“You really need to learn how to properly obey me. And to never, ever question me again. Especially in front of others. You should also know just how much I hate doing what I am about to do.”
She almost asked him how much he hated doing it, but she held her tongue. She shook her head from side to side and raised her hands up to ward off the first blow she could already see coming.
“No,” she said. “Please, don’t.”
He struck her. The sharp edge of the belt cut into her wrists like the blade of a knife. She opened her mouth to scream, but barely managed to sputter a faint cry. He drew back and struck her again. She twisted and tried to get away but was trapped by the twin wings of the high-backed chair.
Another blow landed.
She pressed into the cushion, trying to make herself smaller.
“No,” she whispered.
But the blows only intensified, raining down on her faster than her mind could handle. All she could hear was the repeating crack of the belt. All she could feel were the electric shocks pain, an intense desire to breathe and the inability to do so, and the fear, the overwhelming fear. She quickly became overpowered by it all, dropping her hands, letting the blows strike her as if they meant nothing.
Nothing at all.
“Had enough?” he growled. His face was red with anger.
“Yes, yes. Whatever you say. I’ll—”
“I say when you've had enough!” He yanked her out of the chair by her foot and dragged her across the floor. She squirmed and resisted, and he shifted the belt to his left hand and whipped past any defenses she could raise. He flipped her over on her stomach. Her thin cotton shirt pulled up around her neck. Her bra stretched and became entangled within her shirt. He yanked her again and cracked the leather belt across her naked back. Pain crippled her mind. Her body bucked with each blow. She tried to move away, tried to flip over, tried to curl up, tried to get away from the unrelenting savagery. But he held her in place with his boot and whipped her again and again.
She went limp, and finally, mercifully, the blows stopped.
He lorded over her. She rolled and gazed up at him through swollen eyelids. His teeth were bared in a feral grin, and he was panting from the exertion.
“Get up, you useless bitch. Get to your bedroom. And get undressed. I’ll be there soon to deal with you properly. I went easy on you this time, so you’d better be ready for me.”
She pushed herself up slowly. The pain flared in her back and she collapsed to the floorboards. He kicked her in the thigh. The pain of the blow was dull and distant.
Sobbing, she obediently rose and went to the bedroom and started to undress. Each button on her shirt reminded her of the pain he had inflicted. Her wrists were raw and swollen. Her hands shook uncontrollably, and she had to stop undressing because she fumbled everything she did.
Downstairs, she could hear him yelling at someone. He was coming for her soon. She started at the buttons again.
There was a mirror on the dresser. She looked at herself in it. Her face had been mostly spared from injury. Her eyes were puffy and red and her lips cut and swollen. Everything else on her body burned with a throbbing pain. As she stared at her own reflection, she saw someone she hated, someone so vile she figured she deserved whatever he was going to do to her.
She swept the mirror from the top of the dresser along with a collection of his precious grooming items.
Water splashed. Brushes clattered. Metal jangled.
She didn’t care. She had sold out her true friends. They had been the only people who had ever tried to help her. They had been the ones who had saved her. And how had she repaid them?
By betraying them.
And who had always been there for her when she’d screwed up?
Jesse.
He had been the only one strong enough to have ever truly forgiven her for all that she’d done. She’d betrayed him worst of all. And for what? Petty jealously? A vile, vicious man like Noah?
“What is wrong with me?” she whispered at her reflection.
Numb, not sure what she was doing, she left the bedroom and returned downstairs. He was in the living room sitting alone on the sofa. His hands were folded, and his head was bowed, as if in prayer. He glanced up when she stepped in front of him. She rested her arms across her chest and her half-unbuttoned shirt.
She was no longer afraid of him.
“What are you doing down here, girl? I told you to—”
“I’m not going up there ever again.”
Noah started to chuckle. Then he started to laugh. “Oh, my dear sweet girl. How misguided you are.”
She backed away as he stood, and she continued to backpedal until she stepped into the kitchen. The door behind her led outside to her salvation. She would have to move quickly if she wanted to reach it before he could stop her.
He followed her into the kitchen.
“Eve, Eve, Eve, my dear, what am I going to do with you? You seem to think you can continue to act this way. Is this what you learned while you were away from me? This cannot stand, you know. I do this to make you a better person. A better wife. This is what is best for you. It hurts me to hurt you. Hurts me deeply. You know that, don’t you?”
He stepped closer.
She backed up, bumping into the kitchen table, and stumbling against a wheel-back chair. The chair scraped against the linoleum floor and toppled over onto its side. She felt her way around it with the backsides of her legs, making sure not to trip.
“You still have so much to learn,” he said.
She retreated until she bumped against the stove. She could retreat no more.
“You will go where I told you to and do what I said, or so help me…” He raised an open hand and threatened to strike her with it.
She reached behind her back. She felt the knobs of the stove. She reached higher, probing for something, anything she could use to defend herself. She touched the edges of a frying pan. She shifted again, searching until her fingers located the handle. It was warm, but not hot. She curled her fingers around the metal handle and lifted it from the stove. It was very heavy. Solid.
