Chapter 6

MINA

I lay on my side, my hand on my bloated, sore stomach.

After throwing up the first few mouthfuls of pizza, I kept down some dry crackers and sips of juice. That meagre meal was more than I'd eaten in too long. The taste though…

Even watered down juice tasted like heaven. Clean and fresh and full of flavour. I could easily have ignored the pain and eaten a whole box of the crackers. If I did, I'd throw them back up. My stomach wasn't ready for that much food, even if the rest of me was crying out for it.

I flinched as a shadow stopped in the doorway. Surrendering to a spike of fear and panic, I curled up around my cramping stomach, even as I made out Reuben's silhouette in the light from another room. It illuminated the corridor and most of the room I lay in.

The bed under me was like a cloud after living on concrete. It was almost too comfortable, the blankets too heavy and warm. I'd pushed them aside and lay straight on the mattress.

"Better?" Reuben stepped inside, arms crossed as though he needed to defend himself from me. He had no reason to be physically intimidated by me, so I wasn't sure what was behind his posture. Something about me had him on his guard. Vice versa was true, so I'd lay no blame on him. Not yet.

Was I better? I wasn't sure. I hadn't thrown up for long, but it was long enough.

"I suppose so," I said. "I shouldn't have eaten so fast." I was lucky to have made it to the powder room in time. Otherwise I would have thrown up all over his hardwood floors.

"I don't blame you." He picked up a chair from the side of the bedroom and placed it down next to me. "For any of it."

I wanted to tell him he should, but I wasn't ready to explain why. The time for that would come when I was feeling stronger. When I was better able to defend myself against him and anyone else.

"I have a doctor on the way to see you," he said. "A discreet one. Anything you have to tell him won't leave these walls. If it does, I'll deal with him."

Of course he would. Someone like Reuben Brantley didn't like his orders being disobeyed.

"Like you dealt with my father," I said.

"Exactly." He sat forward, his elbows resting on his thighs. "I can't imagine how you survived those years. I'm not sure I would have." That was a surprising admission, coming from someone like him.

"I'm not sure I did," I said. "Maybe I'm dead and I haven't realised it yet."

He responded with a soft snort. "Does that make me the devil? Some would say it does."

"I don't think this is hell," I said. "Unless all those years were Purgatory and I've finally moved on."

"I'm no angel, so I'd suggest you're still alive." He didn't smile when he said that, but his words were slightly lighter.

Now I thought about it, I couldn't remember having ever seen him smile. Maybe that was something he didn't do.

"That's a possibility." I sucked in breath and held it for a long time before slowly letting it go.

"What is it?" he asked. It wasn't quite command, but he gave no apology for prying either.

I pushed myself to sit up against the headboard, my knees tucked into my chest.

"I'm scared of waking up," I whispered.

He took a moment to process that. "In case this is a dream and you're still in the cage."

"Yes." If I woke up and found myself there, the last shred of my sanity would shatter. I was certain of that.

He ran the tip of his finger across his lower lip, back and forth with mesmerising slowness.

"I won't offer to pinch you. I can assure you, this isn't a dream. Not, I think, a nightmare either. Your fear sounds rational. Expected after what you've been through."

"My mother used to say that people shouldn't make promises they can't keep," I said.

"That's good advice," he said. "I have a preference for operating the same way."

"Then I can believe you if you promise this is real," I said. Could I? I wanted to.

"I promise you, this is real," he said. "You're in my house. I can also promise you that Kurt Lasalle will never touch you again. He will be dealt with appropriately." There was a slight emphasis on the last word. It promised that when they found him, Kurt would suffer.

"I believe you," I said.

"This wasn't what you expected," he stated. "When you first saw me, you thought I'd have you killed. Why?"

I chewed my lip. "I believed Kurt when he said my family was all dead. He suggested you had them killed. I thought I was the last of us. Why wouldn't you have had me killed?"

Reuben inclined his head slowly. "Now you know that's not the case. I've had no reason to go after any of your family, after your father. Not your brothers, your sister or even your cousins." A brief frown creased his brow.

"What is it?" I asked. I hardly knew my cousins, but when he mentioned them he seemed troubled somehow.

"Gianni mentioned Kurt's sister Daisy," Reuben said. "One of her boyfriends is your cousin, Ric."

"Gianni said Daisy would have Kurt killed if she knew what he did to me," I said. "You think Ric knew?"

Reuben grunted. "No. He wouldn't have kept something like that from her. She'd rip his balls off and make him eat them."

I was starting to like her. She sounded like one hell of a woman. "You think there might be conflict between them because her brother did this to his cousin?"

