Chapter 2

Ryuhi hadn't expected to wake up. 

The beeping of a hospital monitor. The pungent smell of disinfectant. She couldn't move her hands. Her feet felt numb. Her vision was blurry. Maybe she was crying. 

"She's awake!"

Ryuhi heard someone call out loudly as her ears rung with pain. She heard loud clanking of heels as she felt the fear freeze her veins, she wanted to move her neck but she couldn't and the only thing she could see was the ceiling. She couldn't feel anything.

It wasn't anything new.

Ryuhi tried to move her arms, her legs, her fingers but she couldn't feel anything.

Someone yanked her head as she felt her vision adjust. The numbness wore off a little as she felt a sharp spike of pain in her neck. 

She felt someone slap her but she felt nothing.

"Ungrateful wretch! We raised you for eighteen years and this is how you repay us?!"

It was her stepmother. She could see her ugly makeup even if her vision was blurry. Ryuhi hung her head and didn't argue. She was so pathetic.

She couldn't even die properly. 

"Can't you answer me at least."

She could see a white blanket covering her legs. Her neck was wrapped in a cast.

"Mother stop. She will die."

Her brother. No, it was her ex brother. They weren't her family anymore.

"I don't care if she dies. Does she even realize what would have happened to our family if she had succeeded?"

She imagined Reynold pacifying her stepmother as he ran his hand through his hair with an exasperated expression on his face. 

"Do you know our family would have been dragged through the mud if you had died? Everyone would have blamed us for mistreating you."

"Why aren't you answering?"

She kept her head down, tears threatening to flow. All the effort, all the work she had done in making a facade of not caring had crumbled away when she was in front of him.

"ANSWER ME YOU COWARD!"

A file flung on her legs as the numbness wore away fully as she sobbed half from the pain and half from his words. 

Why was she so weak?

Everytime she saw him she felt so useless. 

She couldn't even die without their permission.

She hear his sigh again. The clanking of heels told her that mother had gone away. No. Ryuhi wanted to scream. Not alone. 

Not with him.

Not again.

His hands creeped to her chin, as her body heaved with panic. No. 

This couldn't happen again. She needed to leave. She bent down as she opened her mouth to scream but nothing came out.

Her tears flowed harder when he forced her to look at him. 

She couldn't mover her hands.

She couldn't move anything.

His eyes glared at her with hate. 

Loathing.

She felt bile rising up her throat when his hands trailed down to her ribs.

Ryuhi wanted to scream, scream so loud that everyone in the world would believe her. But if she was screaming the whole world was mute.

Now that she was mute, it didn't make a whole lot of difference.

His frown twisted into a smile on seeing her panic. Seeing her terrified. This man was not her brother. Her brother never existed. 

NO!

Please.

Please leave me alone.

Please let me die. 

She sobbed because she couldn't find her voice again. The only sound that came out was empty breaths, heaving begging. Pain shot through her nerves, her legs, her entire body. 

"Didn't I tell you?"

"You're fucking mine."

He spat on her face and held her face close for longer, until he could see the fear in her eyes, her trembling body, the quivering lips sobbing and he had memorized it in his mind. He jerked her face away from him as he let out a disgusted noise. 

"There's someone who wants to meet you. You better keep quiet bitch."

Ryuhi didn't relax until after he had left. She could never relax. Now that she couldn't speak, he would never let her go. She needed to run.

Ryuhi grabbed the bed post near her as she dragged her body of the bed. She fell onto the floor with a thud. It hurt. 

It hurt so hard but it wasn't the worst she had experienced. Ryuhi couldn't move as she fell helpless on the cold floor waiting for someone to rescue her. They said that she could rescue herself.

But that Ryuhi was already dead.

The door opened on its hinges as her entire body stiffened and trembled. All the courage she had taken to jump had vanished. She was broken.

He had come to shatter her again. 

A warm hand wrapped over arms as she felt her entire view tilt. Another hand wrapped her from her legs and she felt her entire body rise. She could feel the warm sweater. 

It wasn't Reynold. 

She looked up and blinked.

"Did you fall?"

Her eyes widened as she tried to get away and he obliged setting her on the bed once again. He sat down on the stool next to her. She crawled to the edge.

He was a handsome man, with black hair reaching upto his shoulder, an earring sparkling one ear and a neutral expression on his face. His eyes looked kind.

Reynold's used to too.

Ryuhi wondered what he was going to do her. Did her family sell her to him?

She was so pathetic that she still called them 'family'.

He stared at her for a while.

"Do you remember me?"

She had to answer or he would get angry. 

She couldn't anger her father's clients.

He even looked rich. Very rich.

Ryuhi shook her head.

"I rescued you from the water. I'm sorry I didn't get there sooner."

She didn't answer and looked away. She was sorry that she didn't jump earlier. Then she wouldn't have to look at them again. 

"Your family told me that you have amnesia. And you lost your speech. But you can understand me right?"

She nodded refusing to look at him. His voice sounded so kind. So warm. She wondered how much he had been paid.

"Do you want to marry me?"