“I did let you down. I told you I wouldn’t let anyone hurt you and I broke that promise. I failed you, and that’s not okay. It’s just not.”
She looks sad, and I don’t want her to feel bad for me, not at fucking all. She just got whipped with a belt, for Christ sakes.
“Don’t be sad.” I rub a knuckle gently across her bruised cheek. “I don’t want you to feel bad. None of this is your fault. You didn’t ask to be brought here. I vowed to protect you until the auction, and I failed you. This is on me, and whatever misery I feel for failing you is my own. Let me feel bad, let me hate myself. I deserve to feel this way.”
“Ivan.” She pushes up onto her arms. I can see the pain in her features as she moves closer to me, her body hovering above mine. “I’m just lucky that I found you that night when I got out of my cell. If I didn’t, I would already be dead, so while you’re wallowing in your misery, just remember that you saved my life that night, just like you did tonight.”
I know she’s right. I fucking know it, but that doesn't mean I want to admit it. I open my mouth to respond but close it. There is nothing more for me to say. I would just have to keep a better eye on her, watch her cell at all times, unless… An idea enters my mind. I could get her a cell phone. Something she could keep just in case. I bet if I went down to my office, I could find a burner in one of my drawers. I usually always use one when contacting Rossi.
“I can’t always be hanging around your cell, and I can’t keep you up here with me all the time, even though I want to. I have some burner phones down in my office. I’m going to give you one and have you keep it with you during the day.”
I see a spark of excitement in her eyes.
I pause, my eyes bleeding into hers. “Kitten, you have to promise you won’t call anybody but me. You need to trust me on this, just like you trusted me earlier to take the pill. I have a plan to get you out of here, but if you do something that could compromise it, I will not be able to protect you, or get you out alive.”
Her eyes light up, like I’ve never seen them before. “You can really get me out of here?”
“Yes, and I promise I will, but if someone finds out I gave you a phone, we are both as good as dead. This place is a fortress… a well-armed fortress. If someone alerted the police of this place, Rossi would know right away. He is connected, has people everywhere. He would burn this whole place down before the cops could get a strike team together. Do you understand me?” I can’t even begin to explain the importance of this to her.
“Yes, I understand, but how are you going to get me out then?” She seems unsure, and she should be. I don’t know yet how I’m going to do it, but I’ve already killed for her and once Rossi discovers what I’ve done, he’ll have us both killed. There is no way around it.
“There is no way I can just walk you out of here, but the place the auction is at is not this heavily protected. They still have tight security, but I know some people there. I can pay some guys off, call in some favors to get you out quietly, and if that doesn't work, then I’ll take you out by force. One way or another, I’ll get you out of this mess and together, we will go into hiding.”
“Together?” She sits up a little straighter, her eyes wide, like she doesn’t believe what I’m saying. “You said…” She stumbles over her words. “Before, you said that you wouldn’t want to… keep me, even if you could.”
I clench my fists against the sheets. “I know I said that, and it’s still true, partially.”
She looks sad at my response, and I hate it. But she’s also acting like she expected more, like maybe I’d want her forever and though the thought is appealing, I’m not so sure I could keep her. She deserves better, a life where she doesn’t have to remain in the shadows.
“I can’t keep you, Violet, and you wouldn’t want me anyway. There are things about me that you wouldn’t like and things I can’t share. This is temporary. A means to an end. I will save you and then you’ll be rid of me, free to do as you please.”
“I just…” She averts her eyes down to the sheets. “Never mind, you’re right.” There’s a bitterness to her tone but I can’t force myself to think any further into it. I can’t admit to her how I feel, or the things I want to do to her.
“Go take a shower, and I’ll go downstairs to my office and find a phone, okay?” I give her a soft smile, but she doesn’t look at me. She just moves away from the bed and toward the bathroom. All I can think as I watch her walk away is how if I could save her and keep her all to myself, I would.
But I won’t subject her to a life on the run.
She’s already broken enough, and the thought of hurting her, or putting her in a position where she could be hurt again, isn’t something I will let happen.
11
Violet
I don’t know how to feel about what Ivan told me. Freedom. A life without him. It seems like those things can’t coexist together… not anymore. Not after being locked inside this place for so many weeks. Weeks that feel like years. I try to imagine it. I couldn’t go back to my old life. I couldn’t just go home and put my sister in danger, pretending nothing happened. If I regain my freedom, I have to live somewhere else, far away from the only family I have left. I won’t be Violet anymore but a shell of my old self.
I’ll have to remain hidden just like Ivan will.
It should be easy for me to imagine being on my own, knowing Ivan doesn’t want me, not like I want him. I try and analyze the reasons I want him the way I do and none of them make sense. I tell myself it’s because he’s been the only sliver of light in the darkness surrounding me that makes me want him, want him in a deeper way, but I’m not so sure. I think maybe it’s the fact that deep down, I know he wants me, too. Though the circumstances of how we’ve come together are fucked up, I can see it, feel it in the way he touches me. But if he won’t admit it to himself, what can I do?
I shake the thought away. If he didn’t care, he wouldn’t have trusted me to have a cell phone, knowing I could call anyone. He wouldn’t have killed that horrible man, and he wouldn’t bring me up to his room every night, holding me close to his body, telling me everything was going to be okay.
It’s not that he doesn’t want me, it’s that he’s afraid to admit it. He’s afraid he’s not good enough, but he has no idea how good he truly is. At least in my eyes and I plan to show that to him, tonight. I know I don’t owe him anything for his kindness, but I do want to give him something that he’ll always have as a reminder of me.
I sit in the cell alone, bored out of my mind, wondering if Ivan will take me up on my offer and what will happen if I actually do get out of this alive. Two days have passed since the checking, and I’m now back in my cell for the first time again. Ivan was able to keep me in his room all day yesterday and it was pure bliss, even after the conversation we had. He took care of me, making sure I was comfortable and had everything I needed. He even cooked for me.
It made coming back down here this morning dreadful. The last thing I want is to spend more time in this room, especially after everything that happened here, but he did as he said he would and got me a phone. I keep it hidden in the sweatpants I’m wearing just as he instructed.