Page 66 of Bully Wolf's Nanny
She reached forward to caress his face, but to her surprise, he slapped her hands away. “Don’t touch me.”
Recoiling, she held her hands against her chest, concern giving way to something worse. Dread, perhaps. There was nothing kind in Nicolas’s face. No warmth, nothing. With a start, Daisy realized the last time she had seen that look on his face had been…
Had been before he first kissed her. Back when all he wanted to do was make her life a living hell.
Her stomach twisted into a knot.
“Nicolas?” she asked, hating the way her voice wavered. “What’s going on?”
He observed her like one might observe a cockroach in a glass jar, lip curling in disgust. “What’s going on? What’s going on, you stupid bitch, is that you were fucking dumb enough to fall in love with me.”
Her heart thundered to a halt entirely in her chest. Her breath was stolen from her lungs, leaving her empty and hollow and aching.
Surely not. Surely, he couldn’t be serious. This was some sort of practical joke. It had to be. There was no way that even he could be so cruel…
But as he stalked towards her, face twisting in hatred, Daisy realized that he, in fact, could.
“You really fell for it. I couldn’t believe it. The others certainly won’t. Do you want to know what’s really going on, Daisy? What’s going on is I was challenged to fuck you. The others didn’t think it was possible, didn’t believe that any girlwould have such little self-respect, didn’t think any girl would ever open their legs to a guy who’d tortured them. But you, Daisy, you proved them wrong. Congratulations.”
“I…I don’t…”
“Of course, I probably could have fucked you that first time I kissed you, right up against the tree. You probably would have let me, wouldn’t you? I mean, what other fucking hope would you have of a guy touching you? No guy would ever want to go fucking near you. But I admit, it was fun to draw it out, to let you come to me. You invited me into your fucking house, Daisy. I mean, it was fucking hilarious. After everything I’ve done to you.”
“Nicolas,” tears were falling freely down her face now, her mouth open in horror at his words, “you don’t mean that. Tell me you don’t mean it!”
“Oh, I mean it,” he said with a sneer. “Don’t tell me you actually believed I loved you? Jesus fucking Christ. Look at you! Look at me. In what fucking world would someone like me ever want to be with someone like you.”
“You’re lying,” she said through the haze of tears, “I don’t know why, but you’re lying!”
He took a deep breath in through his nose, clenched fists trembling at his sides. “Believe what you want. I don’t care. As long as you fuck off. Your idiot parents broke faith today, no doubt in shame over their whore daughter, so go with them to whatever shithole they end up in.”
She reached forward, ignoring every instinct screaming at her to stop, and took his hand. It was so big in both of hers, so warm, rough with calluses. When he didn’t immediately shake her off, she blinked away her tears and tilted her head to look him straight in the eye. “Nicolas, just stop. I don’t believe whatyou’re saying. I love you, and I think you love me. Whatever it is, we can face it together. Just please, please don’t do this.”
He stared at her for a moment, his eyes an ocean, before he blinked and the icy walls slammed back into place. Wrenching his hand out of her grasp, he sneered at her, taking a step back. “You still haven’t got it into your thick head, have you? This was all a trick. I don’t love you, I don’t want to be with you. I took your virginity because you were stupid enough to open your legs for me, and you weren’t even a good fuck. Maybe if you spent more time at the gym and less time stuffing your face, I could have at least had something nice to look at.”
His words may as well have been swords. They pierced through her, straight to her very soul, and in that moment, she knew he was serious. He meant it. This was real.
She didn’t bother responding. Just choked down a sob and fled into the woods, straight back home. Her parents were already packing. She joined them. They left the very next day for a hotel in a town outside Iron Walker territory.
They stayed there for two months while her parents worked out what to do. Every day was like a living nightmare. All Daisy could think about, from the moment she rose to the moment she closed her eyes to sleep was Nicolas’ words. The pure disgust on his face.
The aching love she still had for him.
So when she sat, bawling her eyes out in the hotel bathroom, clutching the positive pregnancy test in her trembling hands, something deep within her broke and was forged anew.
She would do this. She could do this. Her parents told her their intention to move out west, to Los Angeles, and she didn’t go with them. She stayed, got a job as a waitress, eventually saved up enough for the deposit to rent a shitty apartment.Her stomach grew bigger, and with each passing day her pain lessened.
Her daughter was born, and she remembered what it was to love. She met Amelia, and remembered what it was to laugh. She looked at herself in the mirror, dark circles and crumpled clothes and all, and remembered what it was to be herself. So she made herself a promise.
Never again. She would never fall for a man’s lies again.
***
Present day
“Damnit, damnit,damnit,” Daisy cried, kicking the wheel of the useless car. It was no good. The thing was completely dead. She took one more look under the hood, praying that the answer would magically appear, but of course there was nothing.
They were stranded, in the middle of the woods, and night was falling thick and fast.
