Total pages in book: 102
Estimated words: 99623 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 498(@200wpm)___ 398(@250wpm)___ 332(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 99623 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 498(@200wpm)___ 398(@250wpm)___ 332(@300wpm)
I reach for my phone, but then remember it's in his car. It's not like this dress has pockets.
"Hey, baby," an unfamiliar voice calls out as I pass.
"What?"
"Wanna go upstairs? My cell has a great camera."
"No. Oh my God. No!" I shove away from him, only to be jostled into another leering face.
"I'll fuck your mouth any day!"
I reel back, the panic washing over me as people move closer. It feels like everyone is looking at me, laughing at me, mocking me. Some have pity in their eyes, while others size me up like they know exactly what’s under my dress.
It feels like I'm in a waking nightmare.
"Come on, Emmy," Zach murmurs, alerting me to the fact that he's still with me. "Let's get you out of here."
"What's going on?" I ask, on the verge of tears. "Why's everyone looking at their phones?"
"Fuck!" Zach pinches the bridge of his nose. "Come on."
It's too much. I sway on my feet, thankful I wore boots and not the heels Stella claimed I needed. "Sterling..." I whimper his name.
"I'll find him," Zach says, alerting me to the fact that he didn't storm off with his boyfriend.
Finally, I see him, but before I can make it to him, the music gets cut and a familiar voice crackles over the PA system.
My voice. It's my voice.
"You won't break me.” I hear myself say as sounds of sex fill the room.
Filthy sounds.
Animalistic grunts and pleading groans. The sound of skin slapping skin.
"I'm so close. Oh, God, please."
My gut churns and bile crawls up my throat at the sound of my begging.
I don't even realize I'm crying until the tears dripping from my chin splash against my chest.
My heart races and my legs shake as the obviously and poorly edited sound clip plays.
I spin, looking for the nearest exit, only to find something so horrific, it renders me immobile.
On the far wall, there's a projection screen, with my very own and very non-consensual porno playing for all to see.
It feels like everything is closing in around me, and for the first time since Rob raped me, I feel like I want to die.
It's too much. Everything's too much.
My watery gaze clashes with Sterling's from across the room. He looks stricken, but I know better than most just how deceiving looks can be.
He said he wanted to break me.
His words from the first week of class bombard me, crashing into me so hard I nearly collapse to the floor.
"Poor little Princess Price. So eager to ruin the lives of others but whimpers and whines when she's paid back in kind."
That's what this is. That's what this has always been.
Payback.
Oh my God. How stupid could I be?
My throat constricts as I try desperately to suck in much needed air, but it's no use. Even my body is turning on me.
He told me. Sterling told me, again and again, and like the stupid little girl I am, I didn't listen.
He played me.
A handful of weeks of being nice and I was eating out of his palm, falling in love with him and letting him into my bed...into my body. Only for him to betray me in the worst way.
He's nearly to me when Melanie steps in front of him, blocking his path. He leans in as she speaks to him, and that's all the confirmation I need.
I was nothing to him. A sweet little nothing. This was all a ploy.
With ice in my heart and a sinking emptiness in my gut, I turn and flee.
"Emmy!" Zach calls after me, but I don't turn back. I just run.
I run through the crowd, out the door, and down the street.
I run and I run and I run, blind from tears and locked in my head.
I run until I'm safely back inside my dorm. Once inside I lock the door and shove the coffee table in front of it.
Pain unlike anything I've ever known lances through me, piercing what's left of my tattered, barely beating heart.
There isn’t a single cell of my body that doesn’t ache.
It’s the kind of hurt that pierces your skin and sinks into your veins, your bones, your fucking soul. It’s the kind of pain that eats away at you like poison, consuming all of the good within you until all that’s left is a shell.
I stumble, tripping over my own feet as I cross the living room. “Stupid, so stupid,” I mutter, righting myself. I flip on the lights as I enter my bathroom, recoiling at the bright light. God, even my eyes hurt.
I guess crying as hard as I have will do that, huh?
My fingers tangle in my now limp and dirty hair. I wince as I tug on the ends, my past and my present colliding in my mind, morphing into a single mangled nightmare.
“Stop, stop, stop!” I plea, the words a garbled cry to the universe. I want it all to go away, for the memories of then and the horrors of now to all stop. But I learned long ago there’s no one out there listening. Not for me, anyway. My own mother didn’t even have time to hear my story.