Petal [h.s.]

Chapter 78 (*)

"Different?" Harry asked with a small frown, clearly confused, "Different how?"

"He... um, he called everyone down, I think as much as twenty people. They all stood in front of me while I was against that pole, and they all just stared and laughed and... each took turns in picking me apart. My appearance, my personality, everything." My voice started shaking a little bit as I swallowed, "Every inch of my skin got criticized in the worst way. They were vicious, and mean. Chase told me about the camera's. They were everywhere in your apartment and everywhere at the mansion. In every room. And they had audio tapes."

Harry knew this already too, but I wasn't sure if the extent of that had really hit him yet.

"Do you realize that... Only the first two times of us having sex were actually private? Only the conversations we had at my apartment were private? They heard everything, Harry..." I sighed, "Everything about the hysterectomy, about James, about your mother, about Gabriel. They saw... everything."

Harry tensed his jaw as he let out a shaky breath and I continued, "They picked apart everything. It was so degrading, I didn't even feel like a person anymore. They went on about our... bedroom activities, especially some of the more risqué things we did." I could tell Harry knew what I was talking about immediately.

Me tying him up, him tying me up, the anal stuff, the squirting, the oral sex, everything. All things that I did in the confines of a private space with my boyfriend who I loved and trusted. Not things that I had done for as many as thirty strangers to see.

"Did you fight it?" Harry asked.

I slowly nodded, "I tried. At first. But my hands were tied and I couldn't cover my ears, and I couldn't block them out for that long. I tried not to let it get to me, after all these were people that I didn't know. They didn't know me, they didn't know you, they didn't know us."

"But eventually, if it got repeated enough, it kind of started staying with me. They pointed out certain things that I already didn't like about myself, they pointed out things about you. Little details in your behaviour around me that I had never noticed before or never thought anything of, but they made such a big deal out of it to the point where I started overthinking every little detail about our interactions."

Harry frowned, "Like what?"

"Stupid things," I shook my head, "Like how you never wanted to see my face during sex, how you sometimes left my shirt on so you wouldn't have to see my scar, how you were cooped up in your office at the bar all the time so you could see other girls behind my back." I sighed.

"And Chase just kept saying that if you cared, you would've been there already. If you cared, you'd be searching for me, you'd have found me. He said maybe you were happy to be rid of me, you were happy that I was gone, you were enjoying your life again with me out of the way."

"Petal," Harry reached for my hand, "I was looking for you. I... I hardly slept those six days, I have never felt worse."

I quickly nodded, "I know. And I knew that, part of me knew that. I was so hopeful, and I knew you loved me and wanted to find me, you had told me enough how important I was to you. But Chase was playing a game, and I grew weaker by the hour. He screamed the insults at me, he had them all scream the insults at me. How fat I was, how ugly, how unlike the girls you usually go for, how repulsive my scars were. How little you cared, how little you loved me."

Harry squeezed my hand and I sniffled once as I felt the tears in my eyes, "And just... It was six days. I was so broken by that point, so insecure, so hurt. It's like he had just... crawled into my brain and nestled himself there, continuously saying those harsh things and making me feel like... Like nothing. I was nothing, I was nobody. Worthless, ugly, annoying. He – um, he touched me sometimes."