"Conflict is bad for business," Reuben said. "If it becomes a problem, I'll deal with it. I assume you don't want your cousin knowing you're here either."

I unravelled myself a little, to relieve the pressure in my stomach. Eating would get easier, but it would take time. I'd have to be gentle with myself until then.

"No I don't," I said. "I don't want him to see me like this either." It was probably irrational to feel ashamed about the things Kurt did to me. No one said the human brain was completely logical.

"No one blames you for what he did," Reuben said.

"I do," I said. "I wonder if I could have fought harder. If I did something different, he would have let me out of there. Or maybe he would have stopped coming."

Reuben leaned forward a couple of centimetres, not close enough to touch, but looking like he wanted to. "You would have preferred to die down there alone."

"When I thought you'd kill me, I was relieved," I admitted. "I gave up on living a long time ago. I gave up fighting when he…" I swallowed hard.

"Forced himself on you." Reuben was always blunt, but he was pulling no punches tonight.

"Yes," I whispered. "He liked to toy with me. To see how long it would take before I cried or screamed."

I gripped the hem of my borrowed T-shirt and raised it up, above my stomach. It was too dark in the basement for him to have seen the scars, but from a sharp intake of breath, he saw them now.

He lifted a hand towards me, but stopped a centimetre or two from touching my skin. "What?—"

"Cigar," I said simply. He'd sit beside the cage smoking one before pressing the hot tip against the sensitive skin of my stomach. Or my back.

Reuben swore under his breath. "Sadistic prick."

I lifted the T-shirt higher.

"Fucking hell," Reuben growled.

I glanced down at my bare chest. One of my nipples was perfectly normal, slightly erect in the cool air. The other was nothing but an angry, twisted scar. The skin melted around it was a testament to how long he'd held the tip of the cigar in place. He'd laughed while he did it. Laughed harder when I screamed in agony.

I dropped the shirt back down. "That was the first time I wished I was dead."

I thought I might break that night. Hoped I would. That was also the night I stopped fighting. I hoped he'd tire of me and stay away. Or better yet, kill me.

"He's going to wish he'd never been born." Reuben's tone was one I hadn't heard from him before. It sent a chill up and down my spine. If it was directed at me, I would have been terrified. But it wasn't. His fury was for me, on my behalf. I didn't know why, but it was.

"This is why I don't want my family to see me," I said softly. "I'm not me anymore. I'm a broken doll."

Ice blue eyes fixed sternly on me. "You are not broken. Nor are you a doll. You're a survivor. What you've been through would have destroyed most people. You have all the scars to prove that. But he didn't destroy you. You will get your strength back and we'll deal with Lasalle. Do you think those scars make you ugly?"

"They do." I turned my face.

"Mina," he said softly, making me turn back to him. "You've always been beautiful. Those scars make you even more beautiful. Every one of them shows how fucking strong you are. You said you stopped fighting. You didn't. You've never stopped fighting. You adjusted. You did what you had to do to walk out of there. I don't think you have any idea how fucking incredible that is."

I opened my mouth to say something, but he raised a finger and placed it right in front of my lips, close but not touching.

"I promise you this. I'm going to do everything I can to make you see how beautiful you really are. You deserve nothing less."

"You don't know—" I started.

"I know," he said firmly. "I know."

I leaned my head back against the headboard. "Why?"

He gave a laugh-grunt from the back of his throat. "I don't fully understand that either. I just know this is going to happen. There's a reason we were the ones who found you. I intend to discover that reason, but in the meantime you should get some rest. The doctor should be here soon. I trust him, but Gianni will be there too. If he crosses any lines…"

"You'll rip his balls off and make him eat them?" I asked.

"Precisely," Reuben agreed. "No one fucks with you and gets away with it. No one."

I believed him, but it was still strange. If you told me a day ago I'd be here, and that Reuben Brantley would say those things to me, I never would have believed it. I would have thought I'd finally lost my mind. Could I rule out the possibility he lost his?

"Thank you," I said softly. "I want to be there when you deal with him."

He nodded. "Of course. I wouldn't leave you out of it unless you asked me to." He pressed his hands to the seat on either side of him and pushed himself to his feet. "How much you're involved is up to you."

"Can I ask you a question?" I asked him before he stepped out of the room.

"You can ask," he said. "I can only say I'll try to respond."

"I haven't seen any women in the house since I got here." Just Gianni, Reuben, Damon and a glimpse of Terry.

"There are none," Reuben said. "None but you."

I nodded and lay back down on my side.

He gave me a long, last look before he strode out of the room.