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I couldn’t respond because I was still gagged, and as much as I wanted to breathe through my mouth once again, I knew he needed to get the rest of the binds off me first. Unfortunately, it was that maximum grade type of duct tape and without a knife, it took him longer to break it into pieces, but somehow he managed to do so.
The tedious process concluded with him lifting me into his arms and carrying me over to a chair in the corner. From there, he was able to remove the gag. Once oxygen hit my swollen lips, I started to eagerly suck it into my lungs.
Gabriel was sizing up my wounds, and I wanted to tell him not to bother, but a part of me was relishing his touch. When he undid the rope from my ankles, I closed my eyes as he rubbed the soreness out of them.
His warm breath swept across the bare flesh of my legs, and I closed my eyes momentarily as I wished it was for a different reason. I almost said as much until he untied my wrists, then titled my head to the side so he could examine the rope marks on my neck. He wasn’t a doctor, so I had no idea what exactly he was looking for, but I let him continue anyway. His hands were slightly shaky, especially when he touched my sore cheeks.
“What the hell did he do to you?” he asked.
I could only guess at what he was actually seeing. Knowing Jayson had used both his fists and a weapon to strike me numerous times, the swelling had to be bad. He’d also nearly strangled me with rope when I’d tried fighting him off. My entire face throbbed from his blows and some of it was still wet with my blood and tears. The violence wasn’t all he had done to me, either. I winced remembering the drug he’d given me.
“What was that?” I’d demanded to know the moment he injected me with the foreign substance.
“I thought I’d bring Ro-Ro to this little reunion as well,” Jayson had told me.
Rohypnol was the same date rape drug he used to give me back in the beginning when he would abuse me. Those first few times, I’d tried fighting him off, but it was futile. I would lay there in bed as he violated me repeatedly, but had been too incapacitated from the drug to force my body to obey my mind’s commands. I was in my bedroom and no match for the boogeyman hiding in the shadows.
As bad as those warning messages had sounded, nothing had prepared me for what it truly was. Being under the influence of that drug made me feel as if I was drunk in a sober body. I’d never so much as had more than a glass of spiked punch or wine I had snuck from my mother’s stash. It was all so unnerving, and even more so now that it had been eight years since I’d been subjected to it.
I still tried to fight, and that was when he used the rope. Sure he would hang me from the raptor overhead, I succumbed to the drug and let him have his way with me once again. That had been earlier this morning, and I kept my eyes closed as more tears started to leak down my cheeks.
“Harper,” Gabriel murmured, his voice like a soothing balm to my soul.
I didn’t want to read too much into his actions. While comforting to me now, it was likely only his decency causing him to touch me in the tender way he was. Gabriel knew I’d been sexual with this man, and I had read his lips and watched his expression change.
It’d gone from anger to concern, and eventually when it all sunk in, it’d turn to disgust as my incestuous actions came to light. I’d allowed another to touch me which was a betrayal to him, no matter what the circumstances.
“Harper, can you open your eyes?”
I slowly raised my lashes and stared into the face of the man I loved.
“I’m going to get you out of here, I—”
“Jayson,” I interrupted. “He’s going to kill you, then me. If he doesn’t, my—”
“No one is going to hurt you again,” he swore vehemently. “Jayson is going to pay for what he’s done to you. I want you to just sit here while I call the authorities. Okay? Will you do that for me?”
I nodded, then grimaced as both nausea and pain nearly overtook me. Gabriel grabbed his phone from his pocket, then walked about a dozen or steps away to talk to the cops. I sat there, until a glimmer of metal flashed in my sights.
The gun. It was on the floor. Because it had been several hours since Jayson shot me up with that drug, I was able to finally move my extremities, even if it was painful to do so.
Time was no longer standing still as I was thrust back to my past. All. I could see and remember were those nights when he would come into my room, touching me in places I hadn’t even let Gabriel. As I sat in this chair, it all came rushing back to me like a slideshow. My blood turned cold, and panic welled up inside of me as I continued seeing and feeling what he’d once done to me.
The physical ache, as well as the emotional agony, twisted in my chest. I pressed one of my hands flat against it trying to force myself to focus on my breathing.
It wasn’t working, and I became desperate for some sort of escape. Even though he was incapacitated so the fight or flight mentality I’d had for years didn’t need to come into play now, my anxiety wouldn’t let it disappear.
With full use of my limbs now, I rose from my seat and quickly grabbed the gun. I was wobbly on my feet, each step shakier than the next, but he was bound and writhing on the floor so I had to take this opportunity. For once, I was now the one in control, and as I stood over him, my finger moved to the trigger.
“Harper, No!” Gabriel yelled out to me, and I turned to look at him. “Put the gun down. You don’t want to do this.”
I let out a sarcastic laugh because this was the only thing I wanted to do. “I have to.”
I aimed the gun at Jayson once more. Wide eyes looked up at me, and for once, I was the one to inflict fear into this monster, instead of the other way around. My hands shook as I moved the gun from one potential target spot to another. I moved my aim up and down his body, pausing on his chest, before moving even lower. When I had the butt of the gun pointed at his crotch, I knew I wanted to blow his fucking dick clean off before ending his miserable life.
I took a deep breath, but before I could steady myself enough to pull the trigger, Gabriel grabbed my arm. “Harper, don’t. I know he hurt you, and it’s only natural to want to hurt him back, but killing him will end your life, too.”
I looked up at him as my tears continued to fall. “Don’t you understand? I have to.”
