Physis (Phoebe Reede: The Untold Story #4) Read online

  I screamed and threw myself across the room, curling into a ball against the wall. With my head tucked between my knees, and my hair falling in a curtain around me, the sobbing started.

  “’S okay, Pheebs.” My youngest brother, Parker, tried to reassure me. It was obviously his arms that had surrounded me—something I would’ve done to him before my nightmare started. He patted my head; each new touch sent another shudder down my spine, but thankfully the flashbacks stayed away. For now.

  “Parker!” Mum was at my side in an instant. “You know you shouldn’t touch Phoebe.”

  She dragged him away. Her voice was quiet as she explained to him again that I was changed when I was taken away from them, and that hugs and kisses hurt me now. Listening to her hushed explanation made me wonder—not for the first time—whether it would have been better if I’d just let Xavier kill me when he’d intended to. Mum and Dad would hate the thought, but I was certain my siblings would have eventually learned to cope with a dead sister. No one knew how to deal with one who was only dead on the inside.

  So many secrets and lies filled the house now, and they were all because of me.

  It was my own fault though. I should’ve known better than to try to spend time with my family. Once, the morning routine had been just that—routine. I hadn’t needed to worry about what happened, or what was said. It used to be easy. Effortless.

  Without another word, I pushed up from the ground and made my way back to my bedroom. Mum didn’t come to check on me. I hadn’t expected her to. Our dance was way too familiar now. We’d been doing it for too long and the steps only grew harder each day. The truth grew more difficult to ignore.

  It wasn’t that Mum didn’t want to soothe me. I was certain if I asked her to, she’d sit on my bed or even lie down beside me, and offer me every ounce of comfort she had to give. But my psychiatrist, Dr Bradshaw, had made it very clear to Mum and Dad that my room was to be my safe place. Short of helping with nightmares, no one was allowed past the threshold without my explicit consent. Mum knew by now that I wouldn’t give it. I couldn’t be near her. Plus, it hurt her to comfort me, and that just hurt me more. We were locked in the endless cycle with no sign of a breakthrough, regardless of what Dr Bradshaw promised each week as I sat in her office learning new techniques to cope.

  More than anything, I wanted someone to reach through the barriers that surrounded my heart and find a way to destroy them—I was certain everyone wanted the same thing—but I didn’t know how to let anyone in. It left me unable to connect with people on even the most basic levels. And that knowledge only hurt me more.

  My days were nightmares filled with ghosts who haunted my every thought, and at night it got much worse. I’d gone to America broken-hearted and had come home broken everywhere.

  IT WAS almost two hours later when Mum knocked on my door. Obviously, the school run was finished. “Phoebe, can I come in?”

  I grunted to let her know she could.

  The door cracked open and she leant against the frame. I was certain there were questions and words she wanted to say burning her tongue. She wouldn’t utter them though.

  We’d already spent all the words either of us had. We’d done that within the first two weeks that I was home. She wanted to push—to force her way through the mess in my mind and fix it all for me. I’d resisted. Not because I didn’t want to be the way I was before, but because I didn’t know how to be that way anymore. Every request for things to go back to how they used to be was another slice through my already tattered heart. The life I’d come home to was filled with little more than reminders of the things I’d lost.

  “We’ve got to head off soon if we’re going to get to Dr Bradshaw’s in time.” Straight to the point. No emotion. That was the way it was with us now. Never acknowledging the elephants trampling the room around us. “Did you want to go have a shower?”

  I nodded. The weekly visits to the psychiatrist were my only trips outside of the house, and more often than not, I would’ve skipped them too if Mum didn’t push.

  When I didn’t move from the bed, Mum spoke again. “Did you give any more thought to Dad’s request?”

  For weeks Dad had been begging me to reconnect with someone—anyone—from my old life. He hated that it had been seven weeks since I’d seen or spoken to Angel. I hated it too, especially when our last meeting had ended with me curled under the bed and her across the room nursing an eye that almost certainly would’ve blackened in the days that followed.

