Total pages in book: 110
Estimated words: 105506 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 528(@200wpm)___ 422(@250wpm)___ 352(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 105506 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 528(@200wpm)___ 422(@250wpm)___ 352(@300wpm)
There was no crease between his dark brows. His forehead was smooth.
I wished that he could be the man that his sleeping form gave him the potential to be. The man whose sister had survived. Who hadn’t gotten tangled up with a wrecked woman who was apt to destroy his life, injecting it full of more tragedy and pain.
As much as I wanted to be one when I was a teenager, I wasn’t a witch. I didn’t have the power to raise the dead or change the past.
So I carefully extracted myself from his embrace instead, dressing quietly.
It was a testament to how exhausted he must’ve been that he didn’t notice me putting on a tank and some sweats, using the facilities and then slipping out of the room.
It was before seven, and the house was filled with light and activity, the sounds of cupboards opening and shutting in the kitchen filtering down the hall. I remembered screaming at my mother from my bedroom, telling her off for waking me up so early.
“Good morning,” I greeted her, lingering uncertainty by the entrance to the kitchen.
My mother was at the stove, and she either hadn’t expected me to get up this early or had forgotten I was even here.
She jumped, turning with a spatula in her hand, the other on her chest. Her eyes flew over me in surprise, and again, I wondered if it was because I was awake or there at all.
Then they warmed.
“Sariah, you’re awake. I was just making you and your, uh, you and Colby some breakfast. Does he eat eggs and pancakes? He looks like the kind of fellow who follows a specific kind of diet.”
I smiled because Colby’s muscled and sculpted body did hint that he tracked his macros. “Yeah, he eats everything.”
“There’s coffee, fresh.” Mom nodded to the drip espresso that indeed was fresh. My mother drank it, though my father abstained because the church forbade it. I, of course, started drinking when I was twelve for that very reason.
I was grateful for something to do, rather than stand awkwardly, unsure of where to put myself.
It was funny, being back in that kitchen where nothing much had changed. The countertops were the same, the cabinets maybe had a fresh coat of sage green paint. The dining table in the middle of the room was set for breakfast, this time with four plates, bowls and cutlery.
I was so distracted by the strange familiarity of the room that upon reaching into the third cabinet for a mug, I didn’t even notice that my tank had ridden up. My mother’s strangled gasp told me just how high it had risen.
Her horrified gaze was focused on the ugly, raised, jagged scar that was about two inches long. Just above my hip bone. It was surrounded by smaller ones, less red and angry but still ugly.
I quickly snatched a mug, tugging my tank down with the other hand.
But the damage had been done.
Mom’s hand was shaking as she took the eggs off the stove and walked toward me.
My entire body turned to stone. She must’ve noticed that since she stopped before she was close enough to touch me.
“W-what happened?” she whispered. “Who did that to you? Who hurt you?” The last two questions weren’t quite a whisper. They were louder, darker, angrier and more venomous than I’d ever heard my mother’s voice sound.
I clutched the handle of the mug, walking to the coffee pot and pouring so I had something to do.
I gripped the counter, bracing myself as I contemplated how to respond. A lie. A lie would suffice. I could say I was mugged. That I was in a car accident. That I’d been involved with a cult that believed in mutilating your own body.
Any and all of those would’ve been preferable to the truth.
“I was taken.” My voice was hoarse. “By a man who hurt women.” I grasped the counter harder. “A man who killed women,” I corrected. I placed the mug on the counter so I could hug my stomach. “But not before he hurt them first.”
My mother’s ragged breaths filled up the room, yet I couldn’t look at her.
“He took me, he hurt me because of the … lifestyle I lived,” I choked out, unable to get any more specific. “He punished me for my sins, just like you said I would be.”
I finally looked at her then, not sure what I was expecting to find. Disgust, maybe.
My mother’s face was a mask of pain and sorrow, her eyes glassy with unshed tears. “Oh, honey,” she whispered. “You have done nothing that you deserve to be punished for. Nothing you could ever do would make you deserve … that,” her voice cracked as she looked down to my stomach. “I used religion like a weapon because I thought I could protect you from the evils of this world with it.” She wiped angrily at a tear rolling down her face. “I couldn’t fathom that you could be hurt that way and blame yourself because of what I instilled in you. My baby.”