Page 12 of His to Keep

“You will soon learn how I give punishment to those who deserve it.” He bends to untangle them from my ankles before wrenching the door open and pushing me inside complete blackness.

The smell is what hits me first. So foul and disgusting, I try not to breathe at all. My eyes struggle to see anything in the abyss, as Father Aaron says, “Repeat after me.”

“Plea—”

“In the name of the Father.” His grip tightens in warning. I can’t breathe. “Say it, Ava.”

“I…In the name of the Father.”

Chuckling darkly, he’s enjoying this too much. Leaning into me, his fingers from his other hand dig into my stomach, and I cringe when his lips brush my ear. “And of the Son.”

“P-Please,” I beg.

“Repeat it.”

Fingers snake along my stomach, traveling down my navel, where they shouldn’t be going. Gasping, I hastily repeat, “And of the Son.”

“And of the Holy Spirit.” Just when I think his hand is about to touch the space between my legs, he suddenly lets go of me. I’m left standing on my own in the dark—naked and cold. He moves around the room, his priest robes brushing against the floor the only indication that he’s still here.

“F-Father Aaron?”

“Say the words.”

Shaking violently, I finally mutter, “And of the Holy Spirit—”

He laughs. The type I know will haunt me for the rest of my life. A light comes on out of nowhere, and I blink from the brightness, finally spotting Father Aaron across the room and what’s next to him. My world dims and fades to black, like it was always meant to.

Amen.

I can’t move. The urge to scream is strong, but no sound passes my lips. It’s a girl—a girl possibly a few years older than me drenched in red. With her hands tied above her head, her body dangles from a hook attached to the ceiling. And the blood. It’s all I see. Covering her skin and saturating her once white dress. On the floor, and the walls, and beneath my feet.

My feet.

I balk. Blood and dirt cover my toes, and ice slides right down the middle of my spine. I stumble back, wanting to stop looking but unable to take my eyes off her. Her own eyes are open, glazed with death. Lacerations open her skin in the most grotesque way, and it’s clear she’s been whipped to an inch of her life.

Stepping back, attempting to put as much distance between me and the horror, my back collides with something. No.Someone. Arms wrap around my waist, but I don’t turn to see who it is. I don’t care. The foul stench in this room is her—urine, excrement, and decay.

Bowling over, scorching vomit projects past my lips and spills over the floor. Acid burns the back of my throat, and I wail, something that doesn’t sound like me at all. Father Aaron steps forward, smile still intact, no doubt his sick handiwork.

“Breathe,” a voice hisses down my ear. But as I inhale, a bloodcurdling scream comes instead.

Panicked, I whirl around. Callum has hold of me, and without thinking, I fall into him. He grunts when I wrap my arms around his waist and cling desperately to him, screaming and sobbing into his chest, not wanting to see the girl again. There are footsteps behind me, and my arm is grabbed. I yell out as Father Aaron forces me to turn and face him.

“Now you see,” he says darkly. “See what I can do. This seductress disobeyed me. What she did was unforgivable, and she paid the price.” I yelp when he throws me onto the blood-soaked ground. “Youwillobey me, Ava. I’ll make sure of it.”

Grabbing under my arms, Callum pulls me out of the room of horrors. I don’t know how I’m walking as we go upstairs and back to the bedroom. Once there, I fall to the floor and stay down, limbs too weak to stand. How is this not a nightmare? Nightmares you can wake up from but there’s no waking from this. This is real, and Father Aaron is a monster.

Just as I think it can’t get any worse, as I inspect myself, dirt and blood coat my skin. So much blood. The ends of my hair, beneath my nails. It’s thick and dried in. Sobbing, I rub at it. “No. Please, no. It won’t come off!”

A hand touches my arm, and Callum crouches beside me. Our eyes meet, and I don’t know what, but something passes between us. An understanding that doesn’t make me feel so alone.

“Come on.” He unexpectedly lifts me off the floor again. His eyes avoid my body and he doesn’t touch me anywhere he shouldn’t. And I’m glad. I’d forgotten about my nakedness in the terror. Maybe I was wrong before about him giving me a short towel on purpose.

Taking me into the bathroom, he turns on the shower again. As he waits for the water to heat, I take in his side profile—straight nose, curved lips, and long, thick eyelashes. He appears as exhausted as I feel and oddlybeautiful. I quickly drop my eyes. I’m clearly not thinking straight.

When the water is hot enough, he helps me in. Sitting on the floor of the tub, I squeeze my knees to my chest as he reaches to point the showerhead directly above me. Water hits my skin and I watch with turmoil as the stream beneath me runs crimson and then brown. It swirls around the drain and disappears, like the girl did from her life. Like I have.

Once again, a sob breaks free, and I can’t believe what I saw. What Father Aaron did changes everything.Will he do that to me? Am I next?

---