Race

Chapter 18

Valerie's P.O.V.

I had known it would be a bad idea to come here when Jake had invited us. Nevertheless Bryan had wanted to go.

The last few days had been awful. I had hoped that I'd never have to see Bryan again. He had been the reason for my move. It had been a desperate attempt to escape him. But he had found me. I had known that it would happen, it had been my constant fear since I had come here. Harry had been the only person that had distracted me from that dread. I had felt safe around him, at least as safe as I could get. And I had let myself fall in love with him. And the moment I had finally gotten over my fear, the moment I had thought that I'd maybe be able to have a relationship again, a real, loving relationship, had been the moment it had all come crashing down.

He must've found out my address somehow. I didn't know how, wether he had been following my parents the last time they had visited me or however else, but he had found me. I had been so careful. I hadn't told anyone my full name. My last name was common. I had hoped that in a city as big as this one, he would never find me if I just called myself "Vee" Jones, instead of Valerie Jones. But fact was that he had.

When I had heard his voice, I had instantly been paralyzed with fear. The sound of it had followed me into my nightmares, it was always etched into my brain. His voice screaming at me, telling me how worthless I was. And his face. It was always contorted into an angry mask. Back when I had fallen in love with him, years ago, he had had a nice face, a soft face, a face full of love. He had been a different person. The anger and violence hadn't been present from the start, they had taken time to fully show.

When I had come back from my state of paralysis, snapped out of it by Harry, my biggest fear wasn't for myself. Whatever Bryan could do to me, he had done before. But what if he hurt Harry? I could never let that happen. Harry could not be harmed. Not because of me. He had to leave before things could get ugly.

I could barely even look at him. What had I done? He had opened his heart to me after I had pushed him away for months and now I had to finally end it. It was already bad enough for me, my heart felt like it was shattered into a billion tiny pieces, cutting up my insides, but it was worse for him, because he could never find out, he could never know the reason we couldn't be together. I knew Harry. If he knew who Bryan was and what he had done to me, he'd look for a fight and though Bryan didn't look like much, he knew how to fight and he knew how to hit and he knew how to hit hard. No, Harry could never find out.

So when he asked me wether or not it was true, I said that it was, hoping he would leave. I'd rather have him hate me than get physically hurt. His well being was my only priority.

But he hadn't left. Instead he had done something very, very stupid. He had hit Bryan square into his face. I had seen Bryan lose it often enough to know that something bad was about to happen. I had to stop this. Now.

"Don't hurt him," I had said and even though the words had been a plea to Bryan, to not hurt the man I loved, I had looked at Harry while uttering them.

I had known Harry wouldn't leave. So the only possible thing I could do was to be the one to leave. I had known what would happen once Bryan and I were alone. Back when I had been 17, I would've done everything to not be alone with him, especially after a fight, because I knew what it would mean for me. I knew the pain it would bring me. But in this case I was more than glad to feel that pain. I'd rather have Bryan beat up me than Harry.

I hadn't been able to look into the mirror for days. I had looked bad. Worse than I probably ever had before. Bryan had kept me hidden from the world. He had taken away my phone and answered the door whenever somebody had tried to visit me. He had called my work and told them I quit. I had been his hostage in my own apartment. Back when I had lived at home, I had been able to escape from him at my parents' place. But now I was locked up with him, at his complete mercy. I had spent the days crying in my own home, being pulled back into the black hole I had thought I had escaped. Life was miserable at best.