Текст книги "Contrite"
Автор книги: Kathy Coopmans
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Текущая страница: 10 (всего у книги 15 страниц)
Chapter Seventeen
We’ve been driving for nearly two hours now in complete silence. No radio, no nothing. We have crossed the Alabama state line and are headed west toward Mississippi. Trent said we have a long way to go. That could mean our destination is anywhere from Mississippi to California. I really don’t know. All I know right now is I have a crook in my neck, my legs are killing me, I have to pee, and I am starving, but I refuse to ask this man for a damn thing.
It’s obvious we were able to lose those two cops back at the gas station. I sure as hell feel sorry for them both right now as I know my brother has gone ballistic on them for losing me. My mind is churning with worry thinking about my dad, and Melody, and all of our friends. My father will come unglued at this news. My heart feels heavy and it suddenly feels too hot. I can hardly breathe, thinking of the pain my family is going through. Zack is a detective, for God’s sake. He’s going to think this is all his fault.
I close my eyes, imagining the look of sheer terror written across his face as he enters my house and sees everything all over the place. He loves me too much to try and pursue this case in a professional manner; it’s personal now, and I feel sorry for anyone who tries to get in his way.
I flinch when I suddenly feel Trent’s strong grip on my wrist.
“Are you all right over there? Jesus Christ, what are you mumbling under your breath about?”
Did I say all of that out loud? I yank my wrist out of his grip and turn my head away from him. I will not talk unless I absolutely have to.
“Don’t act like a bitch, my love. Like I said, we have a few days and nights together, so when I ask you a question, you’d better fucking answer me. Now what the hell are you carrying on about over there?”
Shifting my body in my seat, I scrutinize his every feature, every move he makes as he drives. Even though you really can’t tell them apart on the outside, there are so many differences between these two.
Oh, he did a mighty fine job disguising himself as Turner. For those few days until my brother discovered the truth, he had me fooled. Who knows how long I would have continued thinking Turner was cheating on me if my brother hadn’t followed up on his gut instinct about this fucker’s strange behavior?
That is what makes me feel guiltiest of all . . . that Zack sensed it and I didn’t. How could I have been so blind? I knew the minute he touched me there was something different about my ‘husband,’ but I was too caught up in my arousal to think about it, turned on by the roughness of the way he took me.
I’m mortified and disgusted that I let my libido overrule my common sense. Even though it would have been nearly impossible to prove without the physical evidence of the fingerprints my brother ran, I still feel as if I somehow should have known as soon as I met him at the airport that this man was not my husband.
Trent senses my gaze on him and turns to smirk at me. Self-righteous bastard.
“I don’t even have to ask if you like what you see when you look at me, Clove. I already know you do. I look just like him, don’t I? Or should I say, he looks just like me, since I am actually five minutes older.”
“Wipe that stupid grin off your face. You may look exactly like him, but you are nothing like him at all! You’re nothing more than a sick, fucked up animal. You take advantage of people, and you use people, and you hurt people for no good reason. You make me fucking sick.”
I pause to take a deep breath as this . . . this man gets under my skin.
“Ah, Clove. You are such a dramatic, uppity bitch with a mouth that I happen to like. If the circumstances were different I would be fucking that sassy ass mouth as much as I possibly could. As a matter of fact, I seem to recall you loving it when you took my cock in your mouth and I fucked your sweet pussy until you came all over me. Didn’t think I was sick and fucked up then, now did you?”
He looks at me out of the corner of his eye with a sly smile.
“You can sit there and pretend all you want, Clove, but you knew it was me doing all of those delicious things to your body and not my brother, and you loved it anyway. You and I both know it. You have my scent all over you, baby doll. I marked you, and that will be something you will never be able to forget.”
At that, he starts to laugh malevolently like the crazy motherfucker he is. I reach across and slap him as hard as I can. The truck swerves slightly but he gets it back under control at once. He growls and lunges for me with his free arm. I have nowhere to go when he grabs my arm and twists it until I scream in pain.
“You’re fucking crazy, woman! You must have a death wish or something you foolish slut.”
He twists even harder and I swear I hear something snap in my upper arm as my eyes well up in tears. I am speechless as he jerks me toward him and the seatbelt digs into my skin, causing it to burn across my chest.
