Treat You Better

Chapter Twenty-three: Sweet Talker.

"It was Hale." She said, and took a shuddering breath. "The nightmare was about him."

Bloody freaking hell, the asshole wasn't even in the same country as I was yet he was causing me problems!

My subconscious exploded into rage.

"Hale." I stated, blinking to clear my mind. She needed me right now, not my anger. I took a deep breath and lifted her off my chest so I could see her face.

"You had a nightmare about Hale." I stated. "What did he do?"

Violet's hazel eyes brimmed over with more tears and I quickly wiped them away with the back of my fingers.

"He hit me." She said, her eyes traveling like she was staring beyond me. "A lot. I've been having the same dream on repeat for nights now but he never touched me till now..."

"Violet..."

"Everything is his fault, it's all his fault!" Her head fell against my chest again and my eyes went down to her cast.

Hale's fault.
My heart thumped harder against my chest as my vision clouded over.

"You didn't fall down the stairs." I said quietly, "he pushed you. What else did he do? Did he ever really hit you?"

"Yes," she sniffed, "a lot of times. I couldn't tell anyone, not even my dad, Franca said she'll ruin my life if I did. Just like she killed that guy who owned the farm she wanted..."

"Franca killed..." I paused and shook my head. There was too much information coming in all at once and fast. "Violet, you're going to have to tell me all this later but right now, drink this."

I handed her the water and she downed half of it before returning the bottle.

"Feel better?" I asked, receiving a nod as a response.

"Thank you," she whispered, her sad golden eyes staring up at me. "You promised you won't do anything if I didn't want you to, remember?"

What did she just say? My subconscious paused his angry storming and listened in.

"Well I don't want you to do anything about it." She said and to my surprise, reached up to touch my face. Her hands were cold, I was determined to warm them. "Franca's going to hurt you. She's insane, Hale's out of my life now so I'll be fine and... and I can act like nothing happened..."

"Sweetheart," I said, taking her hand from my face and holding it in both of mine. "I had my fingers crossed when I made that promise."

Her lips parted in surprise and a little bit of fear and betrayal. "Angelo..."

I brushed her hair out of her face and tucked it behind her ear. She was so beautiful and perfect, the thought of Hale doing anything to her at all messed with my brain.
"I'm going to ruin him."

(╭☞•́⍛•̀)╭☞

Violet's POV

Several hours of sleep and a good breakfast-in-bed service later, I'd told Angelo literally everything about Hale, including his mother, the actual murder that happened in their house and my accident.

I could have died too even, if I'd landed the wrong way when I fell. The thought made me shudder.

"What?" Angelo murmured.
My face heated up as realized he'd felt my shudder because we were sitting so close together in a sort of tangled mess.

I couldn't possibly say how we ended up like this but my legs were entwined with his and the sheets, and we were slouching on the pillows, his arm around me.