*~Unedited and subject to change~*
I
knew I was awake, but my eyelids felt heavy, and I could barely open them. I
kept hearing people shout in the background and what sounded like hard blows of
flesh hitting flesh, but I couldn’t make anything out; the words were all swirling
together. It took me a moment to register a familiar smell encompassing me, and
I leaned in closer, soaking it in. It was a sharp, sweet woodsy scent much like
that of cedar. My mother had a hope chest made a cedar that had once belonged
to my grandmother. I used to love going through the contents with her while
breathing in the soothing aroma.
“Are
you okay? Can you tell me if it hurts anywhere?”
His
voice sounded like heaven, but my body still refused to cooperate and answer
him. Why was he asking if I was hurt? I felt fine, other than the fact that I
seemed to have lost motor function and the ability to speak.
I
started to get some feeling back in my arms and legs, and I felt my body
cradled against another that was almost twice my size.
“Did
he...did he touch you anywhere?”
Touch me? Who… Oh he must have meant Tucker. What ever happened to Tucker? He was
carrying me up the stairs, but I can’t remember much after that. Asshole must
have left me up here alone.
“Please,
Maddie, I need you to focus if you can. This is important. I need you to tell
me if he touched you anywhere…inappropriately.” I could hear the concern in his
voice and to be honest it was starting to scare me.
As
the numbness subsided and I regained more feeling throughout my body, I could
feel pain shooting up my wrists as though they had been sprained. Jesus, what the hell happened to me?
My
heart was beating rapidly and I could feel myself beginning to hyperventilate,
but then I felt lips, his lips,
pressed against my throat, just over my racing pulse. His warm breath cascaded
over my throat, causing my heart to race faster, but soon my breathing matched
his and I was able to calm down.
“Better?”
He asked softly.
“Yeah.”
I finally peeled my eyes open to find a symbol I had only ever seen in doctors’
offices tattooed on his forearm. It looked like a staff with wings, entwined by
two snakes. Such an odd looking thing, and yet I felt better knowing that the
one whose arms I was currently wrapped up in bore that symbol…like he was my protector.
“Do
you think you’re okay to stand?”
I
squeezed my eyes shut, trying to ignore the pain in my wrists and nodded my
head. He gently tucked his arm beneath mine and wrapped it across my back,
allowing me to place all of my weight on him. My body still swayed unsteadily,
and seeing this stranger towering above me brought back the image of Tucker’s
body hovering over me and painfully pressing my wrists into the mattress. Oh God, what did he do to me?
My
heart rate picked up again, and he cupped my face, focusing my attention on his
stormy gray eyes and forcing away the fuzzy images that had yet to make any
sense.
“Shhh,
you’re okay. He can’t hurt you. You’re safe now.”
You’re safe now. Safe. Those words were repeated over and over in my
mind, and when they finally sunk in, I opened my eyes one last time to look at
him smiling down at me. His lips looked
so soft, and I reached up to trace my finger along his bottom lip, but my hand
never made it there before I slipped back into the darkness.
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