Hazy Discomfort
Someone jabs me in the ribs. I groan and roll away. Hands grab me and drag me back. “Wake up, Isabel. You’ve been out of it for two days. Wake up or I’m taking you to the hospital,” Hunter declares.
My eyelids slowly open. Blinded by the fierce light of the sun, I squeeze my eyes shut and groan again. “Can you please close the curtains? My eyeballs feel like they’re about to melt and ooze from my skull.”
The bed springs squeak as he rises to draw them.
I open my eyes to a darken room and slide up against the headboard. I wince from the dull ache that pulses in my wrists and backside.
Hunter just stands and stares at me like the weirdo he is.
I yawn and scratch my head. “Why am I so sore? My ass hurts.”
His lips spread into a slow, malicious smile. “You’re bruised, but you’re healing quite nicely.”
My ear drops to my shoulder, and I blink. “Bruised from what?”
His stunning, wicked smile broadens as he holds up his hands, palms up, playfully wiggling his fingers.
“Your hands?”
He nods.
“I don’t understand.”
Hunter comes closer and sits in the empty space beside me. “What do you remember?”
“I remember eating at the diner with Falcon and Vic. I wanted to go to Mayhem. Victor dressed me in a fairy gown and design beautiful henna…” I trail off and raise my arms that are no longer detailed with fine, elegant art.
“What else?” His voice is urgent and strained.
“The club. Victor told me to stay close and keep my phone on.” A heavy pounding fog begins to cloud my brain.
“Tell me more,” Hunter demands, his determined eyes locked on mine.
I close my eyes and drag my hands down my face, sighing. “I don’t know.”
“You do. Talk. Now.”
Leaning my head back against the headboard’s chilly metal rails and taking a deep inhale, I look at the angry purple discolorations wrapped around both wrists. They’re strangely even and stripe-like. My fingers trace along the bruised welt. “There was this guy. He gave me some ecstasy. I took some.”
“How many?”
I feel the heat of his eyes burning into me, making my stomach knot. “Two pills, a star and a peace sign. I felt warm and fuzzy. All I wanted to do was dance, I think.”
“Is that all?”
I press a finger into the strip of purple and watch as the blotch fades and slowly reappears from the indention. I ignore the throbbing pain I caused. “The rest is kind of hazy.”
He leans over and flips my hair over my shoulder. His jaw tenses and he swallows audibly. “How’d you get that bite mark?”
I follow his gaze to a red rugged ring.
He gingerly trails his fingers over the wound, and I shudder. “Uh…” The shroud that’s smothering my brain gets thicker.
“How’d you get it?” Hunter repeats, his eyes narrowing and darkening all at once. He lets his hand fall to the bed, his fingers fisting in the sheets. “Did Max do that? Did he fuck you too?”
I jerk my head back, gazing up in to the depths of his violent eyes. His bitter accusation surprises me.
My eyebrows almost rise to my hairline. “Max?”
The asshole Max Gabai from high school?
Max Gabai, Hunter’s sworn enemy?
His eyes widen, an odd emotion I can’t place twisting his features. The control and patience he’s trying so hard to hold on to snaps. Before I can process any further, he hovers above me, his massive hands fully and painfully wrap around my upper arms. He starts to shake me like a lifeless ragdoll.
His face is so very close to mine. I can see the flecks of aqua in his cornflower blue eyes. “Did he bite you, Isabel? Did he fuck you? Did you let Max fuck you?”
The more he shouts and thrashes me around, the angrier I get. The forceful strength he uses to shake me is beginning to make me dizzy and weak. My teeth are clashing together and my bones feel like they’re rattling from within. I can almost feel my brain getting tossed inside my head as it bobs wildly.
His fingers tighten around my arms. “You let him fuck you, didn’t you? You fucked him! You fucked him!”
We’re nose to nose now.
He screams in my face, furiously shaking every breath of life out of me.
I squeeze my eyes shut to block him out, but he continues to mercilessly jerk me forward and backward.
I feel lightheaded.
I think I’m getting whiplash.
Everything is twirling around me, spinning around and around.
My heart thunders in my ears.
Why do I feel sleepy?
The screaming slowly begins to fade and stream in to eerie silence.
His tight fingers that sear my arms loosen. The gush of blood that passes through my waiting veins is so painful that I would yell if I didn’t feel so woozy.
“Isabel? Isabel? God, I don’t know…”
What?
What’s happening?
I feel tired.
“Baby, don’t go to sleep. Open your eyes. Open your eyes for me, Isabel. Please open your eyes…”
My eyes lazily flutter open to Hunter’s panic command.
He sounds worried and scared.
I don’t want him to me worried or scared, just full and happy.
My eyes open for a fraction of a second and through the black slits, Hunter’s glossy and horrified eyes are completely focused on me. “That’s it. Open your eyes.”
I’m sorry.
My eyelids are just too heavy, and I’m just too drowsy.
I fail and they close.
The warm and soothing darkness envelops me in caressing silk wings that’s very pleasant around my body.
Finally it’s taking me.
Finally it’s quiet.
Finally I can breathe again.
That’s all I ever wanted.
Voices are muffled somewhere far away.
Hands tug clothes over my limbs.
Cold air whips pass my face.
Someone places me in a warm backseat of a car.
The engine starts and darkness swallows me up.