Chapter 16

A/N: there was a bit of a mix up, so please read the last chapter again.

...."and then, they put up an announcement, looking for a suitable foster home for one of the richest journalist's only child, James and his wife were the first to apply, they made a lot of promises which made me although still grieving look forward to moving in"

"Empty, they were all empty, infact they did almost the exact opposite"

I pause my despondent tale to wipe my tears, I take a minute to glance at Ethan, we both sat cross legged on my bed at opposite ends facing each other. I see tears pooling in his eyes.

I felt my heart constrict at the sight.

He feels sad...for me?.

When he notices my gaze on him, he awkwardly tries to blink the tears away, once he's done he motions for me to continue.

"They treated me like their maid, like I had no right to anything. I used to wonder why they didn't just get a maid of they needed one, one time I summoned courage to ask, I was still eleven at that time"

******

*Flashback

"Anabella what are you doing here, have you done my laundry?" Janice, James' wife asks when she looks up at me after taking a sip of her scotch.

"Yes ma'am" I say avoiding eye contact.

I've been working all day with an empty now that I was done with all her exhausting tasks I thought I could finally get a meal and was looking forward to it.

But my pretty bubble was bursted

"That was fast enough, now here" I look up eagerly expecting at list half of the food I cooked in the morning, only to see her holding a brush stick to me, I take it from her with a questioning look.

"Go and clean my toilet"

Bummer, but I didn't dare complain for fear of a greater punishment.

However as I turn to leave, another arm grabs on to mine, I turn to see my foster father glaring at his wife while holding my arm.

"Come on, you've had her all morning, it's my turn" he says then turns to me "go do my laundry"

I drop the brush stick on the side stool in the dinning and proceed to follow him, just then my other arm is grabbed.

"No! It was my idea to get her dumbass she's mine" she says pulling at my arm.

"But I signed the papers, I am the head, so... She's mine!" He says pulling at my arm.

They spend the next moments screaming profanities that I'm pretty sure I'm too young to hear whilst pulling my arm painfully from both sides.

"Why don't you just get a maid then!" I scream finally having enough of it.

The keep quiet and turn their attention to me, I in turn clamp my mouth and eyes shut, realizing the line I just Crossed.

.

.

Oh no, they didn't hit me, they were far to busy for that. James simply replied while they still held my arm

"Why pay to get a maid, when you can get paid to have one"

And then they were back to bickering.

I'm the end I did them both.

End of flashback.

"Things changed for the worse after their big fight and Janice left, left with no one else to bother he turned all his attention to me."

"He abused me In every way possible, he..." I pause as I choke on a sob.

My mind keeps telling me I've said enough, but my mouth seems to have a mind of its own as I continue.

"He was my first... You know.." I pause as I hear Ethan take in a Sharp breath.

He's probably disgusted by me, who wouldn't.

"He was even my first kiss" I continue smiling at how pathetic I am with tears running down my cheeks, I don't try to wipe them away, because they'll keep coming anyways.

"It's blurred in my memory now, it was five years ago"

"Does he still, does..." Ethan stutters, struggling with words. I get what he's trying to say anyways.

"No, he stopped when I turned thirteen much to my relief, he said he didn't have money to spend on birth control pills or an abortion" I say laughing towards the end of the sentence.

He looks at me quizzically, I don't blame him though, I also think I'm going crazy.

"When he first started hitting me, I used to cry every time, but then as time went on,I got used to it, my body became numb to the pain, I didn't even make a sound when he hits me, I guess it didn't give him as much joy" I say shrugging "so.."

|Ethan's POV|

I stare at her intently wondering, and confusedly with one question bugging me

Why didn't she do anything.

As I watch her fiddling with the sleeves of the purple hoodie on the bed, I try to refrain from asking the question, but my curiosity kept bugging me, I couldn't stay in one place my curiosity begging to be fed as to why she didn't at least run away.

I squirm uncomfortably on the bed knowing I can't ask, if her last reaction to a similar question is anything to go by, she doesn't appreciate the topic.

She looks up when she hears the sound of my constant movement, and she reads my unasked question, she does that a lot,

"You're probably wondering why I didn't do anything, yeah?"

I simply nod in response.

"Well let's just say, I tried and tried then eventually gave up trying"

I look at her, perplexed and confused by her words.

"How?"

*****

Flashback * Anabella's POV

"Where are you going Anabella? You want to leave me too?" James says standing at my door while I pack my bag.

Needless to say I'm completely terrified, I had thought he'd be gone until at least evening, so I can pack and run away.

"Where to? Your family is dead, and from what I have heard, you have no close relations" he deadpans.

Truth be told,I have no idea where I am going from here, the world isn't exactly the best place for a barely thirteen year old to be alone, but all I know is that I can't bear to leave with him for one more day.

