Read with BonusRead with Bonus

7: Elise

SHIELA attended the party with her grandmother, Doña Lucia, in a slinky black dress that left nothing to the imagination.

She also brought a date—handsome, tall, younger than Gian, and, most probably, a rich heir to one of the old money.

I pitied him. He almost got choked a few times by the way the woman would grab and cling to him whenever Gian was near. Technically, I was, too, since I was by his side since arrival.

But kudos to him, it did not take long for him to realize what was going on and he couldn’t get far away from Shiela fast enough. He flirted loudly with other women for good measure, too.

And me?

If the initial reason to stay near Gian was for guys presumably attracted to the sexy dress, that’s not it anymore.

Shiela’s poisonous looks thrown my way were efficient enough to glue me by Gian’s side.

If looks could kill, I would be over ten times murdered.

So, instead of focusing on the conversation about real estate properties worth investing on that the guys were talking about, it was on the crazy Ex’d that I found myself constantly on guard.

Booze was flowing and Shiela kept on gulping one glass after another. I couldn’t forget the scandal she had brazenly commandeered in the office. If she could do that sober, why not drunk?

“Gian…” I whispered near his ear. “She is getting drunk. What if she does here that stupid thing she did in the office?”

He glanced at me before leaning down to whisper back. “Don’t worry. They’re getting the driver ready. Her grandmother is preparing to bring her home as quietly and subtly as she can manage.”

The way he seemed to trip on the word ‘manage’ made me look up at him with doubt.

“She’s with mother on this,” he told me, as if mentioning his mother would allay my fears.

He knew me very well and I sighed in relief. “Thank god. Then can I go, please?”

“Where?” he asked, frowning.

I smiled at him sweetly. “I need to pee,” I told him succinctly. Quietly, too, of course. There was a time I questioned why I had to go through something like this when I didn’t even have a big brother. But try telling the prick that.

He looked down at the glass I was holding, and I saw he folded a smile. Fake alcohol. It was a fruit juice from the kitchen that would not get me drunk but would certainly cause peeing in anyone.

And I had three glasses in the past two hours.

“Can you hold it a bit more until she’s gone?” he asked in a low voice. “She’s still here, and I can’t follow you inside the lady’s restroom.”

I glared at him, and he grinned as he looked away. He did that deliberately.

“I’m sorry. I know it’s become boring for you.”

“Yes, it has,” I replied, though the conversation was really interesting. But a woman in a red dress without anyone to flirt with on a Valentine’s night had a right to sulk.

“She’ll be gone in a short moment, just hang in there a bit.”

I relented with a pout for show. I was actually thinking that he must be feeling more anxious than he showed about Shiela potentially causing a scene here.

And he was not the one who invited Shiela’s grandmother.

The conversation continued in the background with the group, but the moment I noticed Shiela wasn’t around anymore, I asked to go again.

He excused us from the others and, holding me by the elbow, we went towards the direction of the kitchen.

“Use the service stairs in the kitchen. Go up to my room and use my bath,” he instructed while we walked through guests who parted to give way. He gently pushed me when we reached the entry to the huge kitchen of the house. “Be quick.”

I sent him a scowl as I entered the very busy kitchen. He was still standing there when I looked back as I made my way towards the service staircase that staff used to reach other floors when something was going on in the living room and halls of the mansion.

I rolled my eyes at how strict he was as a guardian. Who would dare flirt with me here in the kitchen when all the guys were outside, waiting for him to get out of the way?

I waved a hand to Yaya Conching, the eldest house staff member of the Verrazzanos, before I took to the stairs.

“Oh my god, thank you, Lord!” I whispered when I reached the landing to a quiet second floor. There was no one in the hallway at all.

I went straight for Gian’s door and turned the door handle to get inside, then closed it again.

When I turned to face the room, I froze.

Shiela was there, also frozen in a sexy pose as she stood in the middle of the rug. She had ditched the slinky black silk dress.

And her panties.

She was left in her birthday suit.

Eeww.

I couldn’t help the contortion in my expression.

She was sexy and all but—gahhh—I was so not ready for this.

She recovered before me from the surprise and covered her D-cup-sized twinsies with one arm and her flower with the other hand in a knee-jerk reaction.

