Page 40 of XV (Fifteen) (War of Roses 1)

Chapter 12

Ihover on the edge of consciousness for what feels like an eternity. Any minute, I’m sure someone will kick, shake, or threaten me awake—but that moment never comes.

I’m left alone to suffer, and in the end, hunger is what finally rouses me. My stomach aches. So does my head. Between my legs…No.I ignore that pain and focus only on what I can fix now.Food.

Gradually, my eyes open to an unfamiliar ceiling and unease returns. I don’t recognize the bed I’m lying on; it’s too soft to be the one in the safe house. The sheets twisted around me feel clean, but the comfort they impart doesn’t do much to negate the terrifying reality that someone stripped me naked. Thateverythinghurts. The insides of my legs feel sticky…used.

Don’t think about that, Ellen.

Groaning, I roll onto my side, trying to find a semblance of familiarity in the darkness. I track the twisting shadows and vague furniture-like shapes without recognizing much. There’s too much space. I cradle my forehead against my palm and try to remember.Hotel room.Mischa must have kept me here.Leftme here? I don’t sense him nearby.

When I finally crawl from the bed, drawing a white sheet around me, he doesn’t lunge from the corner and command me to stay. In fact, there doesn’t appear to be anyone else in the suite but me. Beyond the bedroom is a small sitting area and then the bathroom. Someone left the light on in the latter area. The floor looks wet, scrubbed down. A chemical odor itches my nostrils.

Rather than inspect further, I aim for the mini fridge in the corner, tucked into a tiny alcove. Whoever bought this room must have paid for the complimentary mini bar in advance. It’s already been stocked, and I grab a pack of crackers and a soda. The pain in my throat is enough to temper my hunger, however. I can only choke a few crumbs down at a time, and even hearing the soda hiss as I pop the top makes me set it aside. Instead, I hunch over the tiny sink above the bar and swap intervals of chewing with measured sips of water from the tap.

That’s how he finds me: with my mouth upturned beneath the faucet and the last wet crumbs of cracker clinging to my fingers. I hear his approach rather than see it. His footsteps resonate in slow, steady waves. One step. Another. Pause. Another. Then something lands at my feet, startling me into spraying water down my front.

“Get dressed.” Mischa’s calm is a distant memory.Now, his voice is unsteady. His breathing… Only the thinnest thread of control seems to hold him together.

I sense it wavering the longer I stay hunched over the sink. Slowly, I shut the water off and gather enough nerve to face him.

It’s a bad idea. His silhouette flung against the wall is more than enough for me to realize my stupidity for challenging him in the first place. His fingers flex at his sides. Opening and closing. Finally, his shadow flickers and fades as his footsteps head toward the bedroom.

When I crane my neck to look down, I find a pile of fabric at my feet. Clothing. The small white shirt and jeans are all he brought, but I gratefully accept them. Even in my hands, they feel better than a flimsy negligee.

From this position, I can’t see the bedroom—or into it—as long as I don’t turn around, so I muster what little bravery I have to creep into the bathroom and shut the door. My first action is to run the shower as hot as I can stand it. Then I climb in.God.It feels…

Like heaven. Like hell.

Blood and grime wash away from me to circle the drain, but the heat makes everything sting and throb at full force. Every bruise. Every cut. Every brutal “love bite” scraped into the flesh at the nape of my neck.

I feel them all no matter how much I scrub. Clean. Cleanse. Soap and water can’t erase him. The soft wash rags the hotel supplies aren’t anywhere near strong enough to peel back tainted flesh. Not like the ones at Winthorp Manor, anyway. Those long, hot showers could make me feel new again. Strong again. Afterward, I could always face Robertagain.

But the longer I stay beneath the scalding spray, the more I’m sure of one chilling truth: I can’t ever leave this room. I can’t face Mischa. There won’t be much left of me to clean if I do.

I think I hide for hours, searching for a state of mind I know I’ll never find. My fingers feel bloated, the skin pruned to the point that I can’t hold the cloth anymore. It lands at my feet, stuck to the bottom of the tub like something used that can only be scraped off. I’m not sure how long I can last when the door rattles on its hinges.

“Open.”

This isn’t fair. Even Robert let me escape him for at least a day or two at a time. He gave me that much.

Mischa has no mercy. No fucking soul. When I don’t open the door myself, he slides it aside on his own. Dominating the doorway, he’s a specter decipherable only in pieces snuck from behind the curtain of my wet hair.

He changed, swapping the suit for his usual fatigues. His hair hangs loose and wild around his shoulders and a sudden memory leaves me trembling: feeling that softness for myself as my fingers gripped his shoulders. Grabbing. Pulling. I stare down in horror at the hands in question, sticky with soap, forever unclean.

“Come,” Mischa commands, his voice grated and low. “We need to move. Now.”

His tone spurs me into action. I switch the water off and pull my new clothing on without bothering to towel off. He watches me, his gaze searing my bare shoulders while I drag the jeans up over my hips and shimmy into the shirt. They’re both too big. I have to roll the pant legs up twice and tuck the shirt in to find some semblance of comfort. By the time I turn to the doorway, he’s already entering the hallway.

I follow him and watch as he returns the keycard to the base of the potted plant. It’s a quick, silent trip back out to the van, and we leave the hotel behind just as night falls.

Locked in the confines of the vehicle with him, I can’t breathe. It’s too close. Too quiet. Too dark. My face burns as I remember his cruelty…but my body remembers something different entirely.Thick, heavy, hot, wet, raw.Those adjectives trickle across my brain, explicit and vulgar. Robert was firm. Robert was familiar. He never made me say the wrong thing.

More.

My fingers fly up to my lips as if to capture whatever insane impulse made me utter that word. What did I want? More pain? More hate?No. The answer lingers in my mind, resisting all attempts to forget: hooded, terrifying eyes. A voice like thunder growled into my ear. Morehim.The living, breathing antidote to my husband. Someone more twisted, and broken, and fucked than Robert could ever be.

My only comfort is that any longer with Mischa and there won’t be anything left of me for Robert to reclaim.

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