Chapter 22: Chapter 22
Alexa was struck with a nightmare playing over in her head. One that kept playing over again and again. The hitting, the penetration, the threats and they all started with someone lying on her in between her thighs. Then kissing her neck while his hands rested on her mouth before the threats started. Those were the sequence of what happened every single time he came over. More than seven times.
But Jared was not like that, Jared was her husband and he was the one holding her. When that knowledge penetrated her head. She started to fight out of her nightmare, something which happened years ago and should hold no power over her again and when she finally came to herself, she felt her body being rocked in arms that were familiar as Jared voice kept on telling her that she was okay and she would be okay. For better or worse.
She lifted her hear to look at Jared who sighed with relief over that fact that she was looking at him and seeing him. "Alexa." Jared tone was coated with happiness and he held her to him as he hugged her. "What was that?"
Alexa opened her mouth to reply but no words could come out. What would she say... She knew that he was still expecting a virgin bride but sadly she was not one. How could she break that news to him now?
"Take your time." Jared responded as he lifted her up in his arms as he slowly stood, letting out a sigh of relief when she made no move to start another emotional fit again. And then he moved towards the princess room. They would need privacy for this conversation he was about to have with her.
Alexa rested her head on her husband chest as he carried her. She was not in the mood to let him nitpick at her thoughts but she did not have a choice, she might have have an outburst and she was not aware, he would want an explanation. An explanation that she was not certain of how to provide.
"Whatever you are thinking should not make you tense in my arms, Alexa. I am not a monster..." Jared tested and just as he suspected, Alexa started pushing away from him. Confirming that something indeed happened to her, something that can be done only by a monster.
"I can walk."
"Not a chance." Jared fired back. "Not after what I just witness. We will take you to your room and request for a physician and ensure everything is alright then we will discuss what happened." Jared answered as Alexa sighed.
"I will not let a physician examine me and I also do not want to talk about this." Alexa commanded.
Jared spoke after a while of silence in which Alexa was already berating herself for ordering Jared when Jared had made it clear that he hated when she did that to him. What surprised her was the tone which Jared used to reply her.
"Is it not funny that you actually believe that what you said will really happen when the person involved is me?"
"It does not change the fact that you have no right to want to force me to say anything." Alexa mumbled but Jared kissed her hair.
"Let us come to a compromise. No physician because I believe you hate people under that profession and technically, you are already back to your annoying self so I can be rest assured that you are well but the reason why you went all wildcat on me, you are telling me and no negotiation about that." Jared informed Alexa who kept him quiet.
"Is it not funny that you actually believe that those words of yours will have any effect on me."
Jared just smiled at Alexa without saying anything.
When he got to her room, he laid her on the bed and sent a maid to fetch something for her to warm they waited in silence before he maid came back and when the maid returned with snacks and left them alone. Jared offered Alexa some who refused.
"You know that you refusing to eat is not going to prevent me from asking you the questions I want to ask right?"
Alexa glared at her husband and his damned tenacity, he was like a wolf hound with a scent that he refused to let go of. "You are so annoying."
"You love me like that." Jared quipped and tried his best to keep his laughter in when Alexa face went red.
"I really want to hurt you right now." Alexa replied as Jared smiled.
"What happened to you?"
Alexa froze. Her mind replaying the scene she desperately want to escape.
***
The person was back. She did not know who but she knew he was back. The heavy breathing was back and although this time she changed position, making her back to be above instead of her front, the person still climbed into the bed with her and turned her.
"Why do you do this? Leave me alone please..." Alexa sobbed then.
"Shhh... You have been a good girl, remain one. Remember that it is only good girls that keep their heads on. It would be a shame if something happened to your pretty little neck."
Alexa sobbed even as her legs were pried open and her clothes torn from her body and he fell on her and pierced her again just like before and used his hand to cover her mouth to drown the scream that bubbled at that moment. And she fought to remain conscious. When she was conscious the beating was reduced because there was the chance that sh could cry at the pain and the person did not want to get caught. If she fainted, she woke up to too much pain in her body.
When the beating started, she also felt someone shaking her.