  I didn’t want a repeat of that fight, and there was no doubt we’d fight again. Nothing had changed between us; she still wanted me to see things that were beyond me to accept. I couldn’t bear the thought of hurting her though. Touching was second nature to her and a nightmare to me. She was never one to hide from the truth—even the ones that hurt too much to acknowledge.

  She was also so enamoured by Beau that she couldn’t understand why I’d pushed him away. I couldn’t tell her all the reasons—couldn’t face the disappointment she’d have for me if I told her about what I’d cost him with my sharp tongue. Everything Angel and I had meant to each other was tied up in my old life, and I’d lost that months earlier. In the end, I’d pushed her away, and despite everything she’d known about the old me, she hadn’t known how to push back. She didn’t know the new me enough.

  The other person Dad had suggested I talk to was even more impossible. Beau.

  A little over eleven months earlier, I’d gone into a bar to see my favourite band and walked out with the man I would end up falling in love with. It was just a shame that we’d only had one blissful weekend together before months of separation and Skype dates. And that was before we fell apart completely.

  A shudder raced down my spine as the past crashed over me. With everything that had happened with Xavier, with Bee, I’d let Beau down. On multiple counts. How could I ever look him in the eye again knowing how badly I had failed him?

  I pushed myself out of bed and my eyes cut to meet Mum’s. “I’m still thinking about it.”

  After a beat of eye contact, I dropped my gaze away. Even something as simple as eye contact was enough to paralyse me and make it harder still to leave the house.

  “Maybe we can hit the shops after we’re finished?” Mum suggested in a questioning tone—leaving the decision in my hands.

  “Maybe.” I was certain we both understood it was an empty promise. It would have been hard enough for Mum to force me to the shops before the appointment, but after being torn open by Dr Bradshaw, it would be impossible.

  “Did you want to do anything for your birthday?”

  I shook my head. My birthday would just be a reminder of the time before. When I was her, the confident me who could ride solo across the USA without glancing at every person and wondering what dark secrets they harboured. The one who could take a compliment without breaking down. Who had the courage to tell unwanted suitors to fuck off.

  In the weeks after I’d arrived home, every major news agency in Australia, and even some internationally, wanted my story. They wanted to know how I had survived being trapped in a storm cellar—dungeon—for three months. Mum hadn’t even asked if I’d wanted to be involved, summarily dismissing every offer. If she had checked with me, I would’ve told her I couldn’t do it. Not only because it was too hard, but because any answer I gave would be a lie. I didn’t survive three months imprisonment. My body might have, but the girl I’d been was dead.

  Once again, I wondered whether it would have been better if I’d just given up and let Xavier’s knife do its job.

  Mum lingered for a moment, worrying her lip between her teeth. As always, I could almost see the questions and concerns burning in her gaze. My gaze slid down her frame before returning to her eyes. There was a silent plea hidden there for today to be the day. For today to change everything between us.

  When I turned away from her without another word, she sighed. “Okay, I’ll see you in the living room when you’re ready
to go.”

  Grabbing a change of clothes, I headed into the bathroom. While I stripped out of my pyjamas, I squeezed my eyes closed and worked the buttons blindly. I’d made the mistake of catching sight of myself—of the scar on my chest—in the mirror one too many times.

  I threw my pyjamas into the hamper and turned on the water until it was scorching. Keeping my chin lifted as high as I could, I climbed under the stream. One day, I might be able to look down at my body and not feel contempt. I didn’t know when that day might be though.

  Soaping up a loofah, I scrubbed at myself. Nothing could wash away the invisible brand of what had been done to me though. Some days it felt as though Bee had climbed under my skin and wrapped himself around every nerve ending. Each beating he’d given me was permanently etched into my mind. It twisted through me and formed a new entity that resided inside my skin with me. Anytime he’d tried a new implement of punishment, he’d delighted in the different cries he’d pulled from between my clenched teeth. Those screams now lived in my head, eternally shrieking songs of suffering.

