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Chapter One

quiet. - eli.

Penelope

My head hurts, and the room spins as I try to keep my eyes open. Splintering pain shreds through every inch of my body, feeling like I’m being stabbed ten times over.

The pain is unbearable. I can barely feel my legs as it licks up my skin, it’s touch-scorching. Mustering all my strength, I try to move a couple of toes. I huff in frustration when not a single one moves. A small tear drips down to the floor at my failure.

Lifting my head, the pounding gets strenuous, my pulse getting deafening in my ears. I open my eyes one at a time, using most of my strength. They burn as I adjust to the light; the brightness brings a few tears to my lash line.

I shift my head to the left to see a small metal bed bolted to the floor with a paper-thin mattress. Not even a pillow or blanket. Moving my head to look to the right, there’s a toilet, its rim almost black with whatever germs are caked on it. I almost gag at the sight of it. There’s a sink right next to it in the same state, black junk caked on. Not to mention the putrid smell that’s wafting over to the middle of the room.

I try to stand up, but something tugging on my wrists and ankles makes me stay. Looking down at my feet, I see they’re bound to the legs of a chair, thick rope rubbing against my skin. My wrists are bound with the same thick rope.

Fear claws at me. I can feel my heartbeat against my ribcage. My throat closes up, making it harder to breathe. I drop my head back down, trying to calm my erratic breathing, not knowing what else to do. I know why I’m here. I was sold. To Riot Petrov.

My father, a lowlife, trailer trash, abusive, deadbeat bastard. He never loved me, never wanted me.

Mom died when I was six, by his hands. The police ruled it as an accident, but I saw him.

I saw him.

I saw him.

I saw him kill her.

He strangled her, then raped her corpse like a deranged animal, thirsty for the soul of his kill. The sight haunting my mind forever.

When Mom was alive, I knew I was safe. My father pretended to love me. Pretended to care. But even in my small child-like mind, I knew better than to trust the words and actions of that man

My gut was right in the end. The day Mom died, it was like a switch flipped. He didn’t rape me after she was gone, not yet. But that doesn’t mean I wasn’t touched. A thigh squeeze here and there. A grope of my ass. His hand straying too far from my neck to my breasts. He beat me. Used me as his personal punching bag when he would come home. I didn’t deserve that.

My mom meant everything to me. There was no doubt I was a mommy’s girl. I was attached to her at the hip, I couldn’t go ten minutes without her presence. If she showered, I had to be in there with her, usually with my coloring books and a snack to keep me content. Every time she left the house, I had to go with.

Whenever Mom asked for him to watch me even for a minute, he’d get this sinister smile on his face while agreeing. He would always touch me in places that I knew weren’t okay, but he told me the first time he touched me, “Tell anyone, my Melon, and I’ll kill your mother,” he whispered.

I was four when he told me that, his hand resting on my upper thigh. I knew it wasn’t okay. What was I going to do? I was four. It was the first time he threatened me.

I remember all my early memories. I don’t know how. Maybe it’s God’s way of punishing me. I just don’t know why. I was just a little girl grieving her mommy. I don’t know why he hates me. Why I’m not good enough. I never did anything. I was never bad, I always listened, even as a baby. I barely cried. All I wanted was my mommy. But he took her from me.

“No, please,” I hear Mommy scream, her voice dull and almost muffled. My father straddles her, his fists drawn up in the air, like he’s about to strike again. I sink back into my room, the door letting the smallest bit of light in.

I don’t understand what’s happening. It’s scary. Like the forest at night. The uneasiness. Every small sound making you jump. Dark and cold.

“Shut the fuck up,” Daddy grits, muffled by the walls. I hear the sound of flesh hitting flesh before her cries go silent. Her silence is deafening. Like the life is slowly being ripped from the little home she built.

“Please,” she squeaks out, my eyes pricking with tears as I listen to her gasp for air. I can imagine her hands clawing at his face, trying to get him off of her. The tears that would be streaming down her face.

I wonder what she’s thinking. Does she know she’s going to die?

I peek back out the second he lifts her head up and slams it down with so much force the floor shakes. Mommy stops moving instantly, but he doesn’t stop. I watch the life drain from her.

I can’t tear my eyes away until he moves off her and down to her legs. He starts to pull down her pants. That’s when I shuffle back into my room, closing the door as quietly as I can. I crawl back to my bed. Fear clawing at my throat, closing off the air that flows through it.

I haven’t come out of my room for five days. And he doesn’t come looking for me. I don’t know what to call my life after this point, but it can’t be good.