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My grip loosened slightly, and I nodded but still held on because the fear held me in a vice-grip.
He showed me his phone. "See? Ease up. I'm just going to put this ambient light on, okay?"
I licked my lips nervously, but then bit my bottom lip. I relaxed my hand, and when he reached out to turn off the light, I only tensed up a little bit.
"See? There's plenty of light in here, okay?"
I nodded in the near darkness, and tried to curl into a ball facing away from him.
When he spoke again, his voice was low. "You were scared in the boot, weren't you?"
My stomach pitched as I recalled the cloying darkness and the cold that threatened to pull me under. "Yes."
"Why didn't you say something?"
"I tried. Over and over, I tried."
He did something unexpected then and pulled me into him, cradling me against his body.
When I finally relaxed a little, his voice was warmth and caramel, "Why are you so afraid of the dark?"
"It's a long story," I whispered.
"You can trust me to chase away the shadows, Daphne. I’m here.”
Drake
Her voice was so soft when she started to speak, I had to strain to hear her.
"You know we were talking about Willow and my mother. As a kid, I was always sick with something. Always sick to my stomach or running a fever. Some days I couldn't get out of bed. I was weak and tired all the time."
I let her talk. I got the distinct impression none of this was going to feel good.
"I was hospitalized a few times. My bloodwork did not make sense. My mother was always by my side, frantically worried. When I was twelve and Willow was six, during one of my phases when I was feeling better, Mum had a new boyfriend. She went to spend time with him, and we went to the neighbor's house with strict instructions not to go outside, not to do anything remotely taxing. Of course, the moment I was out from under her watchful eye, I didn't listen. They had a big tree in their back garden. I had never climbed a tree before. Ella's brother, Max, dared me to climb it, and I'd been feeling good, so I did."
As she talked, I kept her where she was, tucked against me. I could feel the vibrations of her voice against my arm.
"Anyway, I fell out of the bloody tree. I wasn't as strong as I thought. I broke my arm and we had to go to the emergency room. Mum wasn't there, and Mrs. McDaniel kept calling her, but she didn't answer. So I was taken to St. Andrew's instead of my usual hospital. The doctors wanted to keep me for observation. When Mum finally came back from her date, she came to the hospital and insisted that I be moved. She rubbed the doctor the wrong way, so he refused. Plus, there were some oddities in my bloodwork, and they had questions about how I had fallen in the first place and the nature of all my previous hospital visits and all of that. They were basically trying to see if I was being abused. I told them no, that my mother was the best mum, and that she took care of me always. That I was lucky to have her and that without her, I wouldn't have anyone who loved me nearly as much. And what was interesting about the hospital is other than my arm being broken, I got massively better. Much better, like my color vastly improved. I no longer had a nasty gray pallor to me. My hair also started to grow. It had always fallen out before in patches, so I wore it short in a sort of patchwork afro."
Oh, Jesus. I knew what was coming.
"The doctor said something was off with my bloodwork, so he sent it out to an expert, a mate of his. The next thing I knew, social services was there asking me loads of questions. Mum suddenly wasn't allowed to see me. My Gran was called. And after a week in that hospital, I was the healthiest I'd ever been in my life. All because the nurses had deliberately kept my mum away from me. At the other hospital, she'd always had a cot in my room. She'd been the one who always got me water and fed me. Little did I know she continued making me ill. She'd been poisoning me for ages."
I cursed under my breath. "What kind of fucking mother does that?"
"The reason I'm afraid of the dark is that whenever I did something she didn't like, or I really didn't feel well and was a bit unmanageable, she'd yell at me for not resting enough. And then she'd insist that I clearly needed to be taught how to rest. So she'd lock me in a closet in total darkness with a blanket. I would call for her, but I was too sick half the time, and I’d just be stuck in there all by myself."
Her breathing was shallower now, and I could almost smell her tears. "Shhh, I'm sorry, Daphne. I'm sorry, I didn't know. I'm so sorry."
When she rolled over and tucked her face into my chest, I did the only thing I knew to do. I held her. Tight. Vowing that if I ever crossed paths with her mother, I was going to kill the bitch. And I wasn't going to be quick about it either. She had tortured a little girl for her own ends. "I'm so sorry. I should never have locked you in that boot. I didn't know."
She was nodding against my chest, and I just held her, my hands smoothing back the curls so I could look down at her. "I'm sorry. I will never do that again. I'll never leave you in the dark alone, okay?"
Peering up at me, her eyes swimming in tears, she nodded. "I never had to live with her after that. Gran took me and Willow in. And that was the best time in my life. I finally got to go outside, play, and even made a friend. I wasn't sick a day in my life after that, either."
"I will send that woman to meet her maker," I said without even thinking about it.
She reached a hand to my face and caressed me. "You would do that for me?”
