Exposed: An Anthology

by Brooke Cumberland

  Fuck. Me.

  “Brandon, I swear it’s not what you think,” I squeak out. Shit, this is going to be bad. “Dee stopped by. She’s in town and just wanted to say hi, catch up a little. I haven’t seen her in six months—”

  His smile stops me cold. Immediately, I start backing away. Oh shit, I know that look.

  “Now, now… Isabelle. What have I told you about Denise? Hmm? If I remember correctly, it was something along the lines of you are not to talk to, call, or take calls from her, and you are definitely not to FUCKING SEE HER!”

  He’s stepping closer now. Frantically, I look around for an escape, but he’s blocking my only exit.

  “You have been told, and I would have thought you learned this lesson six months ago. Isn’t that how long you said it’s been? What do I need to do for you to get it through your dumb fucking head? Jesus Christ, you’re a stupid fucking bitch.” His eyes are so cold as he steps right into my space. “What part of you being mine—and only mine—did you not understand the last time I was forced to explain this to you? I will not share you with fucking anyone. Do you hear me, Isabelle?” He sneers my name like its very presence on his tongue disgusts him. I’ve hit panic mode now. He has me backed into the wall, no escape in sight. “No fucking person in this goddamn world is allowed you. Only. Fucking. Me!”

  He continues berating me, his eyes bugging out and his spit hitting me in the face. “You’re nothing but a stupid fucking slut! Isn’t that right, Isabelle? I should have walked the other way that night at Fire. I should have known a bar slut from a mile away. But no! It’s all your fault my dick wouldn’t walk the other way.”

  He rears back and slaps me hard across my cheek. I squeeze my hands into fists, digging my nails into my palms to keep from screaming out. I can feel the blood running down my neck from the cut his ring must have caused on my jaw. I may be stuck, but I’ll be damned if I will let him break me.

  “What did I fucking say, Isabelle? NO DENISE! No afternoons chatting like little fucking bitches. You’re to be here, cleaning my fucking house, cooking my fucking dinner, and spreading your fat fucking thighs for my dick!” He reaches out and grabs a bowl of chili, throwing it with all his strength against the wall. I watch chunks of meat, beans, and sauce run down my happy yellow walls. “And what in the fuck is this shit? I told you, you fucking bitch, I wanted lasagna. Does that look like lasagna?”

  I should have seen it coming, but my attention was still focused on my happy yellow walls and the globs of dinner rolling down. I was just turning back to him when his fist hit my temple, momentarily making my vision blur. At least that seems to have knocked some sense into my sluggish brain. I dart to the right, quickly trying to escape the second fist I know will soon be following. Too late—always too late—I catch the second one in the ribs, knocking the breath right out of my lungs. Brandon grabs my thick hair, and with a twist of his wrist, I’m right back at his mercy.

  Mercy I know he doesn’t have.

  Throwing me into the hallway with what feels like the strength of ten men, he’s quick to follow with a kick to my stomach. “You stupid bitch. You just can’t listen. I own you, all of you. No one else. No one else touches what is MINE. Especially not fucking DENISE! I warned you what would happen. No, I promised your dumb ass what would happen if you went near her again.” Kick—Slap—Punch—Kick. “You’re never going to learn are you?” He’s panting with exertion, and it’s taking everything I have not to let the blackness overcome me. Even if I know numbness would be following quickly.

  I lose track of how long he stands over me, screaming and beating, alternating between his feet and his fist.

  Freedom—that’s all I crave now.

  I close my eyes and pass out.

  *~*~*

  When I wake up, the house is dark. Every bone, muscle, and hair on my head hurts. I can’t take a deep breath without wanting to die. I can feel wetness on various parts of my head and body. Fuck. It’s never been this bad. I can’t hear anything out of my left ear. What the hell happened to my ear? Fuck, I need to move. Clutching my arm around my middle, I slowly climb to my feet. I take a look around out of my very swollen eyes and see that dinner is still sitting on the table. The broken bowl, chili dried to the wall, and even the spotless cups are sitting there mocking me. With a slow and silent step, I glance into the living room. No sign of Brandon. Shuffling—more like dragging myself to the kitchen, I see that his keys are gone. Holy shit! He’s not here. Never, not once in six years, has he left me alone in the house after a ‘lesson.’