"I'm leaving and you can't stop me" I say closing the zipper of my school bag now stuffed with clothes Wondering to myself where the sudden boldness came from.

"Oh really" he says stepping into the room slowly like a predator sizing up a potential prey, my blood ran cold as he stood towering over my skinny little body, I shiver in fear, whatever little boldness I had disappears living in its wake a terrified thirteen year old who is definitely too tiny for her age.

"That's where you're wrong Anabella" he says, my name rolling out of his tongue in a sick fashion.

When he grabs on to my arm, I almost let out a scream, expecting a beating of the century..... But no he just dragged me to his bathroom and after locking the door, he lets me go and proceeds to open a pack of razors.

He opens one up and grabs my wrist, I look at him confusedly, this is definitely weird he has never done something like this before.

Then he slashes my wrist with the razor blade, continuously Eliciting an angry spurt of blood from my wrists and a scream from me, as he moves to the second wrist, repeating the earlier actions.

I scream again, not for the pain, but a propensity to watching blood flow out from my wrists.

I don't know what to do but watch with inhumanely widened eyes as my blood flows from my wrists.

He then takes my both wrists in his iron grip, leading me to the bath tub already filled with water he submerges my wrist inside.

In a daze, I wonder what in the world is happening as I watch the water turn light red as it mixes with my blood.

After a few minutes, just as I start to feel dizzy, he takes my wrists out and wraps it with bandages without disinfecting it.

My mind wonders to all lengths for the possible reasons for his unusual actions as he takes me back to my room and shoves me inside then proceeds to lock the room.

Too lightheaded and weak to wonder, I feel my knees wobble under my weight as I fall into a blissful rest.

*****

I wake up to a hand holding my wrist, I look up to see my foster father with a sorrowful smile and tears in his eyes.

What the hell?

"I found her in her bathroom passed out in the bathtub I showed you, with her both wrists bleeding seriously" he says pausing in between words to sniff.

What the.... Is he talking to me?

Then I look up to see two middle aged women one blond with her hair held back in a tight bun,the other had her brown hair down with round spectacles resting on the bridge of her nose.

My attention is back to James when he continues to speak heightening my confusion.

"I was in shock as I dressed her injuries, you don't know the joy I felt when I found a pulse, I thought I had lost my little girl" he says pulling me to a hug towards the end of his sentence which I hastily pull out of repulsed.

I look back to the two women, my lips parted in confusion as they look at my bandaged wrists and take notes in silence with James' weird sniffles at intervals.

"Please tell me what to do I can't lose her"

"When did this start" the blonde woman asks still taking notes.

"Oh, the poor soul" he starts dramatically putting his both hands on his chest

"She has been traumatized,she watched her birth parents get killed I heard" he continues eliciting a gasp from me as the memories get trapped in my head again.

"She always used to hurt herself when my amiable wife and I adopted her, my wife is currently on a business trip"

Amiable?

"I thought she would get better as she grew up, but sadly she only got worse"

He states shaking his head dramatically and feigning a pained expression.

"Oh poor dear" the brown haired woman says bending to my level.

I open my mouth to tell them his lying and confess the whole truth

But as James bends to my ear anticipating my actions, he whispers what he knows makes me go berserk "You killed them"

Instead I let out a blood curling scream

"Noooooooooo!!!!"

The two ladies jump back in fright holding to themselves as if I am a mad woman.

"I didn't do it, it's not my fault" I mumble trying unsuccessfully to convince myself as I rock myself back and forth, I take a glance at the bandages James wrapped my wrists with.

In my agitated state I rip them off releasing the blood to flow, from my peripheral vision I see James smile in satisfaction.

And then I realize I just helped him convince them, I Lower my head, ashamed.

"I think we may have underestimated the situation, for now until we set up a therapist for her we have to find a way to keep her safe"... "From herself" she adds

The other woman nods in agreement and claps her hands together "Men" she yells out

I lower my head again as I hear footsteps in the room only looking up when I felt something on my injured wrist, I look up to see that my hand has been handcuffed to the bed post.

I look up at them in disbelief.

Can't they tell he's lying.

As they walk out of the door, James sees them off thanking them for their help.

"Yes I promise to talk very good care of her" he yells from downstairs, he closes the front door.

I look up when he comes in with an angry expression pulling at my cuffed wrists. He bends to where I lay on the bed.

"Run now, my Anabella" he says smiling sadistically.

End of flashback

*****

Ethan's POV

She ended her story with a sigh, she had already stopped crying long ago she only has a look of a lost child.

I have to hand it to him he is as slippery as an eel. But that wouldn't have been enough to stop me if I were her from getting away from this hell hole.

I almost jump in shock when she starts to speak again.

"But that didn't stop me" she continues smiling sadly, "once they were convinced I was 'stable' they released me much to James' dismay. After that darned therapist was done bugging me day after day talking about something about PTSD ,she finally stopped coming and my life returned back to 'normal'.

