Little Lady

Chapter 5

Alice's vision began to grow fuzzy. Little sparkles and black and white spots covered her eyes. She fought against the man's grasp at first, wiggling her feet and flailing her arms like they all did in the movies. Eventually she stopped. It was hopeless and it was pointless. Everything was fading. Everything was hurting. She didn't know how long it had been. Had it even been a minute? An hour? Just let it end. 

Suddenly then heavy weight of the brusque and grotesque man was gone. The smell of his cigar pipe was gone. Alice heard a loud thud on the gritty grey cement sidewalk and the sound of pattering feet. She slid down the brick wall, grabbing at her throat and coughing loudly. The rain had ebbed, but it was lightly drizzling in London. Heavy fat clouds decorated the sky like marshmallows on s'mores and the rain fell down like melted chocolate. Alice hated it. She hated the rain. Her coat was soaked and so was Xander's. She closed her eyes just for a moment, just to get away from it all. 

"Are you alright?" Xander asked, and he looked at Alice with concern creased all over his handsome face. Xander stretched out his arm and Alice looked up at him hesitantly. Nobody could see that she had been crying. Not in this weather.

One thing she was grateful for, at last. 

Xander crouched down onto his knees and looked into her eyes and Alice turned away, refusing to take his hand. She just wanted to stay here, just for a little while longer. The sooner she left, the sooner she would have to go back to Klaus. To her surprise, Xander lifted Alice up into his arms and held her tight. "I'm taking you home with me." 

~~~

Alice sat in the same Mercedes she did every Friday night. The black interior was painstakingly familiar and the sleek outside was exactly like her time of torture. Except this was Xander's black Mercedes. His driver sat in the front, nodding at him as he opened the door. Alice hadn't said a peep in the last 15 minutes. She remained completely silent as Xander took pity on her and she climbed into the lush car.

Alice didn't know what she was doing or what she was thinking. She just didn't want to leave. She felt safer with a total stranger than with Klaus, a man she had thought she had known her entire life. 

The silence in the car was replaced by tension between Xander and Alice. He gave her a sidelong, worried glance. Strange for a man who only met her for a mere five minute three years ago. "Dave, do you mind turning up the heat?" Xander asked, in a bit of a condescending tone. Alice remained still, grateful for the toastiness in the car. She craned her neck and pressed her face to the window, something she used to do when she was little. London was cloaked in fog and early morning dew. Gusts of wind blew brown and green leaves floating past in the now again soaking rain. Did it always have to be a dreary day in London?

"Do you still need to call your mum?" Xander practically whispered the words. Alice didn't want another pity party, and she didn't want her mum to listen to her panicked sobbing. Klaus would have her throat for it. Alice shook her head, muted by Xander's kindness and her insignificance to the world. "I'm sorry about your phone," he added. Alice nodded, silent tears flowing down her cheeks. She didn't know when she would stop crying. 

You have to be strong. It will get better. It can't get any worse. Alice hugged her body, sniffling. She still felt cold and she still felt the tight grasp the strange man had had on her neck. He was one of Klaus's men. He had been watching her. Alice stiffened and her eyes widened in horror. What if he was following her right now? Alice turned around to see nothing. There was only Xander's lone Mercedes traveling on a long road. 

Klaus would keep track of her and he would come for her soon. There was no denying it, she was only pushing away the inevitable like a child refusing a plate of broccoli and opting for the mashed potatoes. That child would have been forced to eat the broccoli anyhow, like she would be forced to run back to Klaus. He had her trapped; she was a mere bird in a foreign cage, rattling about and singing a sad, forlorn song that only Xander could hear. Alice pushed her dirty blonde hair back and gazed at Xander. He once again looked troubled. Xander caught her gaze and smiled at her warmly, as if ensuring that she was going to be okay. 

She had never known a greater lie, and yet, she lied to herself everyday.

"Alice, are you still cold? We're almost there, don't worry." Xander had thrown her coat and his in the back. They were both wet and wouldn't do any good now. 

Alice's lips were bruised, her body shook like the cravings were coming back. There was a cut on her left knee and the blood was running down her leg. None of her drugstore make up could cover up her injuries that ran endless all over her body, like she had deliberately laid down on the train tracks, waiting to get ultimately scarred. She wished that Xander couldn't see her this way. She wished that she wasn't sitting here with strangulation marks on her neck and a broken heart that couldn't possibly be pieced back together. 

The car came to a halt in front of a three story estate with metal black gates. The driver, Dave, rolled down the window and hit a red button. "It's Dave, with Mr. Wright," he said, and the gates magically opened and the Mercedes rolled right through. The tires came to screeching halt when bewildered Dave saw a lady up front. Her dark brown hair was curled up in an extremely tight bun on the top of her head. She wore a spotless white day dress with embroidered flowers and gold beads and glared daggers at Dave.

"Xander, where have you been?" The women poised her tiny hands on her petite figure and cocked her head to the side, accidentally stomping on some pink gardenias on her trip to the car. Xander rolled his eyes and rolled down his window.

"I was busy, mom. Dad wanted to see me about the business," he muttered. Xander's eyes looked stormy, as if he challenged this delicate and frail woman that was his mother. 

"This early in the morning? Your father doesn't get up this early in the morning for Martha's brownies." Xander shook his head and rolled up the window. Dave drove past the woman as she moved out of the way, her arms crossed over her chest. 

"My mother is terrible," Xander said, and turned to look at Alice reassuringly.

"Will she mind that I am here, with you?" Alice looked at him, scared. She didn't need another person shunning her and pushing her away. Her own father thought she was worthless. What did that say about her?

She was nothing. Just another British whore. 

"Don't worry about it." Xander waved his hands nonchalantly and the Mercedes smoothly cruised into the garage. Dave turned the engine off and got out of the car to open the door. Alice, looking like a mess, climbed out first. She wanted to fall over wearing her heels. They couldn't hold her up. They offered no support, only plenty of pain. Xander came out and put an arm on her shoulder.

"It's okay, you're safe now." She was far from safe. What if one of Klaus's goons lurked in the pretty garden? Alice was never safe. Not from men, never from Klaus. Alice nodded and smiled, like she believed Xander. She had always been a good actress, maybe for the fun of it, maybe just so the police wouldn't call her out for prostitution. 

"Alice, you can go on and go upstairs and take a shower. I'll call the police and you can change into something different. Just ask one of my maids." Xander was super rich. Too rich and too kind for belief. He was the picture perfect man at first sight, but Alice knew better than that. All she could do now was accept his kindness. Alice ascended the stairs, her dirty blond hair bouncing in tendrils as she ran up them, her legs feeling free. 

Alice stopped midway, hearing a screeching cry of seething anger. What was going on?

"Xander, I don't have time for you to come back to the house at 3 in the morning and fucking lie about it!" Xander's mom was terrifying. All women had the capability of being terrifying. "Then you bring home yet another strange dirty girl. I'm tired of you and your whores! Enough of this and get a real relationship and stop disappointing me and your father." 

 Alice froze on the steps. Another strange dirty girl. This wasn't the first time Xander had been with a prostitute.