Inevitable (24 page)

‘How did you get back home?’ he questioned, as he flicked my hair up and off my neck and cupped it gently, pulling me closer to him.

‘On the Sunday afternoon, Petre unlocked the room. I had heard shouting outside earlier and was sitting terrified in the corner. Petre had been sent in to lose his virginity, to use me. What his family didn’t realise was that Petre was gay; it wasn’t something he could voice to his traditional family, but we had spoken about it before, so we helped each other. He had brought me water and a sandwich, I was desperate to eat and so dehydrated. He sat and hugged me while I cried and I made sure we stayed in the room long enough for it to appear that we had sex. Once the right amount of time had passed, we made an appearance back in the office and faced his father. I was threatened for my silence, in exchange for mine and my family’s lives. Petre helped me leave that house, I saw no other members of the family as we left and he dropped me off at my home. I was just so pleased to be there. He dropped me off and I watched him leave.’

I inhaled a deep cleansing breath, then continued with my story, ‘I walked up the driveway and I could see in the window my parents were watching TV, talking and my brother, Jack was sitting at our table doing his homework, it was all so normal and I was so very grateful. It was a sight, that at times over the weekend, I hadn’t thought I would ever see again. Frankie came over that evening and between her and Jasmin they got me through. They heard me out and let me make my own decision. After I pretended to be ill for a few days my parents seemed to realise, much to their relief, I was back. Eventually I was sent a few miles away to a six form college to get my grades back up and slowly but surely I began to function again.’

The stroking of my hair had stopped and Nathan was busy kissing the top of my head. ‘I am so fucking proud of you, Bella… so fucking, goddamn proud.’

‘You are?’

‘Yes I am, you went through a fucking nightmare and came out the other side, better than that… you went back to make him pay. I’m in fucking awe of you.’

‘But I’m damaged goods, Nathan… you could have anyone you wanted… you are just so… so bloody everything, gorgeous, sexy and caring, women throw themselves at you, why on earth would you want to settle for me?’

He moved me underneath him. I knew why, it was so I could see him as he spoke. The light was starting to dim, but he was absolutely dazzling. His eyes sparkled and his hair fell down over his face. ‘I love you. It’s that simple… from the moment you touched me in that nightclub, I was a fucking goner. You are the everything I didn’t even realise I fucking needed, until ya came crashing into my world shouting the fucking odds. You think you’re damaged goods?’ he laughed, as I tried to push back up the longer strands of his hair. ‘All I goddamn see is the strongest, most beautiful person I have ever known. I’m never letting you leave again, Bella.’ He crushed me to him in the kind of embrace that felt like it could mend everything. After a few minutes, he spoke again. ‘You know our chicken and biscuits is outside the door, getting cold?’ He winked at me.

He made me laugh, Nate was always ruled by his stomach and I loved the normality it brought back into the tense, emotional room.

NATHAN

I
left our so-called fucking “deluxe room” and felt the door shut gently behind me as I bent down to pick up our food. I’d heard the knock at the door earlier, but Bella had been in full fucking flow and there was no goddamn way I was interrupting her. The noise from the kids playing in the pool caught my attention and from my squat position, I lifted my gaze to watch them through the open wooden slats of the balcony walkway. I tried to absorb their happiness as I prepared myself to be the man I fucking wanted to be, for her. But my attention just homed in on the damaged, peeling paint as it cracked and split on the decaying planks, it felt like a reflection of my life.

I had wanted the fucking truth from her. For us to move on with our lives we needed to lay everything out there, but the anger coursing around my body was like nothing I had ever fucking experienced before. I could feel every vein fucking igniting like it contained lava. I clenched and unclenched my fists, willing myself to calm the fuck down, at least enough so that I could go back in and comfort the only woman I had ever loved. This was the sort of fucking thing that would normally drive me straight over the goddamn edge, it wasn’t in my control to change it so like the addictive asswipe I was, I would crave some sort of escape from reality, I needed some sort of release. I had been young when I had gained these coping mechanisms. I instinctively rubbed my leather wrist cuffs, squeezing them in the fucking places I knew scars lay underneath. After feeling a sense of liberation, I reached into the back pocket of my jeans and fished out my mints, I popped the lid and threw a couple into my mouth, whisking them around with my tongue and connecting them with my teeth. I raised my face to the blue sky and exhaled.

Come on, ya stupid fucker!

I knew I only had a few minutes of solitude, any longer and it would hurt her, she would think I was fucking avoiding her because of what she’d just shared, when it wasn’t that at all. It was the fact I couldn’t trust myself right at this very fucking minute. There was no goddamn way anyone would ever hurt her again, not on my fucking watch. I thought of the young girl she had been, at the hands of one hell of an evil fucking bastard. If I ever caught sight of him, I would kill him, in no fucking uncertain terms, I would cut his fucking balls off and feed them down his throat, until he fucking choked. Almost on instinct I threw my right fist into the wooden floor.

‘FUCK, FUCK!’ The pain shot through my knuckles and I stretched out my hand in front of my face and then shook it, trying to shake away the pain.

