Chapter 22
Sapphire.
I heard the commotions outside and rushed to my window overlooking the compound, I saw Aragon and Marcel coming in together
I furrowed my brows when my eyes zeroed in on the blood on them. Did they fight? Something similar to concern flickered through me and I shook it off.
Was I concerned about them! It couldn’t be
I was their prisoner. I tried to remind my stupid self. I watched as Aragon spoke to a warrior, he was agitated as he spoke and the rest paid rapt attention as they listened. He clenched his fist and looked up suddenly, I moved back into the room immediately hoping he didn’t see me.
I didn’t care about him and I never will
1 went back to my bed and resumed reading, it has become my favorite thing to do since I came here. Even when I was in the palace, when I wasn’t being pushed or threatened, I read to keep my peace,
My eyes flew up when there was a knock on my door, Isised it was Aragon because his scent was stronger now,
“Come in.”
He opened the door and stepped in carrying a box with him. My eyes flew to his when I recognized the familiar box but I refused to give him any Jinkling of how I was feeling.
He dropped them in the middle of my room and stood staring at me, I returned his stare with a blank one.
Was he expecting a thank you from me because he was never going to get it
“Well!” be prompted.
“Well, what?”
“Are you not going to say anything?”
I sighed and folded my bookmark into my page, a gesture that screamed his disturbance in my room.
“Are you expecting a thank you. Alpha? Do you want to play savior after bringing my things
“You don’t have to be a bitch about it,” he napped.
“I am not, I am simply staring facts you could have sent over a guard to deliver this. You didn’t have to come drop it off yourself because you expected gratitude”
“You are pushing it,” he warned.
I rolled my shoulder and nodded, “Okay,”
I said nothing after that. What could I say to someone who brought back my things from the palier, was I supposed to shout for joy since my stay here has been prolonged?
“You will be starting school tomorrow but I don’t expect you to neglect your dics here.”
“I understand.”
I made no move to show how attending college and experiencing something new for the first time warmed my heart. I kept my emotions in check because they might be used against me later.
After years of emotional abuse, I was maner now to rein them in. If they get a whiff of what makes me happy then they might use against me,
“If you need anything, I am sure Marcel and Leah can get it for you,”
My eyes brightened at the mention of Leah, “Yes, I had hoped to ask them. They have been good to me,” I said, hoping he would get the dig I threw
He glared at me and a satisfied feeling coured through me, “Whatever,”
He named to leave but changed his mind. “Your pack members are demanding freedom in exchange for more information about you. So let me ak agun, is there anything you are refusing to tell me?”
1 shook my head, “No, anything they say is all true. Grant them whatever it is they want, I don’t care.
Theld in a grin when he clenched his fist and closed his eyes, when he opened them again, they were pitch black
I gasped and stepped back, I wasn’t scared but he intimidated me.
“One of these days. I will get all I need from you.”
“Don’t hold your breath, Alpha
Because years of torture and I still didn’t break under my father, I wanted to say this but I clamped my mouth shut.
He looked like he wanted to say more but he shook his head and slammed the door shut before he walked out.
Esked to myself before looking at the box, happiness filled me and I closed my mouth with a hand and squealed into it.
Despite how homble my stay with my father was, I cherished every happy memory I let myself have while I stayed, It was the one thing that kept
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Chuyder 29
When I made lntle things like e
- cups and designed before colgating my dead mother to have tea with her. The days I wrote is my journal till t decided it was better to keep everything insuår
1 fror when my door swing open and a petite body slammed into me with so much forer, my fight instincts came out almost immediately had it been for the squrals.
“You are going to college withine, she sand more clearly
Inodded and let out a little laugh. “Yes, I guess Lam
she untangled herself from me before making herself comfortable on my bed, she stared at the box but said nothin
I desperately wanted to know what she was thinking but Levuldn’t ferer n.
“How excited are you the nikes.
Ishrugged, “Honestly, I don’t know, I am more nervous I guess. I haven’t ever gone to school and I probably don’t know how to act around people
“That’s why I am here. I will guide you and also protect you. I like you so you are my nem
best friend.”
Igiggled the sound surprising me because Levulde remember the last time Theard that sound
“You are so funny“,”
y have a life of their own. It’s sickening.”
“No seriously. The girls here are bitches, they are too far up Millicem ass to realize they
Tone hundred percent agreed with her, they were fighting her handles for her. I didn’t care because they were all nails and sales. My sounds ran deeper than that
Aragon
Every time I talk to Sapphire, I end up frustrated. She has this way of never acting like a victim, and somehow, she always makes me feel like a fool Today was no differem. I had inken that box to her, hoping it might be the star of something better between us, but she was as cold and distant as ever, her icy demeanor making the space between us feel even more impenetralik..
