Chapter 5

The bodyguards dragged Alanna from the curb, her feet barely touching the ground. They shoved her into the back of the SUV, the door slamming shut with a sound of finality. Cameron was behind the wheel, his knuckles white as he gripped the steering wheel. His face was a stone mask.

Alanna' s wrist throbbed where one of the men had grabbed it. She had half-expected him to yell, to demand an explanation for why she was trying to run. Maybe even to pull her into a rough, angry embrace.

He did nothing. He said nothing.

The silence in the car was a living thing, thick and suffocating. The only sound was the rhythmic slap of the windshield wipers against the glass as a cold rain began to fall. Her clothes were still the same ones from the party, now rumpled and stained. Her body ached. The seafood appetizer she' d eaten at the party was a bad idea; her skin was starting to itch with the first signs of an allergic reaction she'd had since childhood.

Cameron just drove, his eyes fixed on the road ahead, refusing to even look at her in the rearview mirror. They weren't heading for the family estate. Alanna watched the familiar streets give way to a winding road leading out of the city, her unease growing with every mile.

They finally stopped at a grand, imposing gate. The Robertson family mausoleum. The place where her parents were buried.

Before she could ask why they were there, a stack of papers flew from the front seat, hitting her in the face. The sharp edge of the paper sliced her cheek.

"Get out," Cameron commanded, his voice devoid of all warmth.

He got out of the car and stalked around to her side, yanking the door open. He grabbed her arm and dragged her out into the pouring rain, forcing her down onto her knees in the wet gravel in front of her parents' tomb.

The sharp stones dug into her knees. She heard a sickening crunch and a fresh wave of pain shot up her legs. Blood mixed with the rainwater, staining the ground beneath her.

"Do you know what you've done?" he snarled, standing over her like an executioner. The rain plastered his dark hair to his forehead, his expensive suit soaked through.

He threw the papers, now damp and muddy, at her feet. They were printouts from gossip websites, headlines screaming about Bailey Kent.

"You destroyed her reputation! You planted those stories, didn't you? Bailey was a finalist for the Rhodes Scholarship. They rescinded the offer this morning because of the 'scandal' you created."

He leaned down, his face inches from hers. "She tried to kill herself, Alanna. She's in the ICU right now because of you."

Another lie. Another perfectly staged drama.

"And you," he continued, his voice dripping with contempt, his eyes raking over her torn dress and bruised face. "You come back like this, looking like you crawled out of a sewer, and you think you still have the right to judge anyone? To destroy a good, innocent person's life?"

The words hit her harder than his slap. He was using her trauma, the very thing she had survived, as a weapon against her. He was calling her dirty.

Her heart, which she thought was already dead, shattered into a million icy fragments. The pain from the whips and chains in the compound was a distant memory compared to this. This was a deeper violation.

"Do you have proof?" she whispered, her voice shaking. "Proof that I did any of that?"

His face twisted with rage. His hand shot out, his fingers wrapping around her throat. "Proof?" he hissed, his grip tightening until black spots danced in her vision. "The IP address the posts came from was traced back to the house. To your laptop. Who else would be so vicious? Who else would be so jealous?"

She clawed at his hand, a desperate, choked denial caught in her throat. He was squeezing the life out of her.

He finally let go, shoving her back onto the gravel. "You will kneel here," he decreed, his voice a low, terrifying growl. "You will kneel here and repent to your parents for the disgrace you've become. You will kneel until Bailey wakes up and forgives you."

He turned and walked away without a backward glance, leaving her alone in the deluge.

She coughed, gasping for air, the rain washing the tears from her face. She tried to stand, to tell him to check her phone, to check the computer, to see that Bailey had set her up.

"No one else would do something so evil," he had said.

He was so sure. He wouldn't check. He didn't want the truth. He wanted an excuse to punish her, to justify his betrayal.

She wouldn't kneel for him. But her legs... her knees were broken. She couldn't stand.

She knelt in the rain for three days and three nights. The bodyguards stood watch from a distance, silent sentinels of her misery. The cold seeped into her bones. The wind was a constant lash against her raw skin. Her allergy was in full bloom now, her body covered in painful red welts.

On the third night, she finally collapsed.

A bodyguard came over, his face impassive. "Miss Kent has woken up," he said. "She has forgiven you."

Alanna wanted to laugh. The victim, begging for the abuser's forgiveness. How utterly absurd. She hadn't done a single thing they accused her of, yet she was the one being punished.

She looked up at her parents' names carved in the cold marble and finally let out a primal scream of grief, her tears lost in the endless rain. They were all bullying her. The whole world was bullying her.

They took her back to the estate, not to a hospital, but to the storage room. They locked the door.

She lay on the dusty floor, burning with a fever she was too weak to fight. In her delirium, she heard their voices through the door. Anderson, her own brother, talking to their lawyer about transferring the majority of her inheritance and her company shares into a trust for Bailey. To "compensate" her for her suffering.

He was using their parents' hard-earned money to appease the woman who had orchestrated her kidnapping.

Then she heard Cameron's voice, soft and persuasive. He was offering Bailey the Stewart family matriarchal ring, the one his mother had worn, the one meant for his wife. He was begging Bailey to stay, not to go to London.

She was their treasure, their princess. Now she was trash, locked away while they showered her tormentor with her wealth, her status, her future.

The tears had long since dried. There was only a hollow, tearing pain left.

Just as she was about to lose consciousness completely, she heard the lock click. The door opened.

A familiar scent filled the air, the cologne Cameron always wore. A cool hand touched her forehead.

He was murmuring her name, his voice laced with something that might have been guilt. He gently lifted her into his arms. "I'll take you to the doctor."

She used the last of her strength to open her eyes, to look at his face. "Let me go, Cameron," she whispered, her voice a dry rasp. "I don't need you anymore."