My breathing was beginning to slow down, just imagining what I would do to the fucker if we ever met was helping to dampen down the fire from my blood. I cast my gaze down and stared at the box of what had to be pretty damn cold food. I didn’t care, food was fucking food, but Bella might, she needed some food in her, opening up your innermost nightmares was emotionally fucking draining. I’d only recently started to open up my repulsive Pandora’s box. Some of the work that I’d had done to me wasn’t as obvious as new tattoos and piercings. I shook my head and a smile broke out over my face, she hadn’t seen my last surprise for her yet, I couldn’t fucking wait.

Enough, I picked up the box and stood to my full height, stretching out my cramped muscles, my asswipe of a leg was killing me. I shook it off. It was evidently one of those days, I knew my leg would always contain the pins and rods of my accident, like I now knew and accepted my heart would always contain Bella. Over the last few months, I’d realised that I had never really loved anyone in my life before, and I realised that I would never love anyone again the way I loved her. It was all consuming, I could no longer pretend to be fucking immune, I could no longer shag around. From this point onwards, it was her, one hundred and fifty percent her.

Whatever I’d inflicted on my body in the past, the tattoos, piercings, the cutting and the numerous bike accidents, all in my bid for control, all of it felt like a complete fucking waste of my time. It was as though my whole life had been a practise run of “what the fuck not to do”, while I just waited for her to enter into my world.

Now she was back in my life, she was the only thing I goddamn wanted. She was it for me. Now I needed to show her just how fucking much. I put my flat palm to the door and pushed it open, I was preparing to start my life over.

BELLA

N
athan had left the room to pick up our food. I knew he would be a while. What I had just told him needed some digestion time, I understood that completely. Opening up my compartmentalised box in my mind was emotional. It was so emotional that sometimes during the re-telling of my story it had felt like an out of body experience, like looking from the outside in. I could sense and feel his anger but he had cared enough to know that I needed none of it, him shouting and swearing the bloody odds would not erase my past, so it would have been somewhat redundant to the conversation.

I lay on the creased bedding with the quilt still over the top of me, he had covered me up as he had left. It was still warm out in the late June evening, but I needed the comfort the weight of the quilt presented to me.

‘He said he was in awe of me and proud of me,’ I said in a small voice, talking to myself. I smiled. I had so much hope that his acceptance of my past meant we would move forward together as a united front. I hugged one of the pillows close to my body and for the first time in what felt like hours I felt myself smile.

I must have looked like a train wreck. I lifted the quilt and placed both feet to the floor. I could sense Nate was still outside the door, I knew he wouldn’t leave me but I knew he needed a little solitude. I made my way to the small bathroom and clicked on the light. Staring into the mirror, I ran my brush through my semi-dry hair and tied it up into a quick ponytail. I laughed as I pinched my cheeks trying to get some colour back into them, I reminded myself of my mum.

Every day, just before dad came home from work she had tidied her hair in the hall mirror, pinched her cheeks and reapplied her lipstick just waiting for his arrival. I was so lucky in more ways than one. My family had always been a loving unit and with a friend like Frankie, I knew how lucky I was, even when I had flown home six months ago and told them what I had gone through. I had to stand before them and tell them all the lies I had made up, to try to stop them from being hurt and to keep them safe. I knew, as a grown adult, it had all been a complete waste of time, as the hurt on their faces at the realisation of what had happened to me was enormous and I had grabbed my sister for support. Jasmin had sat by my side as I told my story and we had all cried together, once my dad had come in from his garden. He had done much as I knew Nate was doing now. He had walked around his lawn as we watched from the windows in the conservatory, dead-heading flowers and pulling weeds. We had known what he was doing really, he needed the time to comprehend everything that had happened to me.

He was trying to come to terms with something that he could never change and never erase, it had happened and no matter what he did in the future he hadn’t been able to stop that past event. As a male, it must be the worst thing ever to come to terms with the fact something has happened to a daughter, lover or wife and even though there wasn’t a bloody thing you could have done about it, you may not have even known each other at the time, it must hurt like a knife to the stomach. However, as an alpha male, and knowing how they needed to control, if it was possible it was probably even worse. But the one thing that could console and dull down the pain the obnoxious memories left within, was the unconditional love of another. I looked at myself in the mirror and recognised that was how I felt, all the truly important people in my life now knew my history, that in itself took away some of the power Ioan had always had over me. I felt unshackled. I should have done this years ago.

The soft vibrating noise of my phone interrupted my thoughts.

I rushed into the room and started to empty the contents of my small rucksack, finally my glowing phone fell onto the floor. It moved around the stained floor as it vibrated and I could see Jasmin’s smiling picture lighting up the screen. I sank down and crossed my bare legs like a child as I touched the answer button.

‘Bellaboo?’ I heard her questioning voice.

‘Yeah, sorry I was in the bathroom… how are you all?’

‘We’re all good, I would go so far as to say we are really enjoying the cruise now, the guys that John and the team were watching have been taken off the boat and arrested.’

‘Arrested? So they really were something to do with the Antonescus?’

‘It seems that way.’

‘You can all go home now.’ I was relieved, my family’s lives no longer had to be put on hold, because of what I’d brought to their door. It seemed my past had at this moment in time disrupted a hell of a lot of people. I sighed and shook my head at the thought.