"Being bullied at school, Beaten by James, working at the bakery, other than that I was calm for months, James was smug, thinking he had finally broken me, but in reality I was calculating".

"Three months later, I had saved enough money, while James was asleep. I fled"

"Taking a few clothes and some food with me, I was only fourteen at that time, I lived in an Abandoned building in the next town outskirts with a leaking roof, I had bought a tiny stove with the money I saved, I had food, clothes, water, a roof over my head.... But most of all, I had peace even if I was alone"she pauses and smiles with a far away look in her eyes as if reminiscing a memory.

"It was bliss" she takes a dramatic pause, a long one might I add, and I was itching to know how she ended up back in the devil's lair.

"Precisely three months later, things started to go downhill, winter came along, and I was running short of food and money and my few clothes were already worn out from constant washing, so I did the most logical thing I could think of"

"I went in search of a Job to sustain myself, if I had known what was waiting for me, I would have preferred to stay there and starve or freeze to death whichever came first" She says shaking her head in self pity.

"I was barely into town when I started to see weird posters all over town, my curiosity got the best of me, I went closer to one of them to see what it was" she pauses seeming to shudder at the memory.

"Needless to say nothing prepared me for what I saw, it was a poster with my picture on it, the first thing I wondered was how the hell he got a picture of me, I felt suddenly self-conscious, looking around, I discovered other people where also reading the pasted fliers close by paranoid I hoped to God that no one would recognize me"

"As you would have concluded by now, I do not make the wisest decisions when I'm agitated and stressed.... I tore the paper out and shoved it in my pocket, realising only a second too late that, that singular act managed to draw attention to me" she pauses widening her eyes as if reliving the moment.



| Flashback

"Who's that, why is she tearing it off"

Oh my God

"Wait a minute" a middle aged woman says looking at her, then the poster, then her again

Dear lord

"It's her!" Another person screams beating her to it.

"That money is mine baby" a teenage boy says pulling out his phone, he starts to dial the number

"Not if I beat you to it" another teenage boy says.

I stare at them all wide eyed, then....

"No! Please don't, don't make me go back there I'm happy here!" I plead my eyes glistening with tears.

"Poor girl she's really traumatized, go away! Shoo stop bothering her " the middle aged lady says pushing through the gathering crowd.

"Come with me my dear" she says once she reaches me... I take a look at the woman in question, she had kind brown eyes with black hair green at it's root"

She seems nice, so I follow her as she leads me into a bakery, away from probiotics eyes which I later learnt she owns.

***

I was sitting down hours later sipping cappuccino from a mug the kind lady gave me when I heard the door open, I look up and dropped the mug in shock I heard it crash to the floor with a clatter.

"Oh you're here" the lady whose name I learnt is Carrie rushes to welcome the apparently expected guests which includes James, the two women from before and a huge guy who could easily pass as a bouncer.

Needless to say I'm terrified out of my mind when she points them to my direction, I shake in my chair in fright as James' lips rise to a sadistic smirk.

"Come on dear, why did you run away, you had me worried sick" he says pulling me into a repulsive embrace and muttering "You thought you could escape huh" only for me to hear, and then pulls back.

I look at Carrie feeling betrayed, I should have never trusted her

"Oh don't give me that look dearie" she says with a sad look "Your father loves you very much and will take very good care of you, you just have to trust him" she ends.

If only she knew.

The reality dawns on me when the hefty man picks me up unceremoniously. I start to kick vehemently and struggle.

"Let me go!!!" I yell "I'm never going back there, NEVER!!" I struggle, kick and sink my teeth into the man's shoulder with all the force I can muster.

He drops me off with a snarl giving me a murderous glare. I ignore him, stands up I try to run away, but I'm held back by an arm, I turn back to see James holding me, feigning a hurt expression

What the!...who!!

In my angry state I raise my leg is kick him with all the force I could muster in the region in between his legs.

He groans and let's go of my hand, eliciting a scream from all the ladies in the house as though they also feel his pain.

I'm however held back again by the huge man, much to my frustration.

"She's getting violent, I think we need to sedate her" was the last thing I heard before I lost consciousness.

*****

I woke up to a vehement slap on my face. I shot out of my sleeping position. To a view of a very angry foster Father.

"Those nosy women finally left"

End of flashback

*********

Anabella's POV

"I'm sure you know what happened after that" I say ending my sad memory.

"I tried again many times, but he always found away to get me back, it was like a twisted game to him" I turn to look at Ethan looking at me with his Jaw on the floor.

"You're so strong" he says in a low whispery voice as if filled with awe.

I am about to Contradict his statement when.....

"Anabella!!! Where is my breakfast"

I look at an equally surprised Ethan.

And then out the window

What the... it's morning.

A/N Thanks for 4k reads...