“Let me tell you something, Clove. You will die when I say you will die, and not one second before. Now just for that stupid as fuck move you just made, I am done making threats. You are going to pay dearly for that. It’s time you learn who is in control here, babe, and it sure as fuck ain’t you. I am done having you test my patience and even more done with you thinking you can hit me. No one hits me. And I mean ever.”
He shoves me away and my first instinct is to reach up and rub my arm. God it hurts, but I refuse to let the unwanted tears fall and for him to see both the physical and emotional pain he is inflicting on me. He is so much different from his brother in every way possible.
For one thing, no matter how mad Turner has ever gotten, he has never laid a finger on me and he never would. Turner would never call me names, either. Sure, we fight just like any other couple does, and our life is far from perfect, but it’s ours and I want it back.
The possibility that I never will, has me wanting to land on death’s doorstep as soon as I possibly can. I am not going to stop pushing Trent. I am going to push him until he snaps, and I know he will. I may be shortening my own life, but I don’t give a shit.
“You don’t scare me, you know?”
He raises an eyebrow at me.
“You need me for something, something you couldn’t find at my house. You’re shit out of luck there, Trent. You can’t inflict any more pain on me than what you already have, so you can fuck off if you think I am going to help you get your hands on any of that money.”
He doesn’t say a word. Instead, he picks up the speed on the truck and pulls off onto the nearest exit. My heart starts to race. I am afraid that I have pushed him past his limit with my words. He comes to a stop, and after looking both ways, he turns right and then makes a quick left into a carpool parking area. There are several cars parked but I see no one around as he pulls into the rear of the lot and slams the truck into park.
His whole demeanor changes as he reaches over and snaps open the glove box. When I see the long, shiny blade of a knife, I start to shake. He pulls it out and flicks the glove box closed, and without speaking opens his door and walks around the back of the truck. I jump in my seat as I see him heading toward my door.
Fuck, what is he going to do? I can see the expressway from here but it’s too far away for anyone to see what is going on in the parking lot. Behind us stretches a deep patch of woods. Shit. Shit. Shit!
I try to stay calm as he swings open my door and then reaches across and unhooks my seat belt. He still hasn’t said a word, which scares me even more. He stands there for several drawn out moments breathing way too heavily for my liking.
“Get the fuck out of the truck. Now!” he bellows and raises the knife to within an inch of my face.
I do as I am told. He drops the hand holding the knife to his side and grabs me around the waist, pulling me flush against his body. I flinch and try to wiggle free, but he’s too strong. He takes my hands and holds them behind my back, and then walks us backwards until my body is up against the truck. I am shaking uncontrollably as I have no clue what is going through his mind or what he has planned.
“I told you to shut your fucking mouth and you didn’t listen. Now you have pushed me just a little too far, Clove. This is not how I wanted things to go down between us, but you need to be taught a lesson. This is not a fucking joke!”
Oh, God. He has me cornered here like a small animal, and he is the predator. Is he going to kill me before I get the chance to see Turner? I do the only thing I can think of in a moment like this. I scream, and when I do, I instantly know that doing so was a huge mistake. In a blur of motion, Trent pulls back his fist and punches me in the stomach.
All the air is knocked out of me, and I feel vomit rising up in my mouth. He grabs me by the throat and walks us to the back of the truck. I can’t move to protect myself . . . I can barely stand as my stomach twists and turns. The pain is almost more than I can bear. Opening the tailgate of the truck, he hoists me up and pushes me flat on my back.
“Who has the control here, Clove?” He grabs my face and wrenches it so I am staring into his face.
“WHO. HAS. CONTROL?” He raises his voice slightly.
I am sobbing uncontrollably at this point. I can’t tune my mind out, it is spinning out of control as I gasp and wheeze as he towers over me.
“Oh, so now you have nothing to say, huh? No words, Clove? Am I scaring you? You should be scared, my darling. It didn’t have to come to this, but you leave me no choice.”
I am trying to shut him out of my consciousness, to close myself off from the fact that he is about to do God knows what, but I can’t. All I see is him and the feral way he is looking at me.
“Please,” I sniffle through my tears.
