Page 43 of I Shouldn't Feel This Way

“No! I’m begging you to stop! I don’t want the cops to show up!”

“Why? Does he have a record? Let me guess—assault and battery. You married a fucking criminal?”

Rob groaned in pain and clutched his ribs, coughing up blood on the cheap carpet. It was only then that I realized that I was in their bedroom. A long brown belt caught my eye on the bed before I looked down at his trousers. It didn’t take me very long to connect the dots. He was going to use it as a torture weapon on my daughter (if he hadn’t already). Whatever self-control I had escaped me, as I grabbed the belt, coiled it around his throat, and pulled his weight upwards. I sat on the edge of the bed, choking him from behind like the psycho I had become.

“Say hello to the Grim Reaper, asshole!” I tightened my grasp on the leather belt, pulling and pulling while he choked and struggled to break free. Emily was screaming and pulling my arm, but I wouldn’t release him from my death grip.

“Dear God … please!” Emily begged. “Let him go! He can’t breathe!”

No, I wouldn’t let him go. Not until I disgraced the fucker.

“Slap him,” I growled. “Slap him across the face!”

“What? No! Just let him go!”

“I said, slap him now or I kill him!” I squeezed my grip on the belt and watched her face go pale with fear. She cried with pleading eyes, begging me to show some mercy, but I wouldn’t show any. All I could feel was sadistic pleasure.

“I can’t believe you would allow him to raise a hand to our daughter!”

“He didn’t hit her! She ran away!”

“How can you defend this scumbag? Did you see her room?” I screamed at her. “Slap his fucking face!”

Finally, I had pressed the right button, giving her just enough of a push to surrender to my will. She slapped Rob across the face, screaming and crying at the same time. Whether Emily was motivated by my influence or her own instincts to keep him alive, it didn’t matter to me. I was relishing the moment.

“Harder!” I tugged on the belt so that his eyes were nearly bulging out, taking great gratification in hearing his garbled breaths. “Now, tell him what a fucking failure of a father and husband he is! Tell him!” I was livid, staring her down with murderous eyes.

“Noah,” she cried, “please …” Her mascara was runny and her dirty blonde hair looked like a tousled mop on top of her head.

“Slap him and say it!” I was yelling so loud that I was sure my voice was making the walls vibrate.

She eventually succumbed and started to slap the lowlife across face, repeating whatever mantra of words I told her to recite like a submissive slave.

“You’re a failure! You failed me! You failed us!”

I felt like I had possessed her mind and she was finally giving that good for nothing the punishment of his life: humiliation. Feeling high with dominance, I was truly in my element—complete, unrestricted power and control. It was a rush.

“You had no right to hurt Aria, ever!” Emily screamed. “You have no right to hurt me and hit me!”

Well, well, well. It seemed that asshole had a tendency to beat on his wife, just as I suspected. This only fed my rage more. I didn’t like my ex, but violence against women was just plain wrong. Any man who raised his hand to a woman wasn’t a man at all.

When I felt satisfied with her, I fastened the belt around his neck like a collar and dragged him across the floor out of their bedroom. Rob was turning beet red, bloodied from the beatings.

“Are you enjoying this, Robbie boy? Christmas has come early for you this year, and I’m here to deliver.Ho ho ho, fuckface!” I couldn’t recognize my own voice anymore, because a twisted version of my former self had taken over—my darker half.

He choked unceasingly, desperate to free himself, but I wouldn’t let him escape that easily. I continued dragging his fat ass down the hall into Aria’s bedroom.

“Let’s re-enact a scenario that I’m sure took place many times in this room during my absence.” I grinned wickedly, loosening the belt and unraveling it from around his throat. Rob was frantically gasping for breath. The heel of my shoe met his raggedy ass as I kicked him to the ground and reached down to rip his under shirt in half with my bare hands.

Rrrrrrrip,went the fabric. His back was now exposed, and I was ready to unleash my wrath on him. Curling the brown belt around the palm of my hand, I began to whip the bastard, flogging him relentlessly as he cried out in pain. Every time he tried to get back up, I kicked him with a hard blow to the rib or spine. My blood was surging through my veins and my adrenaline had cranked into overdrive. The painful cries that escaped his lips were like music to my ears. I didn’t want to stop. I felt like a maestro conducting a beautiful symphony of pain, and once I was done performing my masterpiece, I would be well received with a standing ovation from a crowd full of women and children who had suffered domestic abuse.

“Don’t you ever,everlay your grubby hands on my daughter again! I won’t even give you the opportunity! If I find out that you’ve laid a finger on your wife and kids, your ass is going behind bars. Do you hear me, you sick fuck?” I flogged him over and over until bloody welt marks appeared on his skin.

“You’re the sick fuck!” he sputtered.

But I had zoned out into my universe of carnage.

“Noah! Stop this!” Emily’s voice echoed in the background. “My kids have arrived home! Please don’t do this in front them! Stop, I beg you!”

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