Enforced (Book 1)

Chapter 23

I woke up the next morning and my right eye was swollen shut. I turned my light on and walked over to my mirror. I saw that I had a black eye and my right cheek was completely bruised as well. No amount of cover up could hide this from Benjamin.

He'd be worried sick about me every time I left him and went home now. And he'd be furious. I considered avoiding him today, but I knew he'd only worry about me. Plus, he knew where I lived, and if he showed up at my house, I don't know what would happen. But I know it wouldn't be good.

With a huff, I took my dirty clothes off and took a cool shower to try to take the swelling in my eye down. It didn't work out too well. I got dressed, grabbed my things, and when downstairs. I grabbed a baggie and filled it with ice, wrapped the bag in a hand towel, and put it against my eye.

I was hoping to be able to avoid my father and I thought I was going to get lucky. I almost made it. I was about to leave the house, my hand was on the door knob, when I felt a clammy hand on my shoulder.

I turned around and was face to face with my dad. I didn't know whether I felt more scared or more angry. I stood there in silence waiting for him to say something. He raised his hand to itch his head and I flinched. "What's your problem?" He asked me.

I lowered the ice from my eye and he cocked his head at me. "Who did that?" he asked me. I just continued to look at him angrily without responding. "Was it me?" He asked, "Did I do that to you?"

I just nodded in response. He moved his hand toward my face and I closed my eyes and leaned slightly away. He poked my cheek that was bruised and I took a step away from him.

"No." I said out loud. I was done cowering. I was done being afraid. I was done with all of it. "Don't you touch me!" I shouted at him. "Don't you ever touch me again! What did I do to deserve this?" I asked pointing at my face. "How dare you?"

"He took a few steps towards me, his mouth gaping. "I, I'm sorry, Bethany." He put his hand up, trying to bring me closer to him. I swatted his hand away, opened the front door, stepped outside, slammed the door behind me, and ran to the shuttle stop. I heard the door open behind me and my dad yelled again that he was sorry.

I got on the shuttle and leaned back into my seat. I can't believe I just did that. I thought to myself. I couldn't tell if I was more proud of myself or if I was more terrified of what I had just done.

When the shuttle came to a stop, I stepped off, took a deep breath, and walked to the dock. When I got to the end, I saw that Benjamin was not there yet. I sat down and kept the ice bag pressed against my face. It was almost a relief that Benjamin wasn't there yet, at least that gave me some time to take some of the swelling in my face down.

I'd only sat there for a few minutes when I heard Benjamin come up behind me. I felt my heart begin to race when I heard him approach. I was afraid of his reaction. I didn't want him to be disappointed in me. He told me to be careful around my dad. He told me to be on my very best behavior. But, I felt like what happened had nothing to do with my behavior. He was just pissed that I came home with a ruined dress. I put my head down and let my hair fall in my face as Benjamin sat down next to me. "Hi." He said cheerfully.

"Hey." I replied, less than cheerfully.

"What's wrong?" he asked. Immediately able to tell that something wasn't right.

"I pushed my hair back from my face and I looked at Benjamin. His jaw dropped and he ran his fingers tenderly along the right side of my face. "Bethany, Jesus, your face. Are you okay? What happened? Who did this to you? Did they do anything else?" he asked me, anger and fear making his hand trembling against my cheek.

"My father." I said, ashamed.

"Why?" He asked, the only thing he was able to verbalize.

"My dress." I uttered, "It was destroyed after creating our shelter in the woods yesterday, he was mad."

"You didn't talk back to him, did you?" he asked. "I want to know if he will hurt you for no reason or if he still needs a 'reason'. He shouldn't hit you regardless, of course. There's nothing you could do to deserve him hurting you. I just want to make sure you're careful around him. I don't want him to lay another finger on you."

"No." I answered, not telling him about yelling at my dad this morning. "But I did walk away while he was talking to me."

"That doesn't matter. He had no right to lay a hand on you. Whether or not Richardson says you are his property." His body was trembling in anger. "I just can't believe this." He stood up and began pacing. He raked his fingers through his hair and turned back to me. I had stood up and walked over to him so we were standing face to face. "I want to do something." He whispered, "I want to protect you from this." He took a deep breath, "He has been getting progressively more abusive, that's how it starts, Bethany. That's how it started for me. He can't do any worse to you Bethany, I couldn't handle it. I can't handle this. Seeing you like this," he said gesturing at me, "Breaks me."

I don't know how his voice was remaining so calm, I could see his body was racked with fury. He was shaking, his body was so tense.

"I don't know what to say. I can't help that he is drunk all of the time. I can't help that he is an angry drunk. All I can do is try my best to avoid him."

Benjamin ran his fingers through his hair again then caressed my cheek, "Tell me what to do. Tell me how to keep you safe, Bethany."

"I have no idea, I don't know what to do. I ask myself the same question every day. I want to keep you safe too, and I can't, and your abusers are much more violent than my father is."

"This isn't about me, Bethany." He stated angrily, "This is about you, this is about keeping you out of harm's way. Your face..." he said again. He ran his fingers down my face and turned away from me. I placed my hand on his shoulder and turned him back towards me.

Tears were glistening in his eyes. "I'm almost eighteen." I reminded him, "We can run away together. Once I turn eighteen, we can leave, leave and never come back. Richardson's men don't search for missing persons who are eighteen or older, they don't care. I have savings, we can start our own lives, get away from this toxic environment."

Benjamin nodded his head. "Okay. We will leave. We will leave when you become of age. I'm getting you away from him. But until then, please Bethany, please be careful. Avoid your dad as best you can, be over the top polite to him. Then when you turn eighteen, screw him, we are leaving. And we are never, ever coming back here."

I fell asleep that night with a smile on my face, knowing that when I turned eighteen, Benjamin and I were running away. We were going to be together. And we were both going to get out of the hell we both reluctantly called home.