  I walk along the wall, holding on for support until I reach my purse, unzipping the side zipper; I reach in and take out my phone—the phone Brandon doesn’t know I have. I’m not allowed to have a phone, and he disconnects the house phone and takes it with him when he leaves. I can barely see enough to turn the phone on. I slide my finger across the screen and unlock it. Finally, after a few wrong buttons, I place the call.

  “Hello? Hello, Iz? Iz, are you there? Is everything okay? IZ??” I can hear her. She’s practically screaming. But I can’t get the words out. She knows I wouldn’t be calling this late. Hell, she knows I wouldn’t call at all.

  I take a shallow breath and rasp out the only word I need to bring my salvation.

  “Help...”

  Then the blackness pulls me under.

  Chapter One

  Izzy

  I haven’t always been this weak person…this broken woman. I used to dream, and when I did, I dreamt big. I had plans, plans of a future so bright it would blind you. I can still remember the day those dreams, those grand plans, and that future as bright as the sun went poof.

  I just didn’t know it at the time.

  At the time, I thought everything would be okay. After all, what seventeen-year-old girl doesn’t think she’s invincible?

  That, coincidently, was the same day I decided fate hated me. No, she didn’t hate me… She loathed me. People say that karma is a bitch, but I have news for you. Karma doesn’t have anything on fate when she is after blood. Not a single thing.

  I wish I knew what it was that set fate on the path of my doom. Maybe it was just being born? I like to think I was at least okay there. My parents loved me, they prayed for me, and I was everything to them. So, no, I don’t think that was the day.

  Or it could have been the day I stole Maggie Jones’s pudding cup. But Maggie was a bully, never nice, and always stuffing her face, so I like to think I did her a favor.

  I once stole a chocolate bar from the grocery store, but seriously? Fate would have been after every little teenage shit if that were the case. Point fingers all you want, but where I come from, it’s like a rite of passage.

  No, I think fate decided she hated me the day I walked into Dale High School freshman year and my path collided with Axel’s. It would make sense that the reason she hated me was the reason for all my pain. The reason I’m convinced fate will never shine in my favor again.

  Why would she? She took it all away. Wiped out every single thing I have ever loved in one swift kick.

  One day, I might figure it out, the reason fate hates me, Isabelle West. But until that day, I damn sure will be careful with my dreams and my plans, my heart and my soul.

  Fate might hate me, but that doesn’t stop me from hoping that one day she forgets about her favorite chew toy. When that day comes, I hope karma has some fun with that bitch fate.

  *~*~*

  2 years later

  I can feel the sun warming my skin. I love this blissful state between sleep and just waking up. It reminds me of being numb. You haven’t hit the switch to turn on your mind, giving it permission to process and remember. You are just there. I love waking up feeling the sun warming my skin; it reminds me that I am alive. Alive and surviving.

  I sigh and roll over in bed, laughing when I see the stupid body pillow dressed like a man with an oddly lifelike face drawn on the top. Dee insisted that I needed it in my life. Her theory was that if I di
dn’t want a man at least I wouldn’t sleep lonely, whatever that meant. I stopped trying to understand all that is Dee years ago. She has been my best friend for the last eleven years. She is the sister I never had and I know without a doubt in my mind that she would always have my back.

  We met when I was eighteen and pissed at the world. She was bopping all over the room during freshman orientation, smiling at everyone who would look at her. She took one look at me and decided that we would be the best of buds. I think she saw the broken soul inside me and with her infectious happiness decided she would be my medication. She was by my side with every up and every down—and trust me, there were a lot of downs. She was my biggest cheerleader and supporter, and she singlehandedly brought light back into my life.

  She picked me up when I had fallen, dusted me off, and helped me heal.

