuck,”
he snarled under his breath. He suddenly released my mouth and pulled me away. “We’re going, tell Stella something,”
he told Evelyn, dragging me down the stairs.
“Olivia!”
Baily called.
But the roaring was growing, the panic causing my head to spin, the world to shake.
He kept pulling me away. Pulling me across the grass, across the street, down the block.
I saw cars parked, cars driving by, cabs we were missing. I needed to breathe. Why couldn’t I breathe?
He fucked me.
He fucked me.
He fucked so many other people too. He had a family. How many times had he given it to her, to others, before coming back to me?
I suddenly felt so damn dirty. The feeling was overwhelming. I had to get my skin off. I needed to get my skin off.
Everett pulled me to a stop, grabbed something, and shoved it onto my head. I immediately started trying to remove it, but he grabbed the strap under my chin and jerked it over tightly before tapping the top of the helmet just above my visor. “Do not remove. Now get on the bike.”
I clutched my chest, shaking my head, my legs trembling. “I can’t—breathe.”
“Yes, you can, now get on the fucking bike.”
I reached for the strap. I was going to pass out, I was going to—
He slapped my hand and grabbed me around the waist, picked me up, and set me down on the back of the bike before sliding down in front of me.
He grabbed my hands and jerked me against him, my thighs pressing against his as he forced my hands around his waist. “Do not let go,”
he ordered before starting the bike and taking off before I had the chance to even consider jumping off.
I barely had time to latch on before we were racing down the street. I was surrounded by his scent as I tried to catch my breath. Surrounded by rain and pine. Fresh air. Like the woods outside of the city. Like the middle of nowhere. Like isolation and freedom, that’s what it reminded me of. Freedom.
My thighs squeezed around him, my body pressing into his back, feeling his heartbeat against me. Warm and solid. Unwavering like the storms in my life. As unwavering as his sea and my cliffs, constantly slamming together, constantly chipping away.
Dependable in their destruction.
In our destruction.
We sped through the city, faster than was legal, I was sure, and all I wanted was to focus on the way it felt. The vibrations of the bike under me, the feeling of his body pressed against mine, the way his muscles shifted whenever he leaned even slightly to either side.
But all I could think about was Steven’s lips on mine.
His cock inside of me, his semen on me, his saliva.
“I’m going to be sick,”
I whimpered.
“Then you’ll be swimming in it until I pull over,”
he called back.
I turned my head inward, pressing it into his back, closing my eyes, only to see wheat-colored eyes, feel his hands on me, his lips—
I swallowed the bile. “I’m going to throw up.”
“Have at it.”
I inhaled through my nose and exhaled through my mouth, trying to focus on that pine and rain scent that was accosting me from all angles, but all I could feel was his cock inside of me. His hands on my breasts, holding my hips, licking my skin.
The bike skidded around a corner, and I tightened around him. The wheel screeched and we came to a sudden stop. Everett disappeared off the bike and I looked up to find us in an alley outside of an apartment building. He hooked a finger under my helmet and pulled me off the bike.
“Stop,”
I pleaded.
But he dragged me down the alley, around the corner, and up the steps to the front of the building all by the bottom of that helmet.
“I can’t breathe,”
I told him.
“Then suffocate,”
he replied bitterly, and dragged me up the stairs on the inside of the building.
I stumbled, struggling to keep up with him, trying to take in my surroundings only to give up a second later.
He was going to kill me.
He didn’t care about the debt Steven incurred to pay for Stella’s place. He didn’t care about the deals. He was just going to kill me to get rid of me, to not deal with me anymore. Which I understood because I would get rid of me too. I was disgusting. I really was a whore. He called me a pathetic piece of trash, a prostitute, because he knew.
My eyes widened and I lost my footing, but Everett continued to drag me anyway, uncaring that I fell on my knees, that I was bruising them, that it took me several seconds to regain my footing.
He knew.
I inhaled sharply, wrapping my hands around Everett’s wrist, digging my nails into his skin, but his grip was solid.
He stopped at a door on the third floor and pulled out his keys. He unlocked the door and pulled me in, shutting and locking the door behind us all with one hand, the other still firmly gripping my helmet.
When the door was locked, he dragged me through the apartment to a back room.
“Are you going to kill me?”
I asked, stumbling into the room.
He remained silent, pulled me through a door, and finally released me. It took a second for me to gain my footing, although I was still swaying on my feet, my hands shaking from how hard I had gripped onto his wrist.
I looked around the room. It was small. Large enough for a bed, a dresser with a television sitting on top of it, and a large chunk of empty wall with metal rings bolted into it.
It was void of anything homey. There weren’t dirty socks on the ground or take-out containers on the nightstands. Just a made bed, a clean dresser, a black tv, and those iron rings.
“Take off all of your clothes.”
I turned on him, finding him on his knees, looking under the bed. “What?”
“Clothes. Off. Now.”
I wrapped my arms around myself and shook my head, taking a step back. “I don’t want you to touch me.”
