Chapter 87

Lashing out with one hand to slap and scratch at whoever gets near. ‘‘Camilla?’’ Alexi’s voice sounds different and far away from me, alien to how he ever sounds. His dark silhouette appearing close by between the flashes and slices of other faces. I can’t look at him, at the monster who takes pleasure in all the suffering of those weaker than him. The monster that uses my wounds against me in any way he can. I shift away, trying to crawl into the darkest corner of the room to hide, and curl back into a smaller space in a bid to hide from them all.

If you’re small and you’re quiet, then sometimes they can’t find you at all. Reverting to child and humming my stupid song like a deranged psychopath. The hand touches me again and I freak out, lash out and slap as it tries to hold me again in full fury, ready to defend myself to the death if I have to. I won’t let that bastard touch me again. I won’t let anyone do those things to me anymore. Those horrible, painful, inhumane, degrading things. I can’t take anymore.

He makes a grab at my wrist, pulling me away from the sanctuary of my corner towards him, trying to get a hold on me for God knows what. I twist free, screaming at him hysterically, losing all ounces of sanity and reacting like a caged animal backed into a wall. Finding my fierce and protecting what’s left of me.

‘’Let me go! Let me … Go!!!’’ I fight weakly, energy waning and sobbing more than fighting as my body gives up the fight from sheer exhaustion. Body getting limp, but I am trying to not stop. Alexi finally lets me go and disappears back into the shadows, silent and still once more as I regroup and pull myself tight back into my little ball in a bid to keep myself safe from him, he’s my idea of hell.

All of them out there, waiting for me. Poking at me and teasing me about what they are going to do. Little girl, oh I am going to enjoy having you …

‘‘I won’t do that again.’’ His voice sounds strangled and low, like it’s not really him at all, and I just back away until I feel the wall behind me once more and tighten myself up smaller, tighter and shield my body. Mistrusting of the softness of his tone because I know it’s all a lie and just another angle, another false tender to pull me back in.

Rick used to be nice sometimes ... to get me to come out. Pretend to care, pretend he was going to stop. It was always a lie.

I try and block him out and jump when I hear his shoes on the floor, scraping on the hardwood making steps. Except they're leaving and not coming closer, and everything in me pauses as I listen to them departing. Stilling all of me, as I hit full alert once more and just hold very, very, still. He walks out of the room leaving me here to sob into my own legs and hate him with every ounce of feeling I have left. Torn between dreams and reality and trying to claw my way back. Honing in on the room around me and clawing back out of that sense of insanity that had me falling into a black hole of confusion moments before.

He retreats, leaving me alone with my misery to ponder what I have got myself into, what I have allowed to happen to me. Alexi is not my happy ever after—he’s my abuser, my enemy. He became what he is by inflicting suffering his whole life until he became immune to the effects of seeing it.

I became what I am because I endured the suffering my whole life until I became numb to the effects of feeling it. Normalising what happened to me.

We are what we are because of people like each other, and we exist because of one another. Both on opposite ends, yet the outcomes are always the same. Humans devoid of real feelings and empathy that cannot function like normal people. Neither of us can ever have a normal life or a normal relationship, we don’t play by the healthy rules and guidelines, he just reminded me of that.

Alexi wants to control me and punish me; I want him to just let me go and leave me alone now that I have been faced with a manipulator I have no skill for. I don’t want what I once did where he’s concerned. To use him and get what I want from him because I know now it’s a completely delusional dream. I stepped into his world and realised I was a complete amateur in every way.

He demoralises with so little effort and inflicts mental scars from people’s own issues—that’s a master. That’s someone who is well versed in his craft, and I am not willing or able to live alongside it anymore. He is destroying what’s left of my mental state and it affects him in no way at all. I have no coping mechanism for someone who uncovers my darkest fears and uses them against me.

As soon as Alexi leaves the Hamptons I’m going to start devising a plan to run. I did it once before, scraping together what money I could and changing my fate. Knowing when to get out has saved my life so many times. I found the courage and I ran from Rick, he owned me too; he had done since I was eleven years old. He made all my nightmares seem like fairy tales in comparison and then some, yet I managed to outrun him and disappear into the world. I could do it again, run further this time.

Alexi has way more reach, but I’m sure I could find a way, escape and just blend into some other world if I try hard enough. Lose the red hair, lose the accent and lose my name, taking the skills I have and get out of the grasp of Alexi Carrero in any way I can.

If I stay this will only escalate, and he will destroy every last piece of me. I don’t want to live in fear for the rest of my life or have an inhumane devil destroy the little tiny parts of me that I managed to salvage through the years of hell I already lived through. I deserve to find some sort of refuge, somewhere in the world. I’m not so worthless that I shouldn’t have at least a respite from always being hurt.