Page 33 of One for the Money
It’s not Matteo. They’re all Alphas, for sure.
That leaves Quinton.
Could any of these be the quiet, perpetually stoned Alpha who took me nest shopping and got me groceries?
Every cell in my body revolts at the idea.
No, these aren’t men I know.
I may be stuck, I may be at their whim, but hell clown is speaking my language. I can do transactional safety.
“What do you want?”
What do I have to offer them?
That’s a stupid question.
I know what I have to offer.
I’ve been here before. Seen this movie play out a million times.
I know the ending.
When hell clown drags a hand down my neck, across my shoulder, and trails it down my arm, I know what he is going to ask for.
Why did I think I could escape? What made me think I was ever going to be safe?
Hope is a disease that no doctor can cure.
A terminal illness.
I let my guard down for just a few minutes, and look at me now. Look where I’ve ended up, after everything I did to get safe.
Same trauma, different territory.
I’m starting to think this is what I deserve. There is all sorts of talk about Alphas and Omegas being fated to be together, but maybe this is the thread the fates weaved for me.
After all, while I am not the one committing the offense, I am the common denominator.
There’s a place in my mind that I hoped I would never visit again, but I know that it will welcome me with open arms—a place where nothing can hurt me. Nothing can touch me there.
There, I am safe.
It is a paddock in the middle of a beautiful meadow, with babbling brooks running through it and fields of wildflowers that stretch as far as the eye can see. Wild horses running and butterflies landing on my nose.
As hell clown’s massive hand shoves up my shirt and grips my breast roughly, I open the gate of the paddock in the corner of my mind and run in, slamming it behind me and falling into the grass of my meadow.
Nothing can hurt me here.
But the hand is ripped away as quickly as he touched me, and I’m falling backward, crashing into the tepid water that still fills the tub from the ice baths the twins took tonight.
Hard to believe that was only a few hours ago.
“We gotta go!” one of the clowns shouts, as I scramble up, trying to catch my breath.
I watch impassively from under the water as they leave, half in the paddock in my mind and half out.
If I stayed in my paddock, in my meadow, I could be done with all of this. I could forget the trauma forever and live out my eternity in a beautiful, peaceful place.