For the briefest of moments, I think he is going to relent. But then, he sits the knife down on the ground and reaches for something behind me. My eyes grow wide as I see his hand reappear in my vision holding a twisted braid of rope.
Immediately I start to thrash about and struggle to get away from him, but he won’t have it. He pulls my hands over my head and climbs on top of me as he weaves the rope around my hands to secure them together.
I continue to kick and scream at him to get off of me until he slaps me in the face, extinguishing whatever will I may have had left in me to try and fight. I hurt everywhere. My stomach is clenching and a griping pain courses throughout my lower abdomen. My face is on fire and I can tell it is starting to swell. My arms ache as they are stretched tight above my head. I think the one he grabbed earlier is sprained.
“H-help,” I croak weakly, but my throat is raw from screaming and the words don’t make any sound.
“There isn’t anyone here to help you, sweetheart.”
Trent grinds his pelvis into mine and I feel how hard he is. Having me bound like this is turning him on. I feel my world tilt and slip from underneath me as I fully realize what is about to happen to me. My body convulses in fear.
“Oh, God! Trent, you don’t want to do this! I beg you, don’t. I know you’re above this. I’m your brother’s wife, for God’s sake. Please!” I beg.
He looks into my tear stained face and he doesn’t seem to care. This cannot be happening to me! Where is everyone? The way he has the truck parked, no one can see us without driving right by this spot.
As if he senses the direction of my thoughts, he shoves me even further back into the truck bed and climbs in, slamming the door behind himself. He gets on his knees at the other end and pulls out a roll of tape.
“God, don’t do this, Trent. Don’t!”
“I told you to shut your damn mouth, and now you will.”
He rips off a piece of tape and places it across my mouth. I am defenseless and there is nothing I can do. I close my eyes as I feel him shift around.
“Open your fucking eyes and watch, Clove.”
I open them wide and I see him hovering over me with the knife in his hand.
“On second thought, I don’t think I need to use this since you can’t move or talk.”
Tilting his head to the side, he studies my features. I know he sees the fear in my eyes. How could he not? It’s written all over my body.
He pushes the hem of my shirt up and licks his lips as he stares down at my exposed breasts, my chest heaving up and down.
“Fuck me. You have the best tits in the world. So ripe and pink and fucking ready for me to suck and fuck.”
He firmly takes them in his hands and kneads them. When I cringe from his touch, he pinches my nipples so hard tears form in my eyes again. He’s enjoying torturing me like this. All of a sudden, he grabs hold of the cups of my bra and rips them down, dropping his head to suck one of my nipples into his mouth. The pressure is so intense that I cry out through the tape in pain and start to shake.
Trent is in his own deranged world. He continues his onslaught until it seems as if he has gotten his fill. When he lifts his head and looks at me with hunger I know what’s coming next. He unzips his pants and pulls his erection free. I can’t look. I can’t look. I turn my head away but he reaches up and yanks it back.
“Do not take your eyes off of me or I will fuck you up. You got it, Clove?”
I nod yes in shock and then I hear my panties being ripped off. Before I even know what is happening, he is on top of me.
I try to take my mind and body to the only happy place I have ever known . . . my husband’s arms. But when I stare up into the eyes of my attacker my security is ripped away, because no matter how hard I try to think of Turner, all I can see is the man who is raping me.
He thrusts and thrusts, taking by force what is mine to give. His expression is contorted; his eyes have turned from green to black as if he is a man possessed. He is pounding into me so deeply I feel as if he is ripping me apart.
I feel him shudder with the force of his release as he comes inside me. I crawl into my own shell and scream from the agony of the pain being inflicted on my heart and body. My eyes are now clenched shut and he’s not moving. I need him off of me. God, please get him off me!
“Clove? Jesus Christ, what have I done? Not to you, Clove. Oh, fuck me! No, no, no, not to you! I would never do anything to hurt you. Oh, fuck!”
He pulls himself off of me and I pull my legs in, curling myself into a ball at the other end in an attempt to get as far away from him as I possibly can. I cannot stop shaking as I sit there half-naked in the middle of a damn parking lot.