  She did it again two years ago. No questions asked. She dropped everything, ran to my rescue, and helped me heal again.

  We had lost that ‘sisterhood’ for a little while when I was married to Brandon. It wasn’t easy, but I was able to keep in touch with her with stolen calls and secret meetings. I knew she worried. She knew things weren’t good at home, but Dee, being Dee, came with a smile and the knowledge that if I needed her she would be there.

  And she hadn’t lied; she dropped everything and ran with one word.

  I know she feels somewhat guilty for introducing us. It’s unjustified but it is there. I can see it sometimes in her eyes when we would be spend time together with a few bottles of wine between us. She hides it well, I will give her that, but I know my girl, and with a heart that big, she can’t help it.

  I met Brandon when I was twenty-one, carefree, and looking to numb my world with drinking and parties.

  He was the first man I gave a second glance to after Axel. It had been almost four years and I was ready to try and love again.

  Oh, how blind I was.

  Brandon was, on the outside, perfect. He was a few years older than me, and had already graduated from the University of North Carolina and established himself within his father’s accounting firm. He was successful and quickly on his way to even bigger things. He wasn’t overly tall, just shy of six feet, with a lean runner’s body. Sandy brown hair and brown eyes. He was the perfect boyfriend, showering me in romance, extravagant vacations, and gifts, always showing up to take me on surprise trips, doing all the little things we always think makes a man perfect. Six months after we met, that perfect boyfriend became my fiancé, and four months later, I became Mrs. Brandon Hunter.

  Then the Brandon I had met and fallen in love with slowly changed. Gradually, he began distancing me from my family, friends and most importantly, Dee. He knew, of all the bonds I had, that hers was the strongest. I became a prisoner in my own life. I know my grandparents worried, but he was slick and always came up with the perfect reason we couldn’t come, or when the rare occasions came that we did, he was always called home for some reason. Dee was harder for him to brush off, but he did. Or at least he thought he did. He was good; I’ll give him that—the master of control and manipulation.

  And he downright terrified me.

  The beatings didn’t start until we had been married for about two years. I went to see Dee when I was supposed to be picking up his dry cleaning. I missed my best friend, and I had honestly thought I could be in and out before he noticed. But Brandon Hunter noticed everything.

  They weren’t bad at first, a slap here and there for whatever offense he deemed beat-worthy. Eventually though it didn’t take much. I could sneeze, and if he didn’t like it, I was sporting a black eye the next day.

  He had played his hand right and I was well and truly stuck. Cut off from those I loved and so terrified of his wrath, I wasn’t going anywhere.

  Those were the years I prayed and prayed for Axel to find his way back to me. Every single horrible day I was at the receiving end of Brandon’s fist, I tried to take myself to another place. To a place where Axel was, ready to take me away and be my hero. But I eventually had to face the facts; my hero was gone.

  Closing my eyes, I think back to the time my life was the happiest. Twelve years ago to be exact.

  “I can’t believe this is our last night together for six months, I’m going to miss you so much, baby.” I look up into his bright green eyes. God, I love his eyes. I think I would be happy to just sit here and look at his handsome face for hours.

  Get lost in him.

  How will I make it without him?

  This boy I love more than anything.

  I lay my head back down on his warm chest, feeling his strong heart beating under my ear.

  I’ve known this beautiful boy since I was fourteen, and Axel has been the love of my life for the last three years. Not a day has gone by without him in it. How am I going to go just one day without him, never mind six months?

  “Babe, quit. It will be over before you know it and I will be back to get my girl.” I hear him rumble under my ear. He knows exactly what is running through my mind.

  We’ve been lying here in his tiny twin bed for hours, just getting lost in each other. I know he hates being in this house.

  His foster family isn’t a bad foster family. Well, as far as they come I guess. He might as well be a meal ticket for them, but they leave him alone. I get the impression that they are counting down the seconds before he leaves for basic training and they get his body out and a new one in. They wouldn’t want their check to be short—greedy assholes. His foster parents have never liked me. I don’t think I will ever understand why, but Axel thinks it’s because I have been around the last three years, taking up space and eating their food. Who knows? I just can’t wait for him to be free of them.