“No,” she whispered. “Never again.”
One of Noah’s gray eyebrows shot up.
“You still defy me?” He laughed, opening his arms wide. “You are such a fool.”
“No,” she repeated.
“Then have it your way.”
He lunged and dug his fingers into the flesh of her arms. She tensed, gripping the handle of the cast iron pan, and yanking it away from the stovetop. She twisted and spun under and away from him and brought the pan around in a half-circle arc, aiming to strike his forehead. He shoved against her and stepped back deftly, easily, and out of the path of her swing.
She had mistakenly swung so hard for his head that when she missed the weight of the pan spun her completely around.
He laughed and stepped closer, keeping his head back, chin raised. He again brought a hand up to strike her, but she ducked to the floor and squirmed away.
She got up and ran from the kitchen into the living room.
“Eve, come here, girl. You are only making it harder on yourself.”
She made for the front door and slammed into it. Grunting, she groped for the knob and attempted to jerk it open. It jiggled but did not twist.
Locked.
Noah came closer. He stopped to retrieve his leather belt.
She flipped the lock mechanism and pulled again.
He cracked the belt between his hands. The leather slapped together wetly.
She yanked on the knob. It was butted up against her spine, making it impossible to get any leverage.
He continued to approach. He was in no hurry.
She desperately sought higher on the door for the deadbolt lock.
Smirking, he came closer. “You will not get away from me. You will never get away from me. God has made it so. You and I are destined to be together forever and eternity as man and wife. Did y
ou forget your vows to me?”
She abandoned the door and slid sideways along the wall, knocking over an end table, and bumping against the winged chair she had been sitting in earlier. She felt her way along its edges, keeping her eyes locked on him.
Then she saw something else from the corner of her eye. Something familiar. Something she could use. Leaning against the wall to her left was her spear. The spear she had traveled all those miles with. The one she had killed raptors with. The one that had become shiny from her using it as a walking stick.
She lunged for it, reached it, and wrapped all ten fingers around it. The metal felt cold. She shifted and adjusted her stance lower and pointed the sharpened end at Noah.
“Eve, come on. Give it up.”
She thrust the sharpened point at him. He stepped to one side. She thrust again. He dodged the opposite way. She thought of the raptors she had stabbed with it. He would not get away this time.
She stabbed at him once more.
He effortlessly stepped left, swapping away the point with ease, leaving her overcommitted. He closed the distance and seized her around the waist. With a quickness that surprised her, he ripped the spear from her hands and flung it across the room. The metal rod bounced off the sofa and tumbled over the top, clanking as it deflected off a china cabinet, rattling dishes, and then rolled to a stop near the entrance to the kitchen.
He let her watch it settle before reaffirming his grip on her. He tossed her against the wall, snapping her head back hard enough to dent the plaster. Breathing hard and heavy, he rained his fiery breath down on her like so many nights he had lain on top of her, grunting and pushing. She flinched away from him, retreating from the hot stench as much as she could, but it wasn't far enough.
“You’ll never get away from me,” he growled. “Never!”
Out of instinct, her knee came up and struck him in the groin. She raked him with her fingernails, digging furrows in the smooth skin of his face. He yelped and loosened his grip, and she rolled and spun away from him along the wall. Pictures fell, crashing down around her as she tumbled onto her backside.
He bent forward, hands on knees, and took a few deep breaths. He straightened, touching the marks she had left on his skin. She couldn’t get past him and into the kitchen. She couldn’t run out the front door.
She was trapped.
Then she saw it. So close, yet so far away. And she’d have to get past him to get to it.
She leapt, pressing with everything she had to get past him.
He grabbed her arm and held on fiercely.
She twisted again, growling at him like a wounded animal. She would get to it. She desperately had to. Feet away. Suddenly, his grip broke and she found herself free. Falling to her knees, heart racing, she rolled twice and reached out for it.
And her hands wrapped around the wooden baseball bat that he had left leaning against the sofa.
She stepped backward into the end table. It wobbled and fell over, knocking off a decorative lamp, shattering glass. She adjusted her grip and held the black-stained bat up protectively.
“Eve,” he said. His hands came up into a calming gesture. “Put that down before you hurt yourself.”
She hunched over and took a step toward the kitchen.
“Be reasonable, Eve.”
He further straightened his outstretched arms, inviting her into an embrace. “All will be forgiven if you just set that down. You know how I feel about you,” he said with conviction.
Yes, but she could now see through his lie.
He grinned a disarming smile.
She shook her head to clear it.
“Come on, Eve,” he said as he approached. “You need me. You can’t survive without me. You’ve always done what I’ve said when I’ve said it like the good girl you are. So, put the bat down. We can work this out.”
He stepped closer.
“Stay back,” she growled, coiling to strike.
“Oh, Eve. How can you do this? You know I love you. You know I’ve always loved you.”
