Page 24 of Claim Her
He slightly stirs at the contact, but his breathing is still even and he continues to sleep.
Closing the door behind me with a soft click, I step right into his living room. When he said before that his place was a mess, he wasn’t kidding. This is my first time seeing everything in broad daylight. The last time I was here, it was night and I was too busy chatting with his brothers to notice other things.
My mother will have a conniption if she sees this whirlwind of clutter, mostly on the wooden table pushed against one wall.
Papers are strewn haphazardly across the floor, some even landing on his rolling chair. Post-it notes cling on almost every available surface—the walls, the edges of his desk, even the armrests.
Even his laptop sits open in the middle of the desk.
Fine. Alec is far from perfect. Then again, so am I.
I don’t bother reading the hastily scribbled notes, so I gather the papers and put everything on one side. That’s it. I won’t do anything else because he might not appreciate me going over his things on my first morning here.
After putting my hair up, I move to make breakfast when the glint of something catches my eye. Curiosity gets the better of me because I gently brush aside a few stray papers and carefully pick them up.
It’s a metal hair clip. Turning it over my palm, my heart begins to hammer.
A sudden wave of darkness washes over me, suffocating me, and a faint memory creeps its way into the perimeters of my mind.
A daisy hair clip.
Maybe it’s just the same.
But no.
The chip on one of the petals. The scruff marks on the metal.
No. It’s the same one.
MY daisy hair clip.
It takes a full minute for my shocked brain to crank back up, and when it does, my whole being kicks into full-on panic mode.
The fear starts as a distant whisper, and it grows louder and more insistent until the only sounds I can hear are the roaring of blood in my ears, my wildly beating heart, and fear echoing through my thoughts.
My breaths are quick and shallow, as if the very air refuses to fill my lungs. Images flash before my eyes, still-shots of my memory from the worst period of my childhood. I’ve spent my whole life burying them, forgetting. Now they claw their way to the surface with surprisingly relentless ferocity.
I focus on pushing them away and banishing them back to where they are supposed to be—back into the depths of my unconsciousness, back into the past where they belong.
But the memories continue to cling to me, refusing to be brushed off, forcing me to remember.
The world around me changes, fading into a hazy blur, replaced by scenes of my childhood.
A day at the beach with my parents and three siblings. Laughter. Playing. Me going to the bathroom, convincing my mom I can go alone. I’m a big girl. I don’t need her to stay outside while I pee. I can do it.
Strong, big hands wrapping around my mouth. Waking up on a dark, cold surface. Finding other eyes staring back at me. Hissing sound. Smoke filling the whole space.
Waking up again seeing the towering trees stretching to the sky, gentle rustle of leaves overhead, sunlight filtering in, smelling damp earth. Confusion mixing with fear when I realize I can’t move my hands and feet, tears blurring my vision when the ropes begin to rub my skin raw.
A boy.
A little older than me.
Standing outside my cell, his body shaking with fear, his face a mask of horror at seeing me.
The next day, he comes. Bringing me food and water. Waiting until I finish so he can take the wrappers and glass with him.
He comes again and again. Promises he’ll help me escape.