Total pages in book: 84
Estimated words: 77841 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 389(@200wpm)___ 311(@250wpm)___ 259(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 77841 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 389(@200wpm)___ 311(@250wpm)___ 259(@300wpm)
I blink into the darkness but my eyes refuse to adjust to the lack of light. It’s too dark. It’s too quiet. It’s too everything.
“If you don’t go the fuck to sleep.” I jerk at the sound of his voice, scaring me in the darkness. “Raya,” he warns, the tone of his voice making me immediately lie flat on the bed.
We’re still not touching. I wouldn’t survive the night if we were. I close my eyes because they serve me no purpose in the darkness. I lie flat on my back, listening, but there’s something soothing about the sound of his voice, about the sound of his breathing, and when I get the urge to drift off to sleep, much like how I’ve acted since I got here, I don’t fight it.
Chapter 15
Liam
The last several days have been nothing but a series of whys and today is no different. Why did I stay lying beside her? After several hours of no sleep, why did I quietly climb off the bed in an effort not to wake her? Why, instead of leaving the room, did I remove the lock from her chain, bolting her to the floor? Why do I even care?
I don’t have any answers to these fucking questions. Normally, a question I couldn’t answer gets ignored. In the grand scheme of things, it doesn’t fucking matter. I asked the question a lot. When I was being held captive in South America—why are they doing this to me? Why haven’t they killed me yet? Why did they take such pleasure in hurting others? Why were their screams from the other room? Why did those screams stop?
I shake my head as I pad down the hallway. Instead of going right into my home gym, I continue left into the living room. The clock on the wall tells me that it’s four o’clock in the morning. That doesn’t surprise me. I can’t remember the last time I had a good night’s sleep but last night has to be the worst night I’ve had in as long as I can remember.
I never sleep well. Clearing my mind enough to be restful is an impossibility for me. It has been for years even in a house with only one door and no windows. I can’t completely eradicate the feeling that I’m unsafe. I don’t know why I thought lying in bed beside her would make it different.
I don’t know how it’s different for her. I don’t know how she’s been sleeping peacefully for the last three hours. I don’t know how she didn’t startle when I got off the bed. I don’t know how she didn’t jolt and sit upright on the mattress when the combination lock clicked against her chain. It’s not like she was pretending, like I was last night.
I knew when I spoke and told her to go to sleep that she thought I was already asleep. She can’t possibly feel safe with me. Although there’s a certain thrill and wanting to convince myself that that’s true, I know what it’s like to figuratively sleep with one eye open. I know what it’s like to jerk and startle and be so exhausted that you can’t help but fall asleep.
But every sound, every clink, every voice, every scream wakes you up. It sets you on high alert. It forces adrenaline through your blood and even the crash of that isn’t enough to allow for a peaceful night’s rest. Was it my promise that gave her comfort? Was it my promise that let her sleep peacefully? Or is it the fact that she believes she’s too important to worry herself with being afraid?
I grit my teeth as I open the refrigerator door. There’s nothing that I want. There’s nothing in the fridge that I’m hungry for. The only hunger I feel is for her. It claws inside of me, begging to be released. But feeding that monster, giving it what it wants, isn’t an option. I don’t hand out promises like they’re nothing. A man’s word, a foster dad told me once when I was five or six, a man’s word has to mean something. His did. When that foster dad used the words or else, I learned very quickly about his word meaning something. I learned that he didn’t waste words. If he said I’m going to beat your ass, he delivered.
I shake my head. My thoughts are all jumbled—what I need to do, what I should do, what I could do, what I can’t do. All of it mixes and swirls together. All of it makes me want to arrow down the hallway, wake her up and demand that she tells me what it is about her that is making me this way.
Knowing I can’t give the monster exactly what he’s begging for, I pull breakfast ingredients out of the fridge. I know she hasn’t been asleep long, but I also feel different from the man that crept out of the bed in order to allow her to sleep. The sun’s not going to be up for another couple of hours, but there’s purpose in what I’m doing. I need her off balance. I don’t want her to know whether it’s day or night.