  Still, for all of Bee’s blind hatred and pain, in some ways the memory of Xavier was that much worse. From the very beginning, I’d been uncertain whether I could trust Bee. There had been something about him that had put me on edge.

  Not so with Xavier.

  Him, I’d given my trust and my friendship. I’d even tried to give him my heart. His actions had been a bitter betrayal and left me utterly unable to trust. Every motive was turned over and examined at length. When the male cabin crew member on the flight home from LA had offered me a drink and a friendly smile, I’d had a meltdown so severe it took some major sweet-talking from Dad for the airline to allow me to stay in my seat.

  While I was conditioning my hair, my gaze followed the strands that fell over my shoulder and caught the smallest glimpse of the lingering scar Xavier had left. The sight of the crude lettering spelling out XAV was too much. It was what I’d tried to avoid. My hands shook as I clenched my hand around the imaginary knife in my hand.

  The shower, the whole bathroom, slipped away until it wasn’t water falling on me any longer. It was blood. An endless river of blood pouring from the wound in Xavier’s throat and washing over me.

  It was everywhere. In my eyes. In my hair. On my hands.

  I scrubbed at it, but it wouldn’t shift.

  I backed away to get free from the crimson shower. My back hit a wall and I screamed as I slid down it and the red deluge drowned me.

  Mum practically took the hinges off the door as she broke into the bathroom. The door crashed open and a second later, the flow of liquid had stopped. Everything stopped. She climbed onto the shower floor with me while we both sobbed together.

  BECAUSE MUM HAD ended up soaking wet from rescuing me in the shower, we’d been late to my appointment. Mum ushered me straight into the building and to Dr Bradshaw’s office. She left me on the doctor’s couch with Nikki while she had a quiet word with the doctor. It was their routine, to find out my progress from the outside, and something I’d given permission for when I’d started counselling. I had no doubt my shower-time breakdown was the one and only topic of conversation this time, despite other topics that would soon need to be broached.

  My suspicions were confirmed after Mum left the office and Dr Bradshaw asked if I wanted to talk about what had happened and what it had reminded me of.

  “It was the day Dad found me,” I said, trying to block out the memory of Beau’s amber and chocolate irises staring at me with such pity and disgust that it twisted my stomach and made it impossible to even look at him. And he didn’t even know the worst of it. It might have been cruel to freeze him out the way I did, but it would’ve been crueller still to admit the truth of what I’d done. What I’d lost.

  I started the story for the doctor, and even as I did, it played in my mind like a movie. Images that would haunt me until the day I died.

  His eyes held more of an evil glint than the one on the knife.

  “He’s sending the police for you, but it’s okay, they won't find you,” Xavier said. His stare pinned me in place. “No matter what, I won't let anyone take you away from me. You're mine, Phoebe. Married or not, I'll have you by my side forever. Even if it's only in the next life. Mom’s waiting there for us.”

  He yanked on the chain that secured me to the room, tugging so hard my ankle snapped out from underneath me and I fell to the floor. The crunch that echoed around the room, combined with the shooting pain that raced up my leg, told me all I needed to know. My ankle was injured.

  Broken.

  Like me.

  With the blade glinting in the overhead lighting, I was struck by the idea of letting Xavier follow through on his threat. At least then, I'd be at peace. Nightmares wouldn't rock me both while I was awake and while I slept.

  I'd been so calm, waiting for the end, that I hadn't realised Xavier was closing the distance between us until he grabbed my collared wrists and drew them between his thighs, pinning me to the ground beneath him.

  He twisted the knife from side to side, as though trying to work out where to strike. How.

  Just do it already! The thought flooded through me. I didn't want to die, but I didn't want to be under his control anymore either. I didn’t want to endure another second alone with Bee.

  “I should carve my name into your heart so everyone will know who it belongs to.” He leant forward, putting his weight on one hand and pressing the tip of the knife against my breast.

  “No!”

