Page 8 of Newton

Xan is a year older than me, and although he's now as evil as his father, he wasn't always that way.

There was a time, years ago, when tears would flow down his cheeks when he was commanded to hurt me. He'd whisper apologies despite the pain he was causing my body. He fought long and hard against having to do it, but just like anyone would, he eventually caved to make his own pain stop.

I can't exactly recall the day something snapped in him, but his tears turned into maniacal laughter, and he'd hurt me even when his father wasn’t insisting on it. The abuse was always worse when Nathan chastised him for doing something wrong. He couldn't take his anger and hostility out on his father, because neither of us was ever that brave. He had to release those pent-up frustrations on someone. Why not turn that anger toward the stepsister? If anything, it might actually put himself back in his dad's good graces.

As he drives, I remember the time Nathan came home to find my wrists bandaged, the cuts so bad the gauze was already red from blood.

"Did she cut herself?" Nathan had asked.

"Only the first time," Xan told his father.

From the smile that spread across the man's face, you'd think he was told he won some sort of prize. He was proud of his son and how Xan, sixteen at the time, had finally become the man he wanted him to be. It was only the beginning of the things Xan would do to me to make his father proud.

Once again, I tug at the sleeves of my shirt, but Xan is all too familiar with the scars along both my arms. He put most of them there.

I know his body to be just as riddled with defects and blemishes. Nathan started his mind-fuck games by making Xan choose between hurting himself or hurting me. He held out a lot longer than I expected. I guess I should be grateful for that as well, but I can't find it in me to care what happens to the man.

"You're going to fucking crash," I growl when he barely pulls his eyes from the rearview mirror long enough to notice the traffic slowing for a red light.

"We're being followed."

I hear the accusation in his tone. "I didn't fucking tell anyone I was meeting you."

I didn't have to. What Victoria didn't overhear, they could pull up from the recording. I was told from day one that all phone calls from the landline, as well as all history online, would be monitored. Some women had the option to get jobs outside of the house, but that was never a choice I had or even wanted. I focused on schoolwork because it was the only thing I could control. As much as I hated it at the shelter, I knew it was the only way I could remain safe, so I never fought against the rules.

I didn't call anyone. I didn't research anything from my old life. I've been in Farmington for so long that I was honestly hoping that Nathan had died or at least given up on me. I don't get updates through the district attorney's office in Columbus very often, not that they really feel obligated since I haven't told them shit about Nathan or Xan.

"They're following us," Xan says as he makes another right turn from the outside lane, growling a curse word when the driver of the car he cut off blares their horn.

"No one is following us," I say, all the while praying someone actually is following us because I know my fate if they aren't.

Instead of heading away from where his father is, Xan does exactly as I'd expect him to do when he pulls up into the cracked driveway of a shitty house. Nathan will be pissed, but he only has himself to blame. If the man hadn't repeatedly beat the shit out of Xan to get compliance, then the man might have a better understanding that when you're being followed, it isn't best to go right where you're expected to go.

"You're going to be in so much trouble," he says as he turns the car off and climbs out.

I wait for him to come around to my side of the car rather than opening the door myself. Xan is volatile on his best days, and from the bouncing of that knee while he drove, I can easily tell today isn't his best day. The last thing I need is for him to put a bullet into the back of my head because he thinks I'm going to try to take off.

"I can't wait to watch him hurt you," my stepbrother whispers in my ear as he grabs my arm and urges me toward the front door of the house.

I lock my eyes on Beth the second I step inside the house. From my quick analysis, I can see that she's okay. The bruises forming on her face will heal much faster than the emotional trauma suffered at the hands of these two men.

Her clothes seem intact, but that's never a very good indicator of abuse. I can't count the number of times I was commanded to wash up and get dressed after one of the Adair men did horrific things to me.

"I think I've been followed," Xan says as he closes us inside the house.

"By whom?" Nathan snaps, pulling a gun from the holster strapped to his side.

The man is always armed, and I know firsthand that he's a damn good shot.

"I think someone from that biker gang," Xan says, pulling out his own gun when his father does.

"So you brought her back here?" the older man growls at him. I don't have to look at my stepbrother to know he's assessing the level of trouble he's in for the fuckup.

"I told you long ago," I say as I step closer to Beth. "He's a fucking idiot."

I do my best to sound as nonchalant as possible. Nathan wants us hard. He wants us to get hurt and beg for more. He doesn't hate anything more than weakness, and I already showed that side of me earlier today when I begged him to just forget about me.

"Are you going to let her talk to me that way, Dad?" Xan asks, sounding like a petulant child.

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