He pulled something out from under the bed and dropped it on top of it. A black duffle bag. He stood up, ripped the zipper open, and pulled out something I recognized.
The cone-shaped gag.
My eyes widened. “Wait, no, please.”
He couldn’t touch me. I was dirty. I was disgusting. I was a pathetic, gross piece of trash. I was nothing.
He pulled something else out, a long stick wrapped in leather with a small loop at the end.
It looked like those horse whips I used during lessons as a kid to make the horse go faster.
My breathing hitched as he stormed over, reared his hand back, and brought the whip down on my thigh.
I cried out, my pussy throbbing. “Fuck,”
I whimpered, rubbing my thigh. “What the actual fuck?”
“Undress,”
he ordered. “Now.”
“Fuck you,”
I spat. “N—”
He snapped me again, this time on my other thigh.
I cried out, my muscles tightening. “Quit that!”
He pointed at me and then to the floor, his eyes like ice.
I glared at him, but I didn’t want to get hit again. “You deserved to get slapped in the face,”
I told him, unbuckling and then ripping off the helmet. I dropped it to the ground in defiance.
“Trust me, you’ll pay for that too.”
A zing went through me as I slid off both boots, but I held my rage. “You are scum,”
I spat. “A piece of shit.”
His eyes were unforgiving, but he said nothing.
“Nothing,”
I told him, shedding my jacket. “A pathetic nothing.”
I was nothing. I was pathetic. “You are worse than nothing,”
I told him through my teeth, shaking my head, the feeling of my own skin making my stomach churn. “You are fucking trash. A whore.”
“And?”
he pushed as I shoved my jeans off. “What else?”
“You’re a slut,”
I snarled, throwing the pants at him, hoping the belt buckle hit him in the goddamn mouth. “A fucking idiot. Dumb. Lazy. Ugly. Worthless.”
I threw my shirt at him, trembling, feeling sick. “You fuck everything like a junkyard dog. Your cock probably gets hard at the mere thought of a swinging, unwilling ass.”
“What else?”
he pushed, stepping up to me. “Come on,”
he ordered, his voice louder, angrier. “What else, little writer?”
He almost sounded manic.
I shoved him back a step. “You’re a fucking loser. Washed up, stretched out,”
I panted. “You fucking suck, what is wrong with you?”
I asked, tears blurring my vision as I slammed my hands into him again, wincing at the pain across my still healing palm. “What the actual fuck is wrong with you? You delusional, prideful, idiotic, piece of worthless, pathetic trash? I hate you, I hate you, I hate you!”
He dropped the gag and snatched my throat, my air instantly cut off, my hands flying to his. He pulled me up until my feet barely touched the ground, our noses nearly touching. “You hate me?”
he asked, walking me backwards. “Or do you hate yourself for letting it happen?”
The tears dripped down my cheeks, my head pounding from the shouting. “I didn’t—”
His hand tightened. “What, little writer? What didn’t you do?”
“I didn’t…”
I gasped, black spots dancing in my vision. “Let…him.”
He slammed me back against the wall, his eyes flaming. “Yes, you did. He beat the shit out of you. He lied to you. he convinced you that your own mind, your eyes, your heart, they were all wrong. You let him get in your head. You let it happen.”
I shook my head. No. He was wrong. He had to be wrong. I wasn’t that weak. I couldn’t be that weak.
“Physical pain to you is nothing,”
he went on, releasing my neck.
I gasped, coughing, choking, my throat raw from throwing up and now swollen from this.
He grabbed my right wrist and jerked it above my head. “You didn’t care about the fire. You didn’t care about the ice. You didn’t care that I hurt you. You liked it. Craved it. It got you so wet, I could wring your panties out if I wanted to.”
My legs shook as I felt something soft wrap around my wrist, my head spinning.
“Abuse is different. Different than torture, different than punishments, different than pain. The basic deciding factor between abuse and a good fucking is who is behind it and how it’s being given.”
He grabbed my other wrist and jerked it into the air.
I looked up, tugging on my right wrist, dizzy. It had been tied to that iron circle by a dark red ribbon.
“You just found out that you were on a long list of fucks from a guy who used you relentlessly. You broke up a family,”
he said, tightening the ribbon around my left wrist before stepping back. He took me in for half a second before disappearing out the bedroom door.
A moment later, he walked back in with a wet rag.
“Don’t touch me,”
I snarled, fighting the restraints as he stepped up to me and began wiping the makeup away roughly.
“Your response, although slightly psychotic, is also normal. You feel things with all that you are, even when you don’t want to. Unfortunately for you, I’m not the gentle type,”
he pulled at the edges of my healing cuts, my cheeks whining in pain as he wiped the rest of the makeup off and finally stood back, tossing the dirty rag to the side. “We’re going to heal you my way. Like I said before, I don’t do coddling.”
I shook my head, tugging at my wrists again, my face raw. All I wanted to do was cover myself up. I felt far too exposed now. “Don’t touch me,”
I said again.