  I can’t believe my beautiful boy is leaving for the Marines tomorrow. Marines…God, Ax is really leaving. I haven’t let myself think about what could happen to him when he leaves. Axel was born a fighter, a survivor. Nothing would happen to him, and I just had to believe that.

  He starts to shift under me, sliding out from under my body and rolling onto his side to face me. I look into his bright, twinkling eyes again, smiling up at him. He really is perfect. Thick, messy black hair is sticking up in disheveled waves from my running my hands through it. His strong cheekbones and powerful jaw always remind me of how ruthless he can be. I run my finger down his perfectly straight nose and then run it along the thick lips I love to get lost in tracing first the top and then the bottom. His lips twitch, and that lazy grin I love so much pops onto his face.

  “What are you thinking about, Princess?”

  “God, Ax, just about how much I’m going to miss you. You promise to come back to me?” I ask him, the tears coming back into my eyes, and the melancholy that has been a constant presence since his graduation Friday night returns.

  “Just try and keep me away,” he says, leaning in to take my lips in a toe-curling kiss. His tongue licks my bottom lip, and then he catches it in between his teeth, lightly biting down. I open my mouth to let him in and capture his moan down my throat. Pushing his shoulder, I roll him underneath me, feeling his already hard cock nestle within my wet core.

  “Mmmm, babe, already?” he groans.

  “Always, Axel. I’m always ready for you.” I say as I lift up and help guide him inside my body.

  As I begin to move with a perfectly mastered rhythm over his lean, hard body, I think to myself how hard it’s going to be to drop my boyfriend off at the bus tomorrow knowing that it’s going to be six long months before I see him again.

  Little do I know, the last time I look into these eyes will be when he turns around to wave while walking up the steps to the bus, the bus that takes my heart with it.

  A heart that never returns to me.

  *~*~*

  Like I said, I haven’t always been this weak woman. I don’t think anyone wakes up and says, “Hey, today I think I will be weak, broken, and completely fucked up!” I certainly didn’t. I think I have worked hard to become who I
am today. With the help of Dr. Maxwell—and Dee, of course—I have slowly become the me I once was.

  It hasn’t been easy, and I still have my moments. I can’t hear my full name without it taking me back to the dark years with Brandon. I started taking the steps to finalize our divorce about six months ago. The same time I had finally healed enough to start moving on. I started my own web design company, something I have always loved to do, and it seemed like the perfect choice. I felt comfortable being able to work out of the house Dee and I shared. Safer.

  Brandon isn’t making things easy for me. One would think with a clear, black and white police report and hospital records showing what the marriage to him did to me that I wouldn’t have any issues with a quick divorce. But no…nothing ever came easy for me. I’ve been fighting with him the whole time—through lawyers, of course. I haven’t actually seen him since the day I was released from the hospital two years ago.

  That was also the day that Dee and my duo became a trio.

  The day I met Greg.

  Where Dee is my sister; Greg is my brother.

  Bonds so tight they would be almost impossible to break.

  Greg is our protector, whether we want him or not. He looks out for us and doesn’t shy away from Friday nights spent in watching chick flicks and eating junk food.

  I met Greg the day I was released from the hospital after a week stay, healing from Brandon’s final beating. Dee was there to pick me up. She pulled up in a minivan with the back loaded up full of boxes. Looking back now, I can laugh, but the look on her face when I asked her why she had the boxes was priceless. She looked me dead in the eyes with the fiercest expression she could muster and said, “Girl, if you think I will leave you here with that piece-of-sorry-shit husband, you are nuts. Nope, no way. We are packing you up and hitting the road. The world is our oyster or something like that.” She then explained that she had the local sheriff meeting us there to make sure Bastard Brandon didn’t try anything. Dee was ready for anything. She told me not only would the law be there to look over things, but she had one of her friends meeting us there. She didn’t get into detail, and I didn’t care. I wanted it over.