Irish Lullaby (Book One of A Violent Melody Duet)

Chapter Nine

She was once again in the shower, once again covering herself in a heated spray that was far too hot to be healthy for her skin. She used a cloth to wash off the sand, slowly rubbing it away to let the small rough pieces scratch at her. It left lines of red and a few spots she bleed just slightly. After she wrapped herself in a robe and laid on her unmade bed, she had asked the maids to leave it like that. She had locked her door before she left to go to the beach and was happy to find it still so, the idea of someone coming in here while she was gone made her uneasy now.
Everything was making her uneasy now.
She didn't know how she would make it through a life with him, her mother struggled with one between her father and she did not want to become that person. The one who drank all day and took pills whenever she needed to suppress any emotions.

Her pills

Her little box of pills that was always on her, the one that had so many different shapes and colors. She could be a small pharmacy with the variety she held in that box. Some many different types that gave her so many different releases. She'd had it with her when they spoke in the library, had it with her before she handed her daughter a glass of champagne.

She never brought Fallon a drink, she never did anything kind for her only daughter.

Her nose started to sting and her eyes welled with tears she didn't know how she still had. Everything was making sense in the most horrible way. Why she was almost kind to her last night, why she gave her such a weird take on the sex talk, why she herself had to take some pills during the talk.

"Oh God." She had never felt so much pain in her heart, it spread out across her entire body a shaking feeling she couldn't control. SHe was seizing up and didn't know what to do to stop it. Her body was suddenly so cold, so fucking cold. Her vision was gaining a tunnel like effect where everything but a small center spot was blurred in long streaks of colors mixing together.
She was breathing but she felt no air fill her lungs, just empty gasps. She was still so fucking cold, why was it so cold? She was wrapped in a thick rob and while curling up into a ball had lifted her comforter over her entire body, but still she felt as if she was becoming hypothermic.

Another empty gasp.

Another quiet scream

Another shot of pure misery through her veins.

Were their sounds being made around her? Was there someone talking to her? She felt as if she could hear a muffled whisper but nothing could pass through the icy cloud of terror she was wrapped in.
This is how she would die, this pain would finally kill her. She had thought about doing it herself since the first moment she realized who Nicholas was under his mask of beauty, thought almost daily about it but she was not strong enough to end her own suffering. Now she didn't have to be because the realization of what her mother, her own fucking mother did to her was to much for her already weak heart to take.

She hoped it would happen soon, she couldn't take much more of this pain.

She was going over the night in her head, the words her mother said, the way she staggered to her room and blamed herself for drinking too much when she thought it had been so little. The way he touched her when her limp body used whatever little strength it had to fight him off.  He took and he took and he felt justified, he had her mothers blessing.
She flipped onto her stomach and put her face over the side of the bed as she wretched every piece of food she had in it onto the floor. When she had nothing left, bile started burning its way up, how much would it take before it burned through her skin and killed her? How much could she take before she finally was broken enough to do it herself?
Another muffled sound, this one closer made its way into her ears. No hands touched her but she felt movement on the bed that had the chill ease and fear take its place. She pushed herself up and against the headboard only to see a maid looking at her with wide eyes and a guard behind her standing next to the door that now hung oddly off its hinges.
They had busted into here, she must have been making a lot of noise. She kept flipping her gaze back and forth between the two. This guard wasn't the same from earlier, he was bigger and looked like he had seen some shit with the scars that etched up his neck and over his hands. He, unlike the other guard, showed emotions on his face and for some reason the look he gave her calmed a small piece of her own emotions that were swirling around like a hurricane ready to hit land once more.
"Miss, might I help you clean up? Should I grab someone for you?" She moved just a step towards the bed and Fallon almost fell off of it trying to get further away.
"No!" She stretched out, her voice sounded like a rabid animal before it striked. The maid jumped back in fear but the guard just stood where he was, watching, observing, taking note of everything she said and did.
"Okay, would you like me to clean up the uhm, the mess, for you?" Her gaze fell to the pile of waste that was now beside her bed on the ground. She started to smell it, with the initial realization fading and her senses returning to normal. She doesn't say anything but nods before curling onto her side and covering her body with the blanket once more.
She listens as the maid cleans and finally she leaves but she only heard one set of feet ever move around the room. She stays under there for another ten minutes before pulling it back and seeing the guard still next to the ruined door, still looking at her. All she does is stare back, shocked by the lack of fear she still feels about having this man in here.
This large, scarred, and very much armed man. "Why are you still here?" She finally asks.
"Doors broken."

"And?"

"And it's broken."

"Yeah, I kind of noticed that, still doesn't explain why you're in my room.

"I can stand in the doorway if you prefer." She let out a short laugh.

"There's fine. Who told you to stay here?" She couldn't imagine anyone in this house caring enough to want a guard at her door while it's broken and anyone could see her or walk right in.
"No one." She squinted her eyes.

"No one?"

"Yeah, no one. I did think someone would want me too though." He shrugged his shoulders, if this man kept giving her vague responses she might take that door off fully and yack him upside the head with him. It would take some effort but be worth it.

"Who is the someone who you thought might want you too? Nicholas?" She scuffed at her guess, that made her feel better.

"I would never let such a petulant child tell me what to do." He looked almost offended she would even consider him an employee of Nicholas, which as they were in his house on his island it seemed slightly weird.
Okay more than slightly but she enjoyed the company of someone who disliked and was not scared of Nicholas. She wondered if she could request him as the guard who comes with her to Edwards, though his inability to answer a question with a straight answer was a tad annoying.

"Then who is worthy enough to get you to listen?"

"You know him." She raised and let fall both her arms onto the bed, her mouth somewhat opened as she stared at him. The question of are you being fucking serious right now, was written across her face.

"If I asked for your gun would you give it to me?"

"Depends, why?" His eyebrow raised.

"So I can shoot you in the shin." Her response was quick. She had been thinking about doing it since just a few words into their conversation.

"You'd probably miss, so maybe."

"How do you even know that? I could be an amazing shot." She was kind of offended, she'd never held a gun or even knew how to properly hold one but she could be a natural.

"I've seen you miss the water when trying to skip a shell." Her cheeks reddened as she recalled a handful or two of them times she in fact did miss the ocean completely, she just got in her head and didn't realize she waited too long to release.

"Yeah, I got you there." He makes a face that looks like an attempt to smile but honestly it could be him trying to silently pass gas.

"I think I might prefer you standing in the hall on the other side of the house."

"I don't take orders from." If he says a girl she is going to throw the bedside lamp at him and his serious face. "Redheads, my mother told me they have no soul." She blinked twice.
That might have actually been worse.