Chapter 31
Chapter 31:
I feel like I’m trapped in a strange, dark unconscious dream. A nightmare tangled with devious cobwebs, filthy walls, and an arid stench that twists my stomach into painful knots. My eyes feel both open and shut at the same time.
A grizzling sensation of something crawling over my leg forces me to focus. Slowly, my blurry vision clears, and when it does, I scream at the sight of a huge rat digging its claws into my skin. The tremors its scratching sends down my spine nearly paralyze me with fear, yet at the same time, adrenaline shoots through me. I fling my leg into the air, watching the black animal fly to the far end of the dark room. It lets out a low squeak as it hits the ground with a dull thud. briefly, it’s dead, but then it scurries across the floor and vanishes through a hole in the wall.
“Seems like you’re awake now. I was beginning to think you were dead p>
My head is pounding, but I’d recognize that voice anywhere. I turn toward the sound.
And there he is.
He’s seated on a metal chair near the hole where the rat disappeared. He’s still dressed the same way he was when I came to his house, which means I probably haven’t been here for long.
A dirty, disgusting smirk twists his once-handsome face—the same face I thought belonged to someone good and kind. Now it’s filled with cruelty. The sight of it makes my fingernails itch with the desperate urge to claw his eyes out. But my hands are bound tightly behind my back, and I’m left lying on this filthy floor like some discarded animal awaiting slaughter.
“How are you feeling?” he taunts, rising from the chair.
Is he mocking me? Didn’t he see me fling a rat across the room p>
I don’t answer. I can’t. I’m too weak, too hurt to speak. My heart aches with the weight of his betrayal, leaving me wondering if he ever loved me at all—if any of those words about wanting to spend forever with me were ever true.
In a flash, he’s standing over me, looming like a hawk above its captured prey. His hand moves so fast, and I scream in pain when it smacks hard across my right cheek.
I’m not given a second to recover before his other hand lands another deafening slap across my left cheek.
The brutal impact sends my face crashing to the floor. I cough, sputtering as tiny spits of blood coat the filthy ground. I would give anything to stop the pain and anguish tearing me apart. My cheeks burn, my head throbs, and every part of my body aches. My throat is so dry it feels like a desert is spreading inside me.
I want to escape. To close my eyes and wake up to find this wretched torture is nothing more than a bad dream.
That fragile wish is ripped away when Dominic seizes my hair, jerking me up into a grueling sitting position. His grip tightens, pain lancing through my skull like a million fireballs.
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I wince and bite down on my bloodied lower lip, fighting the urge to scream. Maybe that’s why he struck me the second time—because I cried out after the first slap.
“Listen, Isla,” his gravelly voice growls. “When I ask you a question, you answer. If I want something from you, you give it to me. Here, I’m the master, and you are my fucking slave p>
He bellows the last words, his voice. I nod quickly, small and powerless, reduced to nothing but a rag in his hands.
He finally releases my hair, and blood surges painfully back into my skull. Tears well in my eyes, spilling down my cheeks unchecked.
I want to ask him why he’s doing this to me, but his warning echoes inside my head. He’s the master who asks the questions. I’m the slave who gives the answers.
He prowls the room like a king surveying his domain. My spine aches so badly that I inch backward until I hit the wall. The dirty surface presses against my back, but at least it holds me up.