He was Never Hers

ChapterThree

I've never felt so angry in my life.

I gripped my steering wheel tightly as I sped down the road. I had decided—I was going to his office at Elysian Bank to confront him. Or beg. Or whatever. Whatever I could do so he’d let me work. I couldn’t stay locked up in the house for three years, like a caged pet, slowly losing myself.

It felt surreal. One moment, my car was speeding down the lane, and the next, it was spinning through the air at a dangerous speed.

I crashed violently into a tree, bending my car into a crunched V-shape around it.

Glass splintered around me, the noise ringing in my ears. Shards of glass whipped furiously past my face. Some lightly bruised my skin, while others impaled me, creating deep wounds.

Worse still, the person who had furiously slammed into me wasn’t done. I heard the angry rev of an engine and the screech of tires as a car sped toward me and rammed into mine again.

Blood spluttered from my lungs, the sound of crunching glass a distant buzz in my assaulted ears.

Shards of metal and glass scraped the skin of my face as the airbag deployed from yet another smash.

I coughed up more blood; the smell of copper singed my nostrils. Panic surged through me when I realized I felt detached—as if the lower part of my body had been amputated. No feeling. Nothing.

That cannot be good.

The car smashed into me one final time, so hard the tree groaned and cracked.

Oh my God. Tears flooded down my face, mixing with blood and snot, seeping into my slack mouth.

Why am I still conscious? This is it. I won’t survive this.

Blankets of unconsciousness began to wrap around me.

Crunch. Crunch. Crunch.

The sound of heels on shattered glass. My head jerked to the side as a slap resounded on my face, blood spurting from my nostrils.

“What the f**k? You don’t die unless I tell you to.” A familiar voice sang, and cold fingers lifted my chin forward.

It was Amaya, leaning forward, hands on her hips. Malicious eyes stared at me through the broken windshield.

“Hello, motherfucker.” A creepy smile played on her snarky lips. “Thought you could steal my fiancé and I’d let you go unscathed, huh? Haha.”

The remaining moments were a blur. I struggled against a man’s hold, my limbs heavy. A filthy, damp cloth was pressed over my face, and a choking smell sent me into unconsciousness.

When I woke up, my head felt like it was on fire. Cold seeped into my skin. My back ached from the metallic surface Amaya had chained me to.

I weakly struggled against the cords that bound me, but I was too weak to fight. The more I resisted, the more the cords burned into my wrists.

Amaya sat in the corner, scrolling through my phone.

My throat was parched. I coughed weakly. “Water.”

“Oh, you’re awake, b***h,” she sneered, standing and walking toward my prostrate form.

“Where am I, Amaya? Take me to the hospital,” I pleaded.

“Never. I’ll make sure to keep you here till you rot. They’ll look for you and assume you willingly went missing.”

“Amaya, please,” I cried. “I need a hospital. I can’t feel my legs.”

She laughed, tossing the phone onto a nearby table. “That’s the least of your problems right now, sweetheart.”

“Why are you doing this?” I croaked.

“You dare ask me why I’m doing this?” she flared, grabbing my chin and spitting on me. “My name is on the front page of every gossip blog, headlined as the pathetic, scorned bride. All because of you!”

“I didn’t steal him.” My voice shook; every word was an effort. "You were the one who took him from me. I just wanted him back.”

Her nails dug into my skin. “Shut up! You should have backed off when I told you to. And now you’re here, trying to play the victim?”

“I am the victim.” Tears poured anew from my eyes. “You ran me off the road.”

“I had to do what needed to be done.” She released my face with a sneer.

“I could have died,” I whimpered.

Amaya smirked. “That’s the point.” Then she pulled a knife from her pocket. Fear made my eyes widen as the edge of the serrated blade glinted under the overhead lights.

I started to kick around with the last bit of strength I had left.

“Amaya, please. Don’t do this.”

Then the nightmare I’d had earlier came flooding back. Panic surged through me.

The mysterious, ominous texts I had flippantly ignored.

I screamed as the knife sank through my clothes with a sickening smack.

“Amaya! What are you doing!” I wailed.

“Making sure you disappear.”

I screamed again as the cold steel tore into my skin, a jarring burn flooding my senses.

My body jerked in reflex, but the restraints only tightened around my wrists and ankles, digging deeper with every desperate movement.

“Stop moving. You’ll only bleed faster,” Amaya whispered, her evil smile widening, her eyes shining as if possessed. “But then again, maybe that’s the point.”

“Why?” I whimpered again, breathless. “We are sisters... think about Mom in the hospital.”

Amaya threw her head back and laughed—a cold, hollow sound. “Sisters? God, you’re delusional. You were always the center of their f*****g attention. Mom, Dad, Eduardo.” The knife sank deeper into my belly, and my vision blurred. “But he is mine. Do you hear me? All mine!”

A fit of coughing overtook me, blood trickling from the corner of my mouth.

“You don’t have to do this,” I gasped. “Please, Amaya. Please don’t walk away. We can fix this. Just... ju—”

But she was already walking away, a victorious sway in her hips.

My heart sank as the metallic door clanked shut.

I was trembling uncontrollably. Not just fro

m the pain, but from the terrifying realization that no one knew where I was.

No one was coming for me.