What do I do now? Me and my big mouth brought this whole thing upon myself. I watch him through my blurred vision as he straightens himself out and reaches down on the floor. I pray like hell he brings up his knife and kills me, but he doesn’t. I am already dead, so he may as well take that knife and plunge it straight through my heart and finish me off.
Instead, he has a rag of some sorts in his hand, and he leans down and wipes himself off with it. He pulls his pants the rest of the way up and then climbs back into the truck, closing the door behind him.
I feel more caged in with him now than I did before as he slides over and presses the rag between my legs as if he is trying to clean me up. What a joke. I will never be clean again. The smell of sex in the air has me gagging and choking beneath the tape.
Maybe he notices, because he drops the rag and removes the tape tenderly. I gasp and suck in as much air as I can. I don’t want to look at him and suffer the humiliation any longer, so I turn my head as he finishes wiping me clean and adjusting my clothes back into position.
I risk a look up at him. In my clouded mental state I can’t quite figure out the expression spreading across his face. Remorse? Or possibly guilt as he realizes exactly what he has done.
He tries to speak . . . maybe he does say something, I don’t know. The last thing I see before I let myself fall into darkness is the look of hatred on his face as he was slamming his body into mine.
Chapter Eighteen
I know I must have completely passed out afterwards, because I come to in the front seat of the truck. My hands are free and I see the sun is hanging much lower toward the horizon.
Looking out of the window, I watch deep gray clouds start to roll in. The sky is as dark as I feel. A deep, black hole where you keep falling and falling with no end in sight, limp and lifeless as a rag doll dragged behind a child and tossed around. The light is right there within reach; I keep clawing and clawing toward it, yet I am retreating further into the darkness as I watch it slip away.
I’m wrecked, a ghost inside my own body. I feel so dirty and I know I have been cast into hell. Trying to sit up, I grimace at the pain shooting through my arms. I manage to pull myself all of the way up and look down at my wrists.
Dark red welts adorn each one. I gently rub them, running my fingers across the rough abrasions. My upper arm has a bruise and feels like it has been pulled out of its socket. My face feels swollen and my head and stomach are throbbing as if I have been hit with a baseball bat. I fight back my tears as I recall in excruciating detail exactly what Trent just did to me.
Never in a million years would I have thought something like this could ever happen to me. How could it? Just a little over a week ago I was living as a happily married woman, working a job I loved and surrounded by a family whose bond I had believed with all my heart was unbreakable. But now it has been broken. No one is going to look at me the same and when they do, it will be with pity.
Turner. How will he ever be able to get past this? He won’t. It’s bad enough that I slept willingly with Trent, but now he’s raped me. Oh, God! Just the thought of that word has my skin itching. This time I really am going to be sick.
I start coughing and gagging as a wave of nausea grips me.
“Jesus Christ. Are you going to get sick?”
The sound of Trent’s voice has me trembling. I turn my head to the window so I don’t have to look at him.
“Fucking hell, Clove. You’re white as a ghost.”
I still say nothing. I can’t, and I won’t. I have no words for this man who has completely destroyed every part of my world and taken everything I love away from me. I don’t even realize we have stopped until my door is pulled open and I feel him put his hands on me. That is when I snap.
“Don’t you fucking touch me!”
I recoil farther into the truck. He backs up and holds his hands in surrender, yet I don’t trust him.
“There is an outdoor bathroom right here.” I follow the direction of his hand and notice we are at a gas station. “Go now.”
He turns and walks around to the other side of the truck. Reaching down on the floor I grab my purse and exit the truck as fast as I can. My legs are wobbly as I make the few short steps to the bathroom, keeping my eyes to the ground. I know I look a mess.
Closing the door behind me, I push in the knob to lock it and slump back against the cold steel door. Several minutes pass before I am able to approach the mirror and the sink. I take a few deep breaths before I raise my head and look intently at myself. I am unrecognizable. Both of my cheeks are bruised and swollen. My lip is busted open and my hair is a frizzy mess. I can’t control the angry sobs that escape me. Tears stream down my face and sting as they make contact with my lips.
Suddenly having the strong urge to pee, I drop my things onto the floor and enter the stall. When I lift my skirt up and squat to use the bathroom, a small gasp escapes my throat as I see the purple bruises on my upper thighs, but it is nothing compared to the burning sensation racing through the lower half of my body as I try to urinate.
