Page 22 of Deliria

And then everything goes hazy. My eyes blur. My body loses all sense of movement.

And as my legs give away, my fear becomes cataclysmic.

I’m trapped. Locked in my own body.

Useless.

Helpless.

Completely at their mercy.

Alexander

Iwatch as my father lays her out on the bed.

She looks even smaller in his arms. More fragile too.

Her eyes are shut. Her breathing has slowed.

All her struggles ceased the moment the drugs took effect, and it couldn’t have come a moment too soon.

“She looks peaceful.” My father says, staring down at her.

He’s right. She does.

When she’s like this, it reminds me of the early days. When we were first dating. When we’d go back to my penthouse, drunkand happy. Everything felt good then. Everything was good. Before the preverbal shit hit the fan.

I let out a sigh, running my hand through my hair, feeling my frustration about this entire situation begin to reach a boiling point.

It didn’t have to be like this. It wasn’t meant to. I had a plan. A good one. If she’d just played ball, if she hadn’t tried to fight, then she’d be safe, happy, oblivious to all of this. It would be easy for her. Simple. Safe.

But her challenging meisan issue. Sooner or later that fight will become a problem I can’t contain.

A thing I can’t control.

And it will destroy us, destroy my family.

I lean forward, examining her dirty feet. They’re caked in mud despite the fact she had a shower not that long ago.

She’s not good at taking care of herself.

She’s not capable of it, despite what her head seems to tell her.

I can see her hair is matted. Did she even brush it today? When was the last time she conditioned it?

The Scarlett I first met would never have let herself become such a mess. She would have been appalled to have even one thing out of place. She was a rare beauty, a woman so enchanting it was hard to not just stare at her all day and forget the world around us even existed.

And she took pride in her appearance. She ate well. Worked out.

She was the complete opposite of the broken thing lying before me now.

My father murmurs something behind me, but I pay no attention as I start undoing the buttons on her robe.

It’s damp, clinging to her skin, evidently, she didn’t dry herself off properly before she put this on.

I have to pick her body up, scoop her up to get the damned thing off and once it is free, I fling it, not caring where it lands. The maids can sort it later.

“Pour a bath.” I say over my shoulder, because god knows she needs one.

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