AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Even purchasing things at the store had felt foreign to her, as if it was from another life. Some might call her sheltered. Locked away and forgotten was more accurate. The woman who was supposed to care for her hadn’t been around much, which was a relief from Alina’s perspective.
She forced down one of the grainy breakfast bars she’d purchased. Food was food, and she wasn’t picky. She also wasn’t hungry, though she couldn’t remember the last time she had eaten.
Time had become meaningless. The pharmacist had told her the prescription was most effective for up to seventy-two hours. She worried over whether too much time had already passed, but three days felt like forever.
She likely wouldn’t be able to remain in this unknown house that long.
Alina forced herself to swallow the pill with the same tap water that eased the graininess from her mouth.
The hours passed slowly, especially with nothing to do with her hands. Losing herself in her art had been her one getaway. The thought of all her carefully stored canvases, now gone, brought tears to her eyes for the first time that day.
Alina certainly hadn’t cried for her guardian when the men had come. They’d killed her guardian first, as if the act would break her. Watching the woman who had often beaten her be beaten to death herself hadn’t brought Alina any fear. There had been an elation when the woman eventually stopped screaming that Alina had never experienced before.
Elation had nothing to do with her normal emotions. She didn’t experience those types of highs. The most she had hoped for was a steady blankness as her hands reached for her paints. She’d thought that was happiness. Compared to the low points when she was bruised, it had been, but it turned out she hadn’t known what low points were either.
The man who had raped her showed her how very low she could become. The memory of him fucking her mouth until she gagged caused her hands to clench against her sides. Her mouth had been the lesser of two evils. It had been her choice, and it wasn’t the act itself that had been the worst part. It was the noises he’d forced her to make, pretending she enjoyed it so that he didn’t do worse. Even though he was always going to do worse.
Nausea twisted in her stomach.
Alina pushed open the bedroom door. It felt safest. She could still imagine Luka, merely a shadow against the wall. The thought of him didn’t deepen her anxiety, because Luka had made it clear he didn’t want her to touch him.
As she wandered from room to room, she wondered if he was going to return. She doubted it. Him leaving the money behind probably meant he wanted her to go.
The house he had brought her to wasn’t very wide, but it was multiple rooms long. The back bedroom led to a hallway connected to a kitchen and then a wide living space. Unused and serviceable seemed to be the theme of this house. It was furnished, but not with anything as nice as what she’d passed in the estate Luka had burned the night before.
There was only one bedroom. The space was larger than where she had lived not long before.
And much better than an empty room with only a dirty mattress.
Her hand flew to her stomach, pressing against the pain there. Not nausea, or not only that at least. The pharmacist had warned her that cramping was a possible side effect.
It would be worth it. Better that than a constant reminder of the man she’d stabbed over and over again. Sinking the knife into him when he’d threatened the reverse hadn’t brought her the same sense of elation as she’d gotten watching the woman who had abused her for years die. She had expected it to. Her captor was dead. He could no longer hurt her.
Once the pain from the side effects passed, she’d work on forgetting. She was good at that. She rarely remembered her mother, the woman who had sung to her in Russian when she was a small girl, hugging her tightly in her arms. What should have been a happy memory only brought a longing for what could never be, and Alina was better off without that.
The memories of her father had remained longer, though they didn’t give her that same happiness. Her father hadn’t been warm and loving. He hadn’t been abusive either, simply stern, and with expectations of how a daughter of the Bratva should behave.
Alina had been willing to fulfill those expectations. It was too bad they were never to be.
She returned to the bedroom, allowing herself to crawl onto the bed for the first time, new shoes and all. She dragged the soft blanket Luka had covered her with up over her body, then returned her hand to her stomach. The cramping really was bad. Pain during her time of the month was fairly normal. She’d been lucky it had started so late in life—only a few years before, when she had already turned fifteen.
She breathed through the worst of it, pressing harder. For some reason, it was her mother’s voice that rose in her memory, singing softly in Russian.
Alina must have dozed. She woke and waited for additional pain. The cramping didn’t return. The worst seemed to be over. Her hand rubbed her stomach as she tried to focus. Something had woken her.
Perhaps the racoon was back. The animal had become quite the nuisance, getting into the garbage no matter how she tried to tie it. Then she remembered her place in the woods was gone.
The bedroom door stood open. Alina was certain she had shut it.
Her pulse began to thud dully as she struggled to sit up. The soft blanket tried to trap her. She kicked her legs until she was free, scrambling from the bed.
There was a shadowy shape lying in the doorway. One with arms darkened by tattoos.
Luka had returned. The way he lay across the threshold didn’t look comfortable.
Night had fallen outside. She must have slept longer than she’d thought.
Alina moved to the attached bathroom, flipping on the light.
