Deadly Secrets

Chapter 49: Brooding

A/N: Trigger warning. References to rape. 

Something brushed against Zara's toe.

It was ignored. She was still in a deep sleep.

Another thing brushed against her, this time her thigh.

A migraine accompanied Zara back into the real world. There wasn't a section of her body that didn't ache. A steamroller drove over her body, turned around, and repeated the procedure, leaving only her head to deal with the pounding. Her tongue felt like sandpaper against the roof of her mouth, and the dryness of her throat could rival the climate of the Sahara desert.

She smacked her parched lips together, and almost lurched when the foul taste of alcohol took its place in her mouth. Zara rolled over and rested her cheek on her outstretched arm. Her bloodshot eyes slowly opened, but her lashes had to flutter in order to clear her blurry vision. She found herself on the floor, part of her top-half covered by an overhanging blanket, and a hand wrist-deep into a misshapen lampshade.

Where am I?

Slowly, and very carefully, she sat up. Tears stung her eyes as the pain in her head intensified, and she had to rest it against the bed; it felt too heavy for her neck. She swept her tangled and matted hair over a shoulder, and twisted her head to look at the chaos on the floor. Shards of glass decorated the area, and when Zara searched the source, she saw a bedside lamp, or at least what was left of it.

A wave of her arm, and the lampshade tumbled off. It landed meekly besides her.

Zara suddenly felt cold, so she looked down. Her eyes widened in terror when she saw that it was covered by nothing but her bra.

Panic soon swamped her when—not too far from where she sat—her eyes caught the sweater she had worn the day before laying in a heap, as if it had been thrown across the room.

Memories of the night before came flooding back, and something snapped in her head. Simon getting shoved against the wall.

Stealing the drink, downing it in the hopes of erasing what she had done.

Texting Max.

Max.

Everything that happened afterwards was a drunken blur. Max couldn't have done what she thought he had...or had he?

She still had her pants on, but that didn't mean anything, he could've slipped them back while she was sleeping.

There were so many possibilities, each worsening with increasingly dismal thoughts.

He couldn't have done this to me. Max would never do this to me. No, he wouldn't. I asked for his help because I could trust him. But is he capable of doing such a thing?

Sobs racked her body, and shrieks filled the silence.

Zara wrapped her arms around her knees, trying to draw the strength to live another day. It had happened again.

Another memory, one from several years back, began to haunt her again, freeing itself from the suppression in the depths of her mind.

She was surrounded by nothing but darkness, a darkness that wrapped its thick arms around her neck, asphyxiating her.

Zara had been thrown into the darkness, all of a sudden. One moment she had been sleeping peacefully in her bed, the next she was gagged, restrained, and carried out the room, out to meet her horrible fate.

Both her arms and ankles were tied together—with what she didn't know—forcing her into a position that made her muscles ache from the strain. How long had Zara been that way? She didn't know. A couple of seconds, minutes, hours, days...time to her was irrelevant.