Page 15 of Hodge
“Do you think women like to see you naked?” I throw back at him. I won’t lie and say that Jake isn’t a good-looking guy because he is, but his whole attitude and insides are ugly.
“You don’t seem to have an issue with it when I’m fucking you.”
“Is that what you call it? Fucking me?” I huff a laugh. “I fake orgasms so you’ll leave me alone.” Now I see the rage simmering in his eyes when he glares at me, and I know I fucked up. But you know what? It’s the truth, and if he wants to take blows at me, I’ll take them right back.
In seconds, he’s lunging toward me, his hand wrapping around my neck before I’m slammed against the wall. I smirk into his face, watching the anger in his eyes.
“Is that all you got?” I taunt. I don’t know why I’m feeling so brave and bold right now, but I’ve about had enough of him. This is all bullshit. My whole life is bullshit.
“You want more? Is that what this is?” He hisses in my face, spittle flying from his lips and hitting my face. I want to gag and throw up, but I swallow it down, not wanting him to have the satisfaction of seeing me get sick.
“Do your best, Jake.” Just as the words leave my mouth, his knee raises and slams into my stomach. I reach up and try to push him away, but it does little good. His free hand comes up, slapping me across the face so hard I see lights blast behind my eyes. I blink rapidly to regain my focus as the hand holding mythroat releases. That’s when a fist lands in my ribs and I scream in pain.
“You have enough fat on you that you can take it,” he yells in my face before punching me once more. I scream at the top of my lungs as my hands ball into fists and I swing at him. I get a few good blows in before he reaches for me, grabbing a handful of my hair. Without another word, I’m being dragged through the house and into our bedroom. Jake shoves me roughly, and I stumble, falling and hitting my head on the dresser. The room spins, my head aches, but I still try to stand. My legs don’t work properly, and I fail to get up. He kicks me in the ribs now.
“Stay the fuck down!” He roars this time. My head is too fuzzy to try and stand up anyway, so I lie on the floor trying to catch my breath.
Jake moves around the room making noise, and I have no idea what the hell he’s doing until he walks back over and grabs my wrists. He pulls them above my head and ties them together before securing them to the leg of the heavy dresser. I tug at the rope, but he’s tied the knot tight. I can’t move.
“Let me up,” I mumble through the haze in my head.
“Fuck you, Kemah. You want to act out, you want to try and test me? This is it. This is where you’ll be from now on!” My chest is heaving for air, my body throbbing with pain. I let my head drop back onto the floor and close my eyes as I listen to the shower turn on. That bastard. I hate him. More than I’ve ever hated anyone in my life aside from my father.
When I was younger, I thought I was loved. I thought they cared about me. It was all a lie. They hated me. I don’t know why. Idon’t know what I did. I don’t want what they wanted from me. And to this day, I still don’t.
All I know is there’s a trust in my name that can’t be touched until I’m thirty. That’s it. That’s all I know about anything in my life. It’s sad, isn’t it? To know nothing about your life?
I’ve lived the way they wanted me to. I did the things they told me to until Jake came along. I don’t know what deal my father made with him. I don’t know much of anything aside from I’m not his little slave and punching bag.
Have I tried to find out more? Of course I have. This I my life after all. But the more I dug, the further into the depths of Jake’s hell I was pulled. I was forced to quit my job. I was forced to leave all my friends behind. I was forced to live with Jake, and there was no way to avoid it.
And this is my life now. Or what you would call a life. This isn’t anything more than torture. It’s nothing more than a living hell, and there’s nothing I can do about it.
You may think, why don’t you call the police, Kemah? What good would that do me? My father knows everyone. He knows everything. There’s no one out there he doesn’t have ties with, and I’ve known this since I was a little girl.
I open my eyes and blink as I look up at the ceiling. This is it. This is how the rest of my life is going to be. I’m being forced to marry Jake. I don’t want to. I don’t want anything to do with him.
Just thinking about him makes my skin crawl. The shower turns off, and after a few minutes, he walks out of the bathroom in his shorts.
“Let me up.” He chuckles and comes to stand next to me so I can look up at him.
“Why?”
“I need to use the bathroom.”
“And you think I give a shit? Use the floor. I’ll have someone clean it up,” he says.
“Jake, stop this shit. Let me up,” I get a little louder this time. Jake leans down, grabbing my face in his hand and squeezing.
“You’re not the boss here, Kemah. It doesn’t matter what you have in that head of yours. You don’t run shit, and you don’t talk back to me. You hear me?” He growls in a low tone.
“Fuck you.”
“Fuck me? Is that how you want to play this game? Fuck me? No. Fuck you, Kemah. You’re nothing! Nothing more than I allow you to be, and at this moment, you deserve nothing more than lying on my fucking floor at my feet!”
“You can’t leave me here, Jake!”
“I can do whatever the hell I want to do with you. Who cares, Kemah? No one.” The word no one rings in my head over and over. He’s right. Who cares? No one.