“Why? Because he touched you? Because you don’t think I’ll fuck you the same now that I know the truth? You didn’t know the truth, little writer, get over yourself.”
I couldn’t stop the tears as I crossed my legs, hating this. Hating everything about it. “Did you know?”
He picked up the gag again before thinking better of it and heading back for the bag, that whip now clutched tightly in hand. “I did my research.”
My eyes widened and I jerked on the ribbon, the pain shooting down my arms. “You asshole, you knew?”
I breathed out. “When? When did you find out?”
“The day I killed him,”
he answered, pulling something else out of his duffle and walking over. “You picked up that picture. I stole it when I grabbed your phone. It didn’t take long to connect the dots.”
He stepped up to me, grabbed my jaw, and forced my mouth open, quickly shoving something inside. “A little disappointed that while you do such thorough research on serial killers and different ways to extract information out of a person unwillingly, you didn’t look deep enough to know that he had a family, a thing for prostitutes, and you.”
I jerked my face out of his, mint exploding over my tongue. “I didn’t think there was a need to deep dive into his fucking life,”
I spat as whatever it was dissolved across my tongue. A thought filled my mind then, assaulted me. “Is that why you won’t fuck me?”
“Pay attention, Olivia,”
he sang. “I licked my fingers clean.”
He slid something into his own mouth. “I had you tested before I made the deal, and every week since then. You’re clean.”
My eyes widened to saucers because, despite the relief, how the fuck did he manage that without me noticing?
“He got the loan a year ago,”
he explained. “He stopped paying, we came to town to take care of business. He kept piddling around. $100 here, $50 there, so we upped the ante, until one day, you walk in. A pretty little thing in a floral dress.”
A shiver ran through my body, warmth spreading through my limbs, followed by a strange tingling sensation that started in my chest and slowly spread from there.
“It took no time to figure out who you were, the books you wrote, the money you had. A good source to pay off the debt of your precious little boyfriend. We already knew his wife didn’t have the money, and we’re not in the business of killing kids, so you were the next best thing. Get the money, deal with the loser, and handle a few other customers trying to stiff us. Do that for a few months, leave.”
My heart picked up, my pussy throbbing, my nipples hardening. Suddenly every graze of a breeze in the room, the ribbon around my wrists, the carpet under me, it all felt so good. It all felt sensual. To the point that I could barely focus on his words. I couldn’t focus on them at all.
I couldn’t help but close my eyes, wrapping my hands around the ribbon tightly. Fuck. What the Hell did he give me?
I opened my eyes just in time to see Everett shiver and roll his shoulders, my own breathing picking up. “You hate yourself because of what happened and it’s pathetic,”
he said, reaching across the bed and jerking the duffle over. “It’s pathetic because I can see you crumbling. A woman who looked me in the eye while her thigh was on fire, waiting for me to flinch first.”
I shivered too, moving myself up just to alleviate the growing ache between my thighs. “You blinked first,”
I reminded him, nearly out of breath. “I won.”
What the fuck was happening? Everything felt like a tease to an orgasm, but all over my body. From the way my hair brushed along my lower back, to the way my toes dug into the carpet, it all felt like the beginnings of the most mind-blowing orgasm I would ever experience.
“And here you are, fucking flinching.”
“He fucked me,”
I growled, finding his eyes. Although it came out more breathless than threatening, and I hated that. “I know most don’t believe in monogamy anymore, but I do. I ruined a family. He broke me apart, for what? Easy pussy? Because I just…gave in.”
My chest deflated. “I was easy.”
He pulled out a candle and a lighter. “You’re not easy, writer, you just didn’t know anything else. A beat dog cowers until someone comes along and reminds it that it has teeth,”
he told me. “He was just an abusive asshole half a day ago. He beat you, nothing else. Nothing more. Nothing less.”
I shook my head. “No, no,”
I mumbled, my hair falling around my shoulders. “You don’t understand. You don’t understand.”
“You’re not pregnant by him.”
He lit the candle, picked it up, and turned to me. “Your mind is fucking you up, Rose, you’re getting in your head,”
he hummed.
“You’re fucking psychotic,”
I panted, flexing my toes, moving my hips, clenching my hands. Fuck me, I was going to cum.
He shrugged. “I learned from my youngest brother; he escaped the asylum.”
He closed the distance between us. “Yesterday, he was the asshole that tried to kill you. Today, he’s the asshole who fucks prostitutes, has a wife, a daughter, a house, and he still tried to kill you. I cut him into pieces. He’s gone. You’re not pregnant. You didn’t care about him. You wanted him dead. Nothing else has changed.”
I panted, tugging at the ribbon again, my entire body a live wire. “I want to rip my skin off,”
I whispered. “I want him to have never touched me at all.”
One corner of his lips flicked up in a smile. “I can’t rewrite time, but I can replace memories. Deep breath, little writer, we’re going to be here for quite some time.”