Page 69 of Save Me
“Good evening, Beth!” Marsdon calls out over his shoulder as he saunters through the crowd at his own leisurely pace.
My breath hitches and when Oliver tries to pull me over to someone else I neither know nor want to know, I decide to damn the consequences and get the hell out of here before I pass out. I need to get away from all of these shitty, pretentious people, who have so far, either creeped me out or made me feel like a weird exhibit to be stared at in a manner that is just plain rude. This includes the man next to me who is still leading me around the room like his prized poodle.
Without warning, I pull my arm down hard, causing Oliver to break his hold on me in surprise. I then take the opportunity to walk casually away in the opposite direction, toward the double doors to freedom. I can hear Oliver shouting almost straight away but pretend not to hear him over the throngs of people who are now preventing him from catching up with me. Moments before I reach the room outside, which is both cooling and calming, I hear him barking at Leo to escort me back to the main bedroom upstairs, sounding full of rage which I know I’m going to have to pay for later.
Ignoring the fact that I now have a great hulk of a man at my side, I head straight for the staircase. The silence is blissful and needed so much more than I originally thought. Once I hit the doors to the bedroom, I look at Leo in such a way that tells him he is neither wanted nor needed inside. He simply nods, his now familiar motion of understanding, and I smile in thanks. The doors click closed behind me and I begin to change into my comfy jeans and t-shirt, practically ripping the insanely expensive dress from my body. It had felt suffocating from the moment I had put it on. Next, I begin to pull the hundreds of pins from my hair, releasing the tension on my scalp and letting it sit in a curly mess to one side of my head.
With nothing else left to do other than wait, I curl up by the window with my foot resting underneath me and as watch some of the guests leave with smiles and gossip about the mysterious Steele granddaughter. The one who is all set to marry one of the most powerful men in Mayfield’s organization. Tears escape over my cheeks, but I do not cry. Instead, I just let them fall silently while I stare into the unending blackness.
Chapter 23
Beth
About ten minutes later, the doors burst open with a furious Oliver gliding toward me, looking ready to deal his brand of punishment on the girl who dared to defy him tonight. I consider just standing before him with my arms held wide open, making it easier for him to attack me. Perhaps it will make things move along quicker so I can finally go home. Instead, I let him pull me from my seat before slamming me up against the wall with his face all up in mine, his teeth bared, and his brow furrowed in rage.
“Don’t you ever leave me looking like a fool again!” he growls with his spit landing on my cheeks. “I’ve had to do serious damage control because of your little performance. Do it again and you will see just how punishing I can be. Do.You.Understand.Me?”
As I flick his bodily fluid from my skin, a bravery I didn’t know I had until now floods through my entire body; it now tensing up with my own anger. I don’t say anything, instead, I stare defiantly back at him, daring him to ramp it up a gear.
“Beth! Answer me!” he shouts at such a volume, it makes me jump, though I still refuse to answer him in any way other than glaring.
Moments pass by before he slowly smirks and slaps me hard across the face, causing a small drop of crimson blood to pass over my lips. His brow raises in question, waiting for me to relent, but still, I say nothing. I don’t see his hand reach up to squeeze around my neck, threatening to trap all the air inside of my body until I’m no longer breathing. But I can feel it. I begin to consider that most people would feel a sense of panic right about now, with their vision blurring, and a sense of doom washing over them, but I don’t. In fact, I have a weird sense of clarity that finally readies me to say something.
“Do it!” I gasp.
His face has contorted into a sneer, with a wave of overwhelming anger emitting from his entire body, but I simply close my eyes and resign myself to my fate.
“Do it,” I repeat as loud as I can, which is not very much, given that he’s cutting off my air supply. I feel a traitorous tear roll down my cheek, which seems to prompt him to suddenly let go, thus allowing me to gasp for air, all the while coughing and spluttering.
“Fuck, Beth!” he growls, pacing up and down before me and running his hands in irritation through his hair. “You make me feel insane!”
I fall to the floor in a heap, clutching at my neck which now feels like it’s burning from where he had held his vicious grip over my skin. Moments of hard pacing later, and I see him drop down with me, weirdly pulling my fetal body onto his lap while I continue to struggle to get my breathing back to normal. He tightens his grip and begins to rain down kisses on top of my head, all the while he strokes my tangle of hair.
“Maybe…maybe…you…should…be…with…someone…more like…that…bitchy…woman,” I gasp with difficulty.
“Are you jealous, my beautiful Beth?” he smirks smugly, seemingly forgetting about trying to kill me just now. “I think I’m enjoying that notion.” I give him an incredulous look, clutching at my neck as well as still trying to breathe. Is he fucking serious?
“Besides, she is beneath me,” he declares arrogantly, “and insulting you is worth my wrath. Don’t you worry about her, my gorgeous wife-to-be, she will not be so quick to say anything to you again.”
“Don’t do anything on my account,” I reply, sounding less than impressed with his response. “Why aren’t you with her if you’ve been involved all this time?”
“Felicity thought, rather stupidly, that we would end up together, so she let me sleep with her,” he says matter of factly. “I can’t be with someone so easy.”
“Wait, she slept with you because she thought you would be with her, which you were well aware of, only to then not be with her because she had given you what you wanted?” I can’t help looking at him like he’s part of a cult that sacrifices newborn babies delivered on a full moon.
“I can see your line of thinking, Beth, but I am not the only powerful man Felicity has given herself to, merely the first. She’s hoping to marry above her station, that is all.”
“Oh my God!” I reply, feeling completely disgusted with this weird, misogynist, and completely screwed-up place. “Please can I go home, Oliver?”
“Sam will drive you home in the morning,” he mutters before finally shuffling us up onto our feet. “I will sleep in my room, and you can stay in here…I am sorry for my earlier actions,” he says a little sheepishly, peering at my neck, which must look like a fingerprint painting. “I only did it for your own protection.”
“Are you kidding me?!” I burst out without my usual fear. “You actually believe that strangling me was for my own protection? Are you insane?!”
“There are a lot of people who would like to take advantage of you, Beth,” he begins to explain to his naïve, child bride. “And when I say I want you by my side, it means do not fucking leave my side!”
The growing crescendo of his anger begins to rise, so I brace myself, and my neck, for a second round. However, instead, he breathes out slowly and cups my cheek softly, turning back into Dr Jekyll with an eerie-like speed.
“If anything happened to you…” he whispers close to my skin, then presses his lips to mine, but I cannot bring myself to reciprocate. “Go to bed, my angel, I will lock the door from the outside so no one can get to you but me.”