Placing my hands on each side of the stall for support, I finish my business and all of a sudden the nausea is back. I turn around just in time to vomit. Not much comes up because I haven’t eaten anything since this morning, but dry heaves wrack my body for a few moments after I’ve brought up everything I can.
Wiping my mouth with the back of my hand, I take a deep breath, and when I do I can smell him on me. That smell sends me over the edge. I run out of the stall and grab wads and wads of paper towels, then I turn the sink on as hot as I can get it. I pump and pump the liquid soap dispenser, dousing the wet paper towel with it. When I’m done, I push my skirt aside and scrub roughly between my legs, not caring if I am causing further damage to myself.
“Good God,” I mutter to myself as I assess the bruising forming on my inner thighs.
There are several of them, and they are tender to the touch. How could someone commit such a terrible act of physical violence? How did I not notice him hurting me like this? This man is going to rot in hell right along with the worst of Satan’s spawn of despicable human beings. I hope like hell I am there to witness when that bastard takes his last breath. Better yet, I hope I am the one who sends him to hell because he sure as shit doesn’t care if I live the rest of my life there, the crazy motherfucker.
A loud knock on the door makes me freeze with my hand in mid-air. The knocking turns into pounding when I don’t answer.
“Clove, if you’re not out here in five minutes I will come in there and get you, now hurry the hell up.”
He’s becoming impatient and not wanting to further delay us from getting wherever the hell it is we are going. Not responding to his command, I take my time getting changed and splash several handfuls of cold water onto my face. There isn’t anything more he can do to hurt me at this point. He’s crippled me beyond repair with the sadistic things he has done. So yeah, he can fuck off while I try and do my best to clean myself up.
I grab my brush and run it through the knots in my hair until my scalp is sore. After what I know is longer than his five-minute ultimatum, I secure my hair into a ponytail and drop the brush back into my bag. I pull out my toothbrush and toothpaste and scrub the residue of my vomit out of my mouth.
Tossing the items back into my bag, I swing it over my shoulder and grab my purse off of the counter. I take a deep breath as I open the door. I see Trent’s form leaning against his truck with his legs crossed at his ankles and his arms crossed over his chest.
I can’t even look at him and I sure as shit don’t want to sit next to him, either, so I open the door and start to climb in the back. I halt as flashbacks of the rape freeze me to the spot. A chill creeps up my spine and I drop my bags onto the floor in defeat. I raise my eyes after a moment, and that’s when I see the long, jagged knife laying on the floorboard of the truck. My eyes go wide and without even thinking, I reach for it and stuff it in my bag.
I can sense him still leaning up against the truck, watching my every move. Dear God up above, please don’t let him have seen me pick up that knife. I climb back down and slam the door with as much force as I can and open the front and climb in. After securing my seatbelt, I turn my body completely away from the driver’s seat and lay my head up against the window. I close my eyes tight as I feel him enter the truck and start it.
“There’s a bag back there with some chips and other munchies I got at the station,” Trent says as we accelerate onto the highway.
Fuck him. Even though I am starving, I don’t want a damn thing from him. Hearing his voice and being this close in proximity to him has my nerves all over the damn place. So I remain rooted in my spot and ignore him, ticking off every mile marker in my mind. For ten miles, ten damn miles, there is silence and then he reaches over and places his hand on my knee.
The color instantly drains from my face. I try and block out the fact that he has his hand on me and I can’t. My breathing becomes ragged. My teeth start chattering and a cold sweat forms on my forehead. I can’t seem to get any words to come out of my mouth. I know he must feel me shaking and when his grip tightens on my leg, I tremble more.
“You need to calm down, Clove.” His husky voice shoots a bolt of absolute terror through me, starting at the top of my head and traveling through every vein and every organ of my body until it ends at the tips of my toes.
“I’m not going to hurt you. I swear.”
Those eight words break through the trance I am under and I take hold of his hand and remove it from me.
“You’re not going to hurt me?” I all but whimper as I continue to keep my vision forward.
