FOUR

KAREN'S POV

After I was sure Devon had gone, I buried my face in the all black pillow and wept. This was what my life was to become. Devon hated me, and yet he had asked me to marry him.

    The smart thing for me to do would be to call off our engagement – the smart thing, not the wise thing. Everyone knew that no woman ever broke up with the Grey’s and lived to tell the story. You didn’t walk away from a Grey, you waited until they got tired of you and chose to discard you.

    The twisted thing about it all was that I was not sure Devon would ever get tired of me. He did not love me of course, and would never love me again, but he still enjoyed keeping me around only so that he could torment me.

   My life was doomed. The only thing I could do now to be free was to get broken faster, to allow him break my heart to a million pieces, till he get bored with me and chose to let me go. I wondered if he might ever really chose to let me go, he might just decide to keep me there as a poster wife, while he went about with whatever woman he fancied. He Had called me a pretender, but what exactly did I do to make him feel this way about me. I needed to find out! Getting to my feet, I rubbed my hands against my sore eyes, trying to clean off the tear makes, then I picked up my torn dress.

    I needed to find a way to prove my innocence if I was going to make Devon love me again.

    Discarding my torn gown, after I saw it was now beyond wearing, I went over to the wardrobe. Again, my heart thudded violently against my breast as I saw the rest of the bondage gear that was in the wardrobe,

    I could not help but wonder if Devon intended to torture me while he made love to me.

    I pushed these thoughts from my mind and searched till I saw a large T shirt. Sighing in relief, I put it on. It was so large, it came down below my knees. I was not a very tall woman to start with, so the shirt fitted perfectly like a gown.

    Stepping out into the hall, I started looking for Devon, or even if I did not see him, at least I might find a clue – anything that would help me understand his anger towards me, and what I can do to make him forgive me.

    Without thinking, I turned the handle to the first door I saw, not knowing where it led, but I had a feeling nothing I did could make life worse than it already was.

    “I think the shirt looks better on you – perfect actually, so I’d let you keep it.”

     I whirled around at the sound of the masculine voice I heard behind me, and I found myself staring at a tall blond man with wavy hair, and a genuine smile. I hadn’t seen him among the guests at the engagement.

    “Hi,” I said, slightly embarrassed. I must look a sight with the tear marks on my face, lips swollen from kissing, barefoot, and wearing just a shirt – his shirt, judging from his words.

    He stepped forward and offered a hand. “I’m Stephan, Devon’s weird cousin, “ He added with a laugh. “If you are just coming from that room –“ He inclined his head in the direction of the room I was just coming from, “that means you’re into the dark art of love-making.” His eyes raked me up and down, lingering on certain parts of my body and making me blush. I suddenly wished Devon was close by, something about his cousin scared me.

     He extended a hand, and when I placed mine in it, expecting a mere handshake, he drew me into his arms, and before I could protest, hid lips crashed against mine, forcefully, making me feel violated, and slightly close to gaging. Even when Devon had been rough with me and forceful, I had still felt drawn to him, it was as if my body knew him, recognized him as the rightful owner of my body, and no matter how badly he treated me, I was still going to yearn for him. It was different with this cousin of his. With this Stephan, I only felt violated.

   I raised both hands and angrily beat against his chest, but he only laughed. “It’s okay love. Devon always allows me share his women – I’m the poor cousin after all.”

    I opened my mouth to argue, to shout, to tell him to get off me, but he only laughed and drew me closet to him, overpowering me, and then he drew me back into the same room I was just fleeing from.

    “I’m sorry love, “ He murmured against my ear, “but you’re just so lovely, so sweet, especially in this red shirt of mine. I just can’t let Devon keep you all to himself.

     Tears did not even come out of my eyes as I felt myself sink against the black sheets once more. This time around, my tears did not save me. This was not Devon, even as wicked as Devon was, perhaps Devon still had a heart. This was some weird cousin of his who believed that stop meant continue. This time, the man on top of me did not stop until he went through with the very act of love making I had thought to offer for the first time to Devon on our marriage bed.

    My eyes were still dry as I watched the door open, and Devon step in. There was hate in his eyes, a cold kind of hate, but he did not look surprised, it was like he already expected that of me all along.

     “So you decided to help yourself to my fiancé ehn?” He said, addressing Stephan. He didn’t even bother to look at me.

    Stephan shrugged as he rolled off me and got to his feet. “I didn’t know she was your fiancé. She seemed as eager as I was.”

     Devon laughed, a cold hard laughter. “One can never really trust these hoes…”

      His words stung me, but again, I found it did not bring fresh tears to my eyes. I had probably finished all my tears, and my journey had only just started. With a calm face that hid the pain that ripped against my heart – and my body, I watched as Stephan buckled his pants, and walked off, so carefree without a single thought of what he had done to me. My first time had been forced, a gift I had wanted to give Devon in perfect surrender had been forcefully taken from me by a man I did not even know, and Devon, the love of my life stood there, watching me in cold anger, as though any of these were my fault, as though I had asked to get forced.

    I wanted to run to him, wanted to bury my face in his broad chest and cry, while he stroked my back and murmured words of comfort. I wanted to watch his anger directed against his weird cousin, instead of against me. I wanted him to promise he would make Stephan pay. But instead, I could only keep lying in bed, with my second clothing for that day, once again torn, and lying discarded around me, so that I was completely nude to Devon’s gaze, a gaze that touched on me with scorn and cold bitterness, seeing nothing of how I had been violated, but only seeing me for the whore or the betrayer, he already believed me to be.

    I sat up, and my fingers curled around my dress, and then, Stephan’s shirt. I was looking for something, anything to cover my nakedness from his mocking gaze.

    “Why bother with clothes?” Devon mocked with a shrug. “You can as well walk naked down the halls, let the world know what kind of a whore you are. So tell me, have you been sleeping with Stephan all the while, or did you just decide the night of your engagement was the perfect time to find a new lover.”

  Stephangot up and walked out casually, laughing at my pain. I turned to face Devon again.

   “Devon, believe me, this – I –” tears filled my eyes, and my body shook violently as I tried to explain the horrible thing that had just happened, but my tears only annoyed him further.

   In a swift movement, he discarded his clothes, and joined me on the bed. When I cried even more, he slapped me, then quickly parted my legs and claimed me.

   I was already sore from the abuse I suffered at Stephen’s hands, but my fiancé did not seem to care.

   His love making was rough, and painful, and yet, my tears only seemed to bring him pleasure. The man who once loved me had turned into a monster.

   I buried my face into the bed and cried as his hands and body subdued mine, making me his, his to torment, his to hurt.

  “I love how you my Sweet,” he murmured cruelly in my ears as he pounded into me. “You were just telling me it was your first time a while back, while you were busy fucking my cousin behind my back.”

   I kept quiet and tried not to cry even more. I knew now my tears irritated him. I didn’t tell him that I didn’t choose to sleep with Stephen, that I was raped, he wouldn’t believe me anyway.

  I could see now that my marriage to Devon Grey would bring me nothing but pain, and yet, I could not reject his marriage offer. That would only annoy him. I was his now, I belonged to him.