Page 44 of A Dark Duet

The girls come back over, and I see my girl with her blank eyes. The sparkle is gone and has been replaced with sorrow and pain, gutting me. I will do anything to take it away. Those assholes are dead.

She won’t even look at me like she used to, with want and fire in her soul, needing me. She flinches when I touch her, standing away from me when I get near, and locks her door to the room when she sleeps.

All the signs were there, and I was too stupid and full of myself to notice. That disgusting pig raped them. I will find him and his little minions, and when I do, I will end them.

“Let’s go. We need to get going.”

“Okay, let me get my hoodie and we can leave,” she says.

They leave to get their stuff and I get an incoming text from Jaden with an attachment. I open it and find Giselle’s medical report.

Jaden looks at me while I scan the attachment. “It’s a twenty-four-hour clinic. It’s not good, brother. He fucked her up bad.”

I look at him, and I see the sadness on his face. He read it. I look at it, not being able to wait. What I read is the worst thing I could imagine. I can hardly stomach it. Internal bleeding from tearing, and contusions on her neck and body, nipples and chest area.

She needed a blood transfusion from the loss of blood. It shows she can still have children in the future and was treated with pain medication, antibiotics, and for any diseases, as is the protocol for a rape victim. Two different, unknown males raped her while one held her, choking her.

She came into the urgent care unit in shock, in and out of consciousness. She was treated for over five hours and sent home. That’s why she couldn’t text me back. Instead of me going after her and making sure she was okay, she was being raped while Brie was assaulted and forced to watch.

He had raped Brie before, like he said, laughing, and I know Jaden is looking into it. We wait patiently until they come back, with Brie sporting a fresh face of makeup. We don’t stare at them or make any comments.

On the plane, Giselle is in a corner with her knees tucked under a sweater. I get up and sit next to her. “Are you cold, baby?” I breathe.

I don’t want to freak her out by touching her. She turns to me, and I raise my arm so she can lean against me. I will do my best not to touch her and just hold her gently. She nods and leans into me, and it’s like heaven to smell the sweet scent of her hair. I breathe her in and lay my hands to the side as she falls asleep.

When we are almost about to land, she wakes up in the airplane, screaming in panic. Brie rushes from the back of the plane and takes her from me, rocking her.

“Shh. Giselle, I’m here. It’s me. They can’t hurt you,” she whispers, and I look at them in shock.

Similar to what I go through every night, except no one is there to rock me. Jaden stares at them like he’s seen a ghost. A ghost he is familiar with. The captain gives the signal that we are landing, and I kneel to pick up Giselle to take her back to the seat. Brie looks at me and I can see the bruises now that she’s closer and I look at Jaden.

He looks at her and gives her his hand. She takes it and sits next to him, placing her cheek on his shoulder.

We get to the house, and I take her to the guest bedroom. “I’m sorry I had a nightmare. It was nothing,” she says softly.

“I know what happened.”

Her eyes widen. “What are you talking about?” she says defensively.

I show her the medical records from my phone as I hand it to her. She slides down the bed and I kneel next to her. “Look at me. They were there tonight, and I can’t keep that from you. I’m going to kill them, do you understand?”

Her eyes look into mine and she shakes. “You can’t. It changes nothing, Nate.”

“You think they can just get away with it, that I’ll let them walk, like it’s all good? They were laughing about it, and I am not sure they won’t try it again. I threatened them, but I showed restraint and restraint to people like that? They confuse it with weakness. I can’t let you go back there, or Brie. You’re not safe there. Predators will wait and won’t stop after they taste what they can’t have freely. Brie will stay with Jaden and you will stay here. We will figure this out. You’re not okay, Giselle. What they did… I read the doctor’s medical reports.”

I close my eyes with rage simmering inside at what I want to do to those assholes. I want to rip them apart limb from limb to inflict the pain they have inflicted on her. She gives me back the phone, not wanting to look at the pages that remind her of what her body went through, reliving what they did to her physically. Mentally and psychologically, she’s in pain. I know what damage feels like, what pain feels like, and being powerless to make it go away or seek revenge.

“Giselle, I’m going to take care of you, and you must trust me. I would never hurt you. I’m going to help you.”

“How? I’m damaged, Nate. I’m broken, and even if you try to put me together, it’s never the same. I will never be the same. I can’t sleep. My skin feels raw from me scrubbing the filth that won’t seem to go away. Sometimes I can still smell them, and I just want to vomit. They should have just killed me,” she whispers.

“Don’t say that. I get it, and you never have to worry. No one will do this to you ever again. You have my word. I will protect you, Giselle.”

Meaning every word, I will protect her, and I will kill those motherfuckers who put their hands on what’s mine. Jail is not good enough, not in my book.

I could easily get them arrested, but for what? They will be set free, and then they will come after them again. They’re scum drug dealers who feed on addicts, preying on young women who come from those sides of the tracks. They may have broken her, but what they didn’t know was that she belonged to someone who was born from their world. Who is just as fucked up with a dark soul, who only knows pain and how to inflict it.

They don’t know that The Reaper is going to come and collect. Right now, I’m going to put back together what they broke and damaged, something that belongs to me, that is delicate, and to be touched by me, and only me.

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