The banshee shriek was another knee-jerk reaction that I was more familiar with.

“Yoouuu! What the hell are you doing here?! This is Gian’s rooooom! Why the hell are you heeeeeere?!”

Goddammit, why can’t she ever speak without shrieking? The guests might hear downstairs. I couldn’t remember if Gian’s room was sound-proofed. I was more used to his pent suite in the tower he used as a home on work weeks.

How the hell did she get to sneak up here without the two matriarchs knowing?

I panicked at the possibility of another scandalous event here now.

“Shiela, shhh! Will you stop? Please don’t do this!” I said as I came near. “You’re going to ruin the party!”

But she got madder. “How dare you tell me what to do? You freakin’ bitch! You fuckin’ trash!”

I shouldn’t have taken another step further. Shiela was a walking timebomb and I should have known better.

But I did.

And as soon as that, everything just happened very fast.

There was a bottle of wine resting on the bureau with two wine glasses beside it. I only noticed them when Shiela reached for the bottle’s neck with her left hand.

I watched in shock as she swung the bottle like when someone swings a sword in a movie—I swear that’s what it looked like—towards me.

But she swayed a little by the end. That’s when I realized I wasn’t watching a movie, and that I should move.

And I would have made it.

But my right heel tripped on the edge of the damn rug and the fight to avoid the bottle became a fight not to fall down on my butt.

In hindsight, I should have chosen to fall.

The bottle hit me on the side of my head.

I heard the sickening sound when it connected before it slipped from her and hit the wall next to me, where it broke and splintered to pieces. The breaking of glass made a noise that was weirdly distorted to my ringing ears.

My knees trembled and I lost strength in them as noise rushed to my ears. I felt something warm flowing down the side of my face to my neck, and it was sticky when I reached up to touch it. Blood.

This all seemed to be happening simultaneously. I wasn’t sure, because I was almost not aware but for a thought running through my head…

I got hit by a bottle in the head, in Gian’s room, by a sex maniac…

Fuck…

But Shiela wasn’t done.

She was hitting me with her hands, clawing at me with her nails. She had turned into a monster.

I had my hands raised to block her as I try not to faint, because I was already helpless, and losing consciousness was the greatest insult.

She was pulling and pushing at me and something ripped.

I felt air on my exposed chest.

I stood there, while shock wouldn’t allow me to get mad, worrying that I hadn’t worn a bra under my dress because it had it sewed-in… and now my boobs were flaunted, too. Like hers.

A small part of my brain was thinking this, while the bigger part was waiting for this hell to be over.

But time stood still even as my brain sluggishly pushed for it to move. It felt like it was never going to be over…

My arms were still in the air when I realized that nothing was hitting me anymore.

My unbound hair was all over my face.

When I dared open my eyes, the face on the other side of my arms wasn’t that of the monster.

“G-Gian…?” Had I fainted? Was he real? He shouldn’t be here. My boobsies were exposed. No one should be here. I was naked.

I was fucking naked.

“Oh my God... Elise...” He carefully held my wrists with both hands and lowered them. I was surprised they moved, but time had started moving, too, as soon as I heard his voice.

And I felt relief.

And very weak, that I allowed myself to fall.

His arms were around me as soon as my knees gave up on me. I could hear Shiela’s hysterical sobbing, but it was going away, as if she was being dragged away.

“Gian! Please! Please! I can do better, I promise! I will do anything! I miss you so much, baby! Please…! Come back to me!”

She’s in real trouble this time, and she knew it, I thought belatedly. But she had beaten me up and it didn’t matter anymore.

“Close that damn door!” Gian snarled.

I heard the slamming of the door.

I remember the party. There’s a party going on downstairs.

They must have heard the commotion and Gian rushed upstairs.

I should have walked right back out and called people as soon as I saw what Shiela was up to. I wanted to tell Gian this. I made a miscalculation. He had already warned me that she was a mental case and I didn’t remember. Instead, I still tried to handle it on my own.

It was stupid.

I wanted to tell him.

I would have done that, too.

But the ink of blackness that was waiting to take me finally reached its tentacles for me.

And everything vanished when I closed my eyes, and I started swimming in those dark waters…

Previous Chapter
Next Chapter