HER || 18+ (OLD VERSION)

S I X

TW - mention of self harm

"I'm going through a mid-life crisis."

"You are twenty-two," Ashton deadpanned.

"It came early!"

They just looked at me.

"We thought you were taking care of yourself," Xerxes said quietly, walking closer to me. Scratch that, stalking towards me. I felt as if he was going to pounce. "We thought you were happy."

He sat down on the bed beside me, I inched away from him a little. His eyes narrowed but he didn't come near. "What's wrong?"

I stayed quiet.

"What's wrong, Olivia?" Zavier repeated the question, sitting on my other side. Ashton climbed on the bed, sitting in front of me. They had caged me in.

I stayed quiet.

"What's wrong, little one?" Ashton asked me, coming closer.

"Red," I whispered. They froze.

This was it. If they pushed now they'd be breaking their word. What would win? Their care for me of their need of knowing everything about me?

"Kitten," Zavier said quietly and then paused, as if not sure what to say. "Your phone has been ringing." He kept my phone on my blanket-covered lap.

"This is not over," Ashton said as they got off the bed. "You can go if you want. We'll have lunch together."

"No."

A muscle worked in his jaw. "We will have lunch together. You will fucking eat. Don't touch the bandage."

They walked out.

"Come out when you want. Your stuff is in the closet," Zavier said as he closed the door.

I let out a breath.

Fuck.

I unlocked my phone. There were messages and missed calls from Kylie, Alisa, Rick, my mother, and some of my friends from Paris.

Jeez.

I texted Kylie that I was alive then I called Alisa.

"Zavier said you were hurt?"

I touched the back of my head. No stitches. That was a good sign.

"A little wound," I muttered, getting out of the bed. I looked at the large clock on the pale blue wall. The room was so beautiful, a combination of both, gold and white. "I'll live," I continued, opening a large white door that led to the washroom. "Are you okay?"

"Alexi is furious. He's coming back. He wants to hunt this whole thing down."

"Well, I approve," I said, putting the phone on speaker and keeping it on the counter. I looked at myself in the large mirror on the wall above the washbasin which was embedded into the white counter.

I looked like death. Pale and tired. A bandage was tied around my head. I lifted the left sleeve of my shirt. Scars. Many of them. Goddamnit. My thighs were worse.

"What happened with you and them?"

I sighed, washing my face. "Nothing," I said. "I passed out because of the wound and woke up like half an hour ago."

"Are you coming back?" She asked. "I was thinking of a spa day, you can even bring Kylie."

I raised my eyebrows. "I can bring Kylie, huh?" I dabbed a towel on my face. "Just because you try to look uninterested doesn't mean you succeed, Alisa. Do you like my blue-haired leech?"

"...no?"

I chuckled. "Alright."

"Where do you want to go for lunch? I'm thinking French?"

"Actually." I tapped my fingers on the counter, wincing at the state of my hair. "I'm having lunch with the Creeds."

"...like a date?"

"No," I said hurriedly. "Not a date."

"So it's a hang with three mafia bosses?"

"...you make is sound idiotic."

"You are fooling yourself by thinking that they don't want to be all over you."

"You are fooling yourself by taking that I want that."

"You are foo-"

"I'm not having their conversation," I interrupted. "I think we have established it, like a million times, that I am not going back to them. They helped us yesterday, as any decadent human would do."

"They are not decent men, Olivia. They don't help."

I bit the inside of my cheek. "I'm broken," I whispered. "They liked me because I was sunshine and rainbows, Alisa. Now I'm thunderstorm and freaking tsunami. They liked my innocence."

She was quiet for a moment. "How about stop presuming and, I don't know, ask them?"

"I'm hanging up, now."

"You are shutting me out, you mean."

I just hung up.

I walked to the closet and wore my coat. It was an empty closet with only my cost there. My heels were there, too. I stepped into them and tried to tame my hair a little without messing up my bandage. This bandage was clashing with my outfit.

I walked out of the room. We were on the ground floor.

They were sitting in a large living room.

"Drop me at Alisa's?"

. . .

Thoughts?

Gonna add something ✨ spicy ✨ to the next chapter. I mean, Olivia clearly needs it.