  He leant even closer. The tip of the blade pricked through my dress as his mouth came to rest beside my ear. “I saw what you did with Bee.”

  I closed my eyes as I was struck by the memory of Bee using a Polaroid camera to capture some of the worst things I’d done.

  “You’re a bad girl, but I still believe you can be redeemed.”

  He sat back and used the blade to slice through the front of the dress Cora had forced on me. The vile pink was too cheery for the surroundings, and yet it somehow fit and made the situation that much more fucked up.

  “You didn’t want to do those disgusting things to him, did you?” He paused to meet my eye. One thing was clear in his crazed stare. I was going to die either way. My answer would only change how gentle he’d be.

  I squeezed my eyes closed and shook my head as I whispered, “No,” over and over.

  “He can’t hurt you anymore. He’s dead. May he rot in hell.”

  “Please, just let me go.” It almost hurt to say the words because I knew they were useless. I’d been pleading the same thing every day. I’d lost track of how many times I’d said them, but the words were a soundtrack to my life.

  “I will. You’ll be free soon, sweetheart. First, I need the world to know you’re mine. Okay?” He shifted the knife again, back over my heart. I bucked against him and cried out as the blade slipped through my skin.

  His hand clamped over my mouth.

  A soft hushing sound left him as he worked the blade through my skin with his other hand.

  “Please! Please stop!” I begged against his palm, but the words were lost.

  “It’ll be over soon,” he murmured again as he lifted the knife and repeated the process for the next letter.

  When his concentration was focused entirely on the task of slicing me into pieces, his body relaxed and my hands were a little freer. Enough that I could move them at least.

  Barely thinking through the consequences—nothing beyond the fact that Bee was apparently dead so he couldn’t hurt me for my choice—I used all the strength I could muster to form fists with my fingers and slam my hands against Xavier’s groin. I feared I wouldn’t have the strength to do anything but piss him off, but I couldn’t lie still while he mutilated me or wait until he decided to sink the knife in further.

  Despite my weakened state and the lack of room, my hands connected with a satisfying thud. I’d scored a lucky hit with the metal around my wrists.

&n
bsp; He cried out and dropped the knife as he clutched at his groin.

  When he was off-balance, I bucked my hips, trying to tilt him off to the side. He fought back, but I had just enough space to use my good foot to shove my body along the cement so I could reach the abandoned knife. I grabbed it between my cuffed hands just as he lunged for me. The blade sank into the skin on one side of his throat. A rivulet of blood bubbled up through the wound.

  I clenched my eyes and held on tighter, shifting my arms to the side as I went. It was kill or be killed. That didn’t make it any easier to deal with the metallic scent that filled the air, or the copper taste that burned the back of my tongue as the unwanted fluid slipped into my mouth and filled my nose.

  Still, I clutched the knife and tried to kick Xavier off me. Grabbing at the wound in his throat with one hand, he pushed himself to his feet and backed away from me.

  “No! It wasn’t meant to be like this.”

  I dragged myself closer to the bed. With Xavier injured, and Bee and Cora apparently dead, I had no idea if anyone would find me.

  Or whether it would be too late if they did.

  “Phoebe. Can you tell me the name of your parents’ racing team?” It was Dr Bradshaw’s voice, calling me back to the present.

  I blinked through the tears and saw I was holding my hands out as though I still held the knife between them. As though I was still trying to fight Xavier off. “E-Emmanuel.”

  Tremors ran through me as the realisation that I had taken a life assaulted my mind once more. I’d never considered myself to be particularly violent, but I’d never allowed myself to be the victim before either. Not like I had been in that space.

  My breathing was harsh as I recalled the police officers’ questions about what had happened. Had I shot Cora? Did I know who did? How did Xavier die? Over and over, I’d had to relive it.

  Hours after finding my freedom, I was faced with the prospect of losing it again over a potential murder charge. I’d cried with relief when they’d told me they weren’t pressing charges in light of the circumstances. They promised to do what they could to bring Hunter to justice. I hadn’t known of his death until I arrived home.