Page 17 of No Strings

“Why not get a nanny or something?” My eyes widen and I cover my mouth with my hand, “Shit I’m sorry, I wasn’t thinking, I.. I shouldn’t have said anything.” My hands raise by themselves as I back away.

“Hey, Morgan, no you’re ok. I’ve been thinking about it myself for a while now, I just can’t seem to pull that trigger.”

This is the time Rhys decides to enter the house. “Everything on this side of the freeway is ready for the thunderstorm.” The little hairs on the back of my neck rise as I feel him approach, he immediately reads the room, “What happened?”

“I said something I shouldn’t have. Again, I’m sorry Brent.”

And with that, I leave. I barely make it five steps out of the homestead before bumping into Beau.

“Seen bossman?”

“Inside.”

“Not going to ask which one?”

“They’re both in there.” I keep on walking but turn to ask, “Aren’t you and Davis normally joined at the hip?”

“For someone who came from a shit situation, you sure have some balls.”

He’s right, this is the second time in the space of no morethan five minutes I have overstepped. I stand there, my heart going into overdrive, and wait for the slap.

Beau seems to read the situation, and he takes a couple steps back. “Oh no, no, I just meant… I actually don’t know what I meant. I’ve heard stories about women who have been in that situation. And you’re not broken, you’re strong. And smart-mouthed. I like it. That’s what I’m trying to say.”

He smiles at me as though being called a smart-mouth is a compliment. “How did you know?”

Rhys, with his immaculate timing, comes out of the homestead. “You fucking asshole,” I march up to him, “You told them?! You had no right!” I shove at his chest. He lets me hit him until the tears spill.

Catching my hands he holds them to his chest. “I didn’t tell them anything. But it doesn’t take a genius to know someone hurt you. What were you going to say? You fell down some stairs?” He releases my hands and points to my neck, “You know the bruises around your neck have his fucking fingerprints embedded on your skin, right?”

I mindlessly move one of my hands to where the fading bruises taint my skin. “I tried not looking at them. I tried to cover them. I tried—” I don’t finish the sentence. I let out a gut-wrenching sob.

Rhys catches me around the waist. “I know you did, Morgan, I know.”

He walks us back to his house and into my room. Laying me down on the bed, he lets me cry. He exits, only to return with a glass of water. Sitting it on the bedside table he brushes a piece of my hair behind my ear before sitting on the edge of the bed.

“Morgan, I read what you wrote on that page. I want to apologise. Not for reading it, because it’s helped meunderstand more, but for saying you were predictable. I know you had to be. To survive him, you had to be predictable. But you don’t have to be anymore.”

I nod into my pillow as more tears fall. God, I’ve been here two and half days and I’ve just been having panic attacks; I hate to wonder what they think of me. Poor broken Morgan. Weak, pathetic Morgan.

I feel the bed shift as Rhys stands up, but as he gets to the door, I murmur his name.

Leaning on the door frame, tucking one foot behind the other, “Yeah?”

“Thank you. I’m sor?—“

“Don’t apologise, you have nothing to be sorry for. You have had to become a survivor, and that meant sacrificing who you were to do so.”

“I don’t like this version of myself.”

“You’re stronger than you think Morgan, you just can’t see that yet. Good news is I’m going to make you find that version of yourself.”

“Not sure if I like the sound of that.”

“You’ll be right,” He pauses before finishing his statement, “Morgana.”

I throw one of the pillows, “Fuck you.”

“There she is.” He yells out as he ducks behind the wall, leaving my room.