Out of the corner of my eye, I see him run his hands through his hair as if he is frustrated. Neither of us speaks again for a long time and my mind drifts, until he pulls off onto another exit. My anxiety and panic start all over again as he drives a mile or so down the road through the middle of God knows where before pulling into the parking lot of a rundown, cheap motel. “W-what are you doing?” I manage to squeak out.
“This is where we are sleeping tonight. Now get out.”
He puts the truck in park and exits, taking the keys with him. I don’t move and when he turns and notices that I am not behind him, he starts to walk back toward the truck. I promptly open the door as he approaches.
“I have had it up to here with your defiance, Clove. Why do you continue to push me? This would go a hell of a lot smoother for the both of us if you would just do what you’re told for once. Jesus, you really must have a death wish.”
Yeah, I have a death wish all right, buddy. My wish is for you to fucking die a very slow miserable death.
“Seriously, Trent. If I go in there looking like this, don’t you think whoever is working in there is going to suspect something? I mean, look at me. My face looks like I have been beaten up, which I have by the way, and they will suspect you. So if you want me to go in there with you, I would say that you’re the one with the death wish because not all people go around beating and raping women. Trust me, if you get me around another person I will tell them exactly what you have done to me,” I seethe.
“You really don’t listen, do you? You must want a repeat performance of what happened a few hours ago.”
His face is within an inch of mine now.
“You don’t scare me anymore, Trent. You’ve won. You have broken me and it doesn’t matter what you do to me now. I’m as good as dead already.”
My hands are clasped together in my lap to hide the fact I am shaking desperately, truly fearing what he may do to me. However, I shrug as if I really don’t care. The big problem here is I do care. I want to live to be able to see Turner one last time.
I watch several expressions dance across Trent’s face. He knows what I am saying is true. His eyes roam all over my face for several long moments and when they shift lower and land on my wrists, they grow wide as if he is the one who is in shock.
I wish like hell that I knew what he is feeling right now as he brings his gaze back up to meet mine. Is this real remorse for the things he has done? Is he being eaten up by his guilt? I hope he is. I hope it eats away at him until it kills him.
“If you even think about running, I will call my father and have Turner killed immediately, do you understand what I am saying?”
“Where am I going to go? You have us in the middle of nowhere, Trent. And despite what you may think of me, one thing is for certain. I may be an idiot for not letting my brother nab your ass and throw you in jail right where you belong. But what I am is in love with my husband, and I will do anything to see him, as you are already quite aware. And one more thing. There is no need to threaten me again, because I am very well aware of what you are capable of.”
He’s bewildered by my words, although he says nothing as he spins around and strides into the motel. I scan the parking lot looking for anything or anyone to help me, and it’s completely deserted. Only one other car sits in the parking lot and I can only assume it belongs to whoever works here. Slumping back in my seat in defeat, I shake my head back and forth and pray like I have never done before that there are two beds in this room. I don’t want to feel his skin touching mine ever again.
Trent returns several minutes later with a key card in his hand along with fresh towels.
“Let’s go,” he commands as he reaches in the back and pulls out his bag.
I open the car door and slam it shut with a little more force than necessary and retrieve my own bag. Damn it, the knife is in there. I need to make sure he doesn’t see it. Slinging my bag over my shoulder, I follow a small distance behind him until he stops in front of our room and slides the key in. The small light turns green and he pushes the door open. When I enter, I am immediately assaulted with the smell of stale cigarettes and a very strong odor of who the hell knows what.
“Fuck, this place is a dump,” Trent mutters as he tosses his bag on the bed.
He walks into the bathroom and closes the door just a fraction. He comes back out within a minute and I hear the shower running.
“Go shower, and make it quick.”
Sitting himself down on the bed, he lays back on the pillow, stretching his free arm over the top of his head. He grabs the remote to the television with the other hand, then clicks it on and starts flipping through the channels.
Not saying a word, I grab my bag and make my way into the small bathroom, shutting and locking the door behind me and stripping my clothes off instantly.
Grabbing a towel, I close the lid to the toilet and place the towel on top of it. I check the temp of the water which is a little too hot for my usual shower, but I leave it to try and help burn away all of the remaining traces of what he took from me a few hours earlier. I may be able to erase all of him from my body, but I will never be able to erase what he has done from my mind.
