CHAPTER536
She deserves worse.
“I think we are pretty fucking even! That’s for trying to drug me and leaving me to be raped by some power mad fuckwit. You’re lucky I don’t stomp on your head.” I snap at her and shove her with my foot, in a bid to goad her to get up and face me. Arrick always told me I should fight fair, and if this bitch wants to get up and go, I am so in the mood to have a girly punch up. I’ve enough anger to expel and she has earned my wrath.
“You’re fucking crazy… What the hell is wrong with you?“ Camilla scrambles to her knees and starts crawling away from me like a coward, unable to face me, and I roll my eyes. She’s using her sleeve to rub the mess from her face and smearing blood across her cheek.
“Get up! I’m not going to touch you if you’re going to act like a fucking girl and be this pathetic.” I follow her and watch in irritation as she uses a lamp post to get to her feet and scowls my way.
“Go ahead… Save someone else the bother.” She bites back as tears stream down her face and I frown at her angrily.
“What? Are you trying to make me feel sorry for you? You have a fucking nerve Cam. After what you did? I hope you rot in hell.” I turn to walk away, tossing my hood up and still nursing my hand. It’s burning like hell and already starting to bruise, and I really could use some ice. It’s another reason I’m happy to walk off and not hit her again. Arry must have hands like steel if this doesn’t bother him, I seriously need a medic. I think the pain in my hand is enough reason for another bout of tears.
“I’m as good as dead, Sophs…. If they find me then I’m history.” Her pathetic voice follows me, and I can’t help myself from turning, despite hating her, my inquisitive side gets the better of me. That desperation in her voice that claws at my gut, the weakness of my non-asshole side.
“What the hell are you talking about?” I glare at her, trying not to care, but she seems so desperate that for a moment I waiver in my rage for her.
“Drug dealers. Criminals. I don’t mean low key street pushers; I mean the big time, Sophie. Mafia type men who think nothing of slitting your throat for not paying up.” She starts to cry, pathetic little silent tears rolling down her face and I’m torn between keeping on going, forgetting I ever saw her, and turning back to her. It’s clear she wants someone to listen and I’m sorry she picked probably the only girl in the city who doesn’t care about her anymore.
I’m so beyond not caring.
“Why? What did you do? Don’t think for a minute this makes me forget what you tried to do to me… You tried to get me raped Camilla… You left me to be raped. Is that what you do? Let men rape and abuse girls like me?” I yell at her, stomping back, despite my inner protests and face her now she is back on her feet. So much anger still bristling inside of me and I need to know why? Why she would do that to me.
“No…. You were …. Revenge. I told you I was a bitch when I was pissed. You left me high and dry, and I was angry at you. It cost me dearly for that apartment, meeting you in the city… All the time I invested in you. The other girls do it willingly, for drugs and the men pay to have a good time, with girls who are a little more class than street pushers.” She sniffs, wipes her face on her sleeve and lets go of the mess. Sadly, it’s not as bad as it looked, just a bloody nose and a little redness and I doubt it’s even broken. I’m disappointed in myself that I couldn’t even inflict a broken bone on her.
“I recognized one of them, her family has money. Why would she need to offer sex for drugs?” I ask drily, hardly convinced that her little story is even legit, and she’s not playing me for sympathy.
“Not everyone’s parents keep supporting them when they become a problem… You’re one of the lucky ones. The girls get hooked on my product and when mummy and daddy stop paying, they become one of my party girls. Sex on tap for wealthy men who get to do whatever they want to them. Lucrative little business deal until I took on the wrong girl.” Camilla cries some more, then wipes the tears away coolly, that strength I know returning and pulling herself up a little straighter. In this moment I still hate her and yet, I can’t seem to move. Staring at the way she self composes, but still looks utterly hopeless.
“Someone fucked you over?” I raise my brows in a very non-surprised way with a dead pan tone.
“Left me high and dry, took my product and my money and screwed me over. Left me unable to pay my debts or fuel my girls.” She’s completely desolate, as though this is the worst thing to happen in her entire life, but I feel nothing for her. I don’t know if it’s the emptiness because of what’s happened with Arry or if it’s what she did to me, but I struggle to feel even an ounce of warmth.
“Karma, Camilla…. I have no sympathy for you.” I sneer at her, satisfied that for once, someone got what they deserved.
“They will kill me if they find me. I’m getting out of the city, out of the state. Going anywhere they can’t find me. I owe them too much money and they don’t like lame excuses.” She’s rambling at me, I guess I’m probably the first human contact since she went into hiding and by the looks of her, it’s been a rough few days. Her clothes are grubby, not her usual classy style.
“What happened