Page 122 of Volatile Obsessions

None of this was pretty.

“I’m just gonna say it, mainly because it makes it easier for me to get out, but also because it’s better to just get it over with,” I explained awkwardly.

Rome nodded, his jaw grit.

Inhaling a deep breath, I went for it. “I was ten the first time he hit me. Before that, he mostly just ignored me. Guess ten makes you of age for beatings when your father hates you,” I scoffed, feeling him tense beside me. “They weren’t really a regular occurrence, but I guess that’s because mum got the worst of it. They did get worse with time, though, and when I turned thirteen, he violated me during one of his manic episodes. He didn’t actually penetrate me, but every act was unwanted, against my will. I guess my cries finally sobered him and, following that night, he never tried it again.”

The bed was shaking.

Literally shaking.

I couldn’t even bring myself to look at Rome from the sheer amount of heat radiating off his body.

It was suffocating.

Debilitating.

More than I could bear.

And story time wasn’t even over yet.

“By this point, I’d met Suki at school. She was a problem child transfer from the Liverpool orphanage. We hit it off her first day in class and the rest is history. It’s like she was sent to me to keep me from checking out so young. To help me through the next shit card and every one thereafter.”

My heart was thrashing. I could hardly breathe, so much so that I had to sit up.

Risking a peek at Rome only made it worse.

He looked positively murderous and I wanted to die. Watching him suffer on my behalf, having to burden him with this because of who he’d become in my life, was forcing me to relive these memories through a whole new painful perspective.

“My father may not have tried to touch me again,” my voice cracked a little, “but he had no problem selling my body to his friends when I turned fifteen. Fredrick was the first of the bunch. He took my virginity, shed me of my dignity. I endured it for a year—one long excruciating year of being used as a receptacle. That’s when Suki and I left. Neither one of us had anything to lose by doing so, so why not, right? Little did we know how hard it was going to be. As two sixteen-year-olds who ran away and fled their country, we found ourselves permanently living on the streets. No one wanted to help us. We slept under plenty of park benches and bridges, starved for weeks at a time. Eventually, we had to sell ourselves on street corners to make a buck for sheer survival. But then two years later, Vic found us on a corner in Brickell, begging for petty change. He took us in, got us jobs at Tootsies now that we were legal—”

“I can’t listen to any more,” Rome growled suddenly, jolting me back into the here and now. “I can’t fucking listen to anymore… Let’s go.”

My stomach almost purged itself from my body. “Where?”

“For a drive.”

I didn’t protest, offering him a silent nod that prompted him onto his feet in a flash. He was equally as silent as he extended a hand and helped me onto my feet as well.

Five minutes later, we were in the car.

He was speeding, weaving in and out around vehicles like a lunatic. I wanted to say something, but I couldn’t seem to form words. My mind was racing. I was relieved the conversation was over and done with, and yet petrified at the same time at the abrupt way in which it ended.

What was he thinking?

Gripping the door handle, I could nothing but sit and watch him maneuver us up I-95, then onto the MacArthur Causeway.

We were headed toward the beach, apparently.

“I get it now,” he finally said, his grip on the steering wheel white. “I get it and I’m so fucking sorry for you, baby.”

“Rome, don’t…” Tears sprung to my eyes. The pity party was coming, the one where he left me because he’d realized how fucked up I was.

“But mostly, I’m so disgusted, I don’t know what the fuck to do with myself. What’s festering inside me right now…”

Here it comes.

“I’m going tokill your father,” he seethed. “Maybe not today, or next month, even next year, but one day, he’ll pay his fucking dues. That disgrace of a man will pay for every single thing he did to you—emotionally, physically, psychologically. All of it.”

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