Page 100 of Deliria

“He did it.” He states, “When I was seven. I was playing with one of his toys and he didn’t like it. So he went and got a kettle of boiling water and poured it all over me.”

What the fuck?

“Lucky for me, the kettle wasn’t that full or it would have done more damage.”

I don’t mean to react the way I do, but I stiffen in his arms. A vision of him as a child, defenceless, innocent, being hurt like that flashes through my mind.

“…It’s third-degree burns.” He continues. “It doesn’t hurt. The nerves were literally burnt right off. I spent months in hospital recovering and when I was discharged, my parents had me shipped to a boarding school.”

“What about him? What did they do to him?” I don’t want to speak his name. I don’t want to make my tongue form those syllables.

He lets out a broken, bitter laugh. “Him?” He says. “Their golden boy? Their precious firstborn? Nothing happened to him. They acted like it was all just some horrible accident.”

“I’m so sorry.”

He cups my cheek, holding me a little tighter as if he needs this moment of comfort from me. “Don’t be. You didn’t cause it. And besides, you’ve suffered far worse at his hands.”

That doesn’t make it okay, though, does it? That doesn’t diminish the horrific abuse and the awful betrayal of parents too. Christ, I knew they were fucked up, but I didn’t realise they were that bad.

“He used to talk about you.” I hear myself saying. Maybe it’s the shock making me ramble on. Maybe it’s the fact that we both now carry some awful trauma because of that man. “He used to get so angry and rant. He used to say such awful things. That you were a drug dealer. That you stole things. That you were a criminal.”

He shakes his head, his eyes flashing with a hint of that very danger that used to send me running.

“Yeah?” He mutters. “Makes sense I guess, he’s been determined to screw me over for most of our lives, simply because I dared to exist.”

“Is that why you’re doing this, then? Is that why you’re helping us?”

He smiles more. “As much as I’d like to say you were the sole reason, that’s not the case. Besides, how could I turn down the chance to truly get my revenge on him, on them?”

I gulp, silently absorbing those words. After he’d chased me through the woods, I’d believed he was as much of a monster as they were. When he’d just stood there and watched while Alex abused me in that dining room, I was convinced that that was the case. But his behaviour afterwards had confused me. The way he’d comforted me, the way he’d acted like we weren’t just fellow conspirators, but that there was something more. Something greater.

He stares into my eyes, searching for I don’t know what exactly.

“Scarlett?”

I shake my head, unable to have this conversation right now. There’s too much going on. Too much trauma, too much pain and too much anger to consider anything beyond the now.

But I can feel it all the same. I can feel that hunger, that need inside myself. There’s a voice in my head telling me that there’s a reason I sought him out in the first place, a reason I knew he’d be my safety in this turbulence.

“Did we…” I hesitate to form the words, the question in my head. “Before all this, before the accident, before I was brought here, did you and I, did we, were we in some sort of relationship?”

He narrows his eyes as a look of what could be jealousy, could be just anger, flits across his face. “No.” He says and that word feels so final. So heavy.

I bite my tongue, nodding in acceptance.

Jesus fucking Christ, Scarlett, stop making this any more emotional than it needs to be. Stop making such a scene.

“I wanted you.” He says, cutting through my headspace. “From the moment I laid eyes on you in that bar, from themoment I saw you flirting with my brother, smiling at him, I was hooked, addicted, fucking gone. I knew what he had planned, I knew that he knew who you really were…”

I gasp, feeling like a chill of ice-cold water has just hit me.He knew? He knew even then?

He tilts his head, obviously reading my thoughts. “He knew from the beginning, Little Bird.” He states.

Fuck.

FUUUUCKK.

I thought I was the one outmanoeuvring him. I thought I was the one pulling the strings. Something in me twists at the agonising thought of how fucking stupid I really was. How utterly naïve. It’s not rage I feel. It’s something so much stronger, so much more furious.

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