Wisen I handed her the box, a piece of her childhood that I thought might bring back some fond memories, the barely glanced at it before putting it auide with a nonchalant expression. No excitement. No gratitude. Nothing i was as if I had brought her a box of rocks instead of something that had once held so much significane
ine like I was some misce she had to
That news it. No more, no less just a feir clipped sentences, and then she was back to her book dismissing ine tolerate
5
Feeling the familiar surge of anger bubbling up inside me. I headed straight to my room, needing to put some distance between us before I said something I might regret.
Once inside. I slammed the door shut behind me and collapsed on my bed, the frustration gaming at me. I couldn’t understand her. Why was she like this: Why did she always push me away it was like she was determined to keep me at arm’s length, never letting me in never showing me even
sued of vulnerability.
I knew had given her nothing to work with but I was willing to try if she w
I felt something hard press against my sade, and I reached into my pocket, pulling out the sinall leather–bound journal I had hidden there earlier. I stared at it for a moment, debating whether I should open it. I knew what was impide–knew it would only make things worse but I couldn’t help myself
Flipping it open, I timbed through the pages until I found the cry, the second entry, written in the shaky, uneven handwriting of a child who had barely leaned to spell I took a deep breath and began to read.
“Today was a bad day. Miss Sara said I had to clean the floors again because I spilled the bucket of water, but I didn’t mean to. I was just so tired, and my arms hun from carrying it, and it was so heavy. But she didn’t care. She yelled at me and told me I was clumsy and stupid and that I would love to clean everything all over agam
work harder!!
My knees hurt so much, and my hands got all red and sure
ine from scrubbing. I tried to be good and do what she said, but it was so hard. I just wanted to go to bed, but she wouldn’t let me unil everything was spodess. She kept saying I was Lazy and the needelio kam how 10
didn’t want to be useless…
After I finally finished, I was so tired I could barely walk. But I had to help with the dishes too, because Miss Sam said I was taking up space and needed to earn my keep I dropped a plate because my hands were all slippery from the soap, and she slapped me so hard my ear ring for a long time I wanted to cry, but I didn’t. Crying just makes it worse. She always says tears are for weaklings, and weaklings don’t get any supper.
I abadn’t get to eat torught because I was too slow, and by the time I finished everything, the food was all gone. My tummy hurts, but I don’t warn Miss
Sara to hear me because she’ll say I’m whining and report to my Other. Tin not whining. I’m just red
I hope tomorrow is better. Maybe if I try harder. Mass Sara won’t be so mad at ine. Bui Timm so tired…
My hands trembled as I finished reading, the childish scrl blurring as my vision clouded with anger. I could feel the fury rising in my chest, the bitter resentmem that had been simmering there for years.
That was her. At five years old. Five. I could hardly imagine a child so young bring put through that, bring treated with such cruelty. Yes, she had
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endored a, mel instead of breaking, she
walls ses high around herself that no our could reache
And here I was trying to hone my way in, trying to get her in open up, in show even a glingise of the pain her min still be carrying even though 1.
imm stubbon. She wasn’t going to let anyone in, least of alli
1 slamittard the journal shut, the sound erbning in the quiet ronin li didn’t make me feel any better. If anything, it only made the rage burn botter How could she act so cold! How condidslr si diere, day after day, with that indifferent expression, like reithing ever touched her, like nothing.
She went through something traumatic and yet, I teased her, bullied and somuned her thinking, she was spuded.
I wanted to scream, to throw sommeiling, tollerak something, But Torre it wonkba’t change anyiling, Sapphire would still be Sapphire. Unyielding. Unreachable. And I would still be on the outside, banging my fists against a wall ila waun’i ever going to crumble.
Maybe that won what informed me the mout. The knowledge that no matter what I did, no matter how hard I tried, she would never let me in She would never be anynar in. And I would have in bive wals that, with the constant reminder that there was a pan of her that I would never understinil, Curver touch, never bral liecame I shattereid it alongside her bastard faiber
Tank hack against the pillows, the weight of in all pressing down on me like a heavy blanker. Had waited so badly in help her, to fix thingy between àn, but maybe that was just another foolish dreams. Maybe she wasn’t broken. Maybe she was exactly who she needed to be to survive this world,
way me who needed to learn how m accept the
But accepting i didn’t make it any easier. And as a lay there, staring up at the ceiling, I couldn’t shake the feeling that somehow, in some way,