He came a step closer. His face was torn and bloody where she’d scratched him, which made him appear demonic in the warm glow of the lamp. He was close enough that she could smell the perfumes and fragrances he used to mask his true stench. She wrinkled her nose in disgust.
He was repulsive, vile, evil.
He was a monster.
And she needed to destroy him.
He was almost on top of her. “Put that down,” he said. “We can work this out.”
He smiled and lowered his arms.
“No,” she breathed. She planted her rear foot and swung the bat with all the rage and fury she could muster.
This was for Adam, for Cory, for Jesse, for all the people Noah had wronged.
In the brief half-second of her swing, he barely had time to register the surprise. His lips twitched, eyes widened slightly, and he began to raise his arms.
But he didn’t move fast enough.
The blow struck him with a splintering crack, hitting solidly below his right ear. He stayed on his feet for what seemed like an eternity. Then his eyes turned white and his legs turned to water and he slumped to the floor.
She moved to stand over him like he had stood over her earlier. Again she raised the bat to strike, to beat the living shit out of him, to crush his head against the floor.
Then she stopped herself.
She sank to her knees beside him and released her grip on the bat. The blood-stained hunk of splintering wood rolled away, twisting, turning, before bumping against the chair in which Jesse had been seated. The chair jiggled slightly.
“What have I done?” she said in horror.
-31-
RESCUE
PRIMAL SHOOTS OF fear stabbed at Eve, leaving her trembling with fear. What could she do now? She was certain she would not last long once Ryan and Matt returned and discovered what she had done.
Noah was dead, and she had killed him.
She stood, holding her face in her hands. Tears filled her eyes. She wiped at them with her wrists and stared at the unmoving form at her feet. A trickle of blood flowed from his right ear where she had struck him just below it. She shook him with her foot. He did not stir. She kicked him in the ribs.
Nothing.
Then she heard someone shouting outside the front door.
They were coming. They would find her. And they would kill her. Go! Run! her mind screamed, but panic held her frozen in a block of ice. She had to find…had to find… Jesse sprang to mind. She had to get to him. She had to get to him quickly before he got away.
But she’d betrayed him.
She heard another barked command just outside. It was loud enough to hear, but not loud enough to know what had been said. The door rattled. She drew a startled breath. Shivering, she bent to pick up the bat and flashed a glance at Noah. He was bleeding. He had not moved.
He had to be dead.
Still, she had to check to make sure. As she bent next to him, a pounding knock came at the door. She jumped backward like a spooked rabbit, gripping the bat, raising it protectively.
The knock came again, louder.
She had never felt so alone, so disoriented, so afraid and confused. Fingers white-knuckled on the bat, she inched her way toward the kitchen.
The knocking ceased.
She turned and darted into the kitchen. The back door rattled and began to open. She hurried to the living room.
Footsteps.
Panic flooded her brain. It fought to overtake her as she sidled along the wall near the arched entrance to the kitchen. Breathing shallow and rapid, she opened her mouth into an O to quiet the noise she was making. Sweat and tears rolled off her cheeks and pattered in droplets at her feet.
She closed her eyes, opened them.
The footsteps grew louder.
One man.
Dexter stepped through the kitchen archway. He spotted Noah lying on the floor. “Hey,” he said, running to Noah’s body.
All sound faded. Numb, feelingless panic overtook her.
She crept behind him and swung.
And missed.
“Eve?” Dexter said in surprise as he backpedaled away from her.
She had no time. She felt propelled as if she were some sort of lifeless doll. She rushed at him blindly. Growling, she raised the bat. He raised his arms to ward off her blow.
Too late.
Crack!
The bat connected with his jaw, wet and hard, spinning his head to one side. He stumbled onto his heels, arms windmilling. She drew back, rushed him, and swung again.
She missed.
He staggered to the right. She lunged after him, driving him back farther and farther. He fell into the bloody chair Jesse had been tied to. His legs crumpling beneath him. His hands came up protectively. She switched from swinging to stabbing with the end of the bat. He tried to absorb the blow with his hands, but the bat slipped through his fingers and smashed into his face, bursting his nose in a bloody spray. His hands fell to his sides, and she swung again, knocking him off the chair and onto the floor. He landed with his rear facing upward half bent, half sprawled against the chair.
He did not move again.
Eve’s legs turned to jelly. She wobbled and dropped the bat. She fell against the sofa, recovering. With a few deep breaths, her head began to clear. Her mind was still screaming at her to get out, get away, run.
“Eve?”
She spun. It was Jenny. Jenny, the one who’d started all this. Eve raised the bat and backed away toward the kitchen.
“I saw what you did,” Jenny said. “I saw it all. Everything.”
Terrified, Eve continued to back away. She saw another flash of movement. She gasped and jumped to the side. Her spear was on the floor at her feet. She flung the bat behind her and picked up the spear in one rapid, continuous motion.
She raised the tip and pointed it at Jenny.
Righteous Apostate: Raptor Apocalypse Book 3 Page 22