Page 63 of Blazing Desires
Confusion mars my brow, the need to comfort her warring with what she’s asked for. I can’t ignore the pull towards her, so I take another step.
“Stop,please,”she begs.
I do as she asks, clenching my fists at my side to try and ignore the way they want to reach out and hold her. My jaw ticks in frustration at having to obey her command when she needs comfort, but she deserves this from me. It’s the least I can do. I’ve put her through hell and there’s still more to come.
“That was when the beatings from my father started.” She continues quietly and I hold my breath in anticipation.
“The first time was after you’d all left. He’d told me earlier in the day that you had all run away together. I thought it was a game, so I just accepted it.”
She shivers but it’s not from the cold.
“Dad told me to go and play, to not disturb him as he had an important meeting. So I played. I’d been running through the halls to see how quickly I could get from one end of the house to the other. Pretending goblins were chasing me, coming to stealme away to faerie. I wasn’t being loud and even took my shoes off to stop them clattering on the marble floor.”
She laughs at herself without a trace of humour.
“That afternoon, he screamed at me for ruining his important meeting.”
Her eyes fill with tears at the memory, one spilling over and carving a streak down her face. My hands twitch with the need to wipe it away. If I could take her pain with it, I would.
“He dragged me into his office, to his desk. He bent me over and…”
Davina takes a few deep breaths and I wait patiently, knowing this is hard for her to get out but I need to hear it. I want a list of crimes I’m going to kill this man for.
“I heard his belt unbuckle…” A sob hitches out of her.
Fuck.He’s a dead man, this is so much worse…
“I begged and pleaded with him, saying I was sorry over and over again. That it would never happen again. He—he told me, ‘No, it won’t happen again because you’ll be locked in your room from now on whenever I have a meeting, you little bitch.’ Before he’d even finished speaking to me, he’d pulled up my favourite cream dress and whipped me with the belt.”
I feel a small sense of relief that it didn’t go any further, but not much. Another sob wracks her body and this time I take a step to close the gap, but she doesn’t notice. Tears now flow freely down her face, and I would do anything to take the pain away from her.
“He hit me with the buckle end. He hit mesixtimes, three strikes on each leg. I had to count them with him and otherwise, he’d start again if I missed one.”
That explains the scars. He’s a dead man walking.
“So, I did. I screamed the numbers in that office. I could feel the blood running down my legs after the first strike, soaking into my socks. When he was done, he pulled my dress down andpulled me to standing. He was so angry with me. And that was the day I became terrified of my own father, of the one man who was supposed to protect me and keep me safe. He’d made me feel like it was my fault, like I deserved the severity of the punishment. I ran all the way back to my room and cried until I had nothing left.”
Her voice cracks with a sob and I close the distance between us, the anger I’d aimed at her morphing into a beast that I would reserve only for her father. She’s in my arms before she can tell me to stop and instead of pushing me away like I expect her to, she clings to me. I sweep her up in my arms in one smooth motion and carry her over to the soft linen couch against the wall.
I sink into it with her body curled into mine, her fists clenching my t-shirt. I hold her tight and rub soothing circles into her body while she cries. There’s a sting in my own eyes but I force myself not to cry. That’s not what she needs from me right now.
“I’ve got you, Mea Divina. I’ve always got you,” I whisper into her hair and place soft kisses on her head.
“You le— left me,” she chokes out. I swear there’s a fist around my heart.
“I know, baby. I’m so sorry, I didn’t have a choice. I would have taken you with me if I could, stayed with you if I’d had the choice.”
That only makes her sob harder into my chest.
After a while, her tears stop flowing and we stay like that, holding onto each other as if it would make up for all the time we’d lost. I don’t know how long for, and I don’t care. We’ve both been through hell at the hands of her father and I’ve yet to tell her about her mum. But I can’t shake the thought of her alone with him, how she’d believed we’d all abandoned her to beabused by that sick fuck. I brace myself, I need to get this next part out.
“There’s something else you need to know, love,” I speak into the silence.
She peels herself from me to look into my eyes. Hers are red-rimmed and puffy from crying. Her fists uncurl from my shirt, so she smooths it out gently before bringing her hands to cup my face. She traces the outlines of my nose, my cheeks, and my jaw, with her dark eyes.
I am warmth everywhere they touch. She takes a breath to steel herself for what I have to say as her eyes lock back with mine.
“He killed our mothers.”