****
It took a while before Alexa came back and this time, Jared was on the bed with her, rocking her worried out of his mind, wondering what the hell must have happened to her for her to still have this intense reaction to something of the past.
"What happened?" Alexa asked in a voice that was cracked like she had been screaming but no sound was heard.
"You went stuff and unresponsive after I asked you a question. It felt like you must have been playing it in your head and so you scared me so much..." Jared explained.
"I am sorry." Alexa muttered.
"You are not aware of things you do when you feel that way do you?" Jared observed and when Alexa bit her lips and made no effort to provide an answer, he nodded at her. "I understand your feeling right now but you need to know that you can trust me. I would never do anything to hurt you and I will always fight for you. Share what happened to you with me and I promise that I would try and find the culprit."
"What ensures me that even when I do tell you what happen that you will believe me or forgive me." Alexa asked.
"Let me worry about that." Jared stated but when Alexa started shaking her head, Jared sighed. "I give you my promise that I will not be angry with you or think you are being a lunatic on purpose because of this incident because I have already concluded a few while ago that you are that you know." Jared joked and winced when Alexa dug her elbow into his ribs.
"I am being serious you know." Jared wheezed. "You do not believe but since you said I do, I am obligated to believe your words and give you a fair chance."
Alexa sighed. Should she trust him. In as much as she wanted to hold Arianna actions over him, she no longer could and ever actions or words of his, right from when he agreed to be her husband as been trustworthy. He never harmed her on purpose, could she believe that he would not harm her on purpose this time?
Jared waited in silence as Alexa made up her mind. He was thinking she would change the topic when she started with her story. Of the time when she was thirteen and was defiled for thirteen times after her birthday, one each night by a face she never saw. A monster that someone let into the kingdom. Jared was told of Alexa hatred for physicians because when she was sick and her parents requested to know what happened to her. Instead of the physicians to help her. They told her parents something else, nothing was done and she remained in the same room she was then even when the physicians had the physical evidence of the bruises that she obtained from the attack of her.
They placed her on bed rest and isolated her from other who she could have told the incident to.
Jared was boiling at the end of the story. Wondering how many physicians he could kill before he was called to explain himself.
"And that is why I never wanted to be defenseless and why I hate physicians." Alexa sighed as Jared turned her front to his and rested fully on her bed with her. Cuddling her as her tears wetted the beddings.
"I am so sorry that you are not getting what was promised to you." Alexa blubbered as Jared jaw clenched.
She was not referring to what he thought she was right? "I do not understand you Alexa, what do you mean? Are you referring to the fact that you were raped and it was not your choice to be a virgin or you mistook what was promised to me and what was promised to me was a person who would never make life boring for me and someone to keep my happy and last I checked, you fulfilled both of those creteria."
Alexa smiled through her tears, she placed her head on Jared chest even as she tried to find a comfortable position to stay in. "Thank you for coming into my life Jared."
"Anything for you princess. You are strong, do not let anybody tell you something else. I will find the person who did this to you and I will paint the ground with the person blood the last word he would ever speak will be an apology to you.
Alexa believed him completely in that moment. To the extent she almost blurt out the words she was holding back about love but she succeeded.
Jared did not say anything to Alexa as he let her get lost in her thoughts while he stroke his hand on her hair and occasionally placed a kiss on the nearest part of her, he could reach.
He did suspect someone for the actions but he also could not outrightly accuse the person. He was going to find someone who was going to watch the person and report back to him.
He had so much conviction that it was he person that it was frightening but this was the same person who kidnapped a lady and had her raped, created the perfect rape scene for his sister and then got away with it. The devil was someone whom they all knew but he could not go out and accuse him.
Not when Asteria was indebted to the kingdom and certainly not when he offered for Alexa hand in marriage, probably to complete what he had started. He needed to be careful around Flynn from now on.
This war was personal before but it just entered a whole new level of personal and although he vowed to punish the person involved, he knew who the person was and sadly he cannot touch the person just yet until he had evidence.
The good thing was that he knew Flynn enough to know that Flynn was not going to wait forever, sooner or later. He was going to do something that would be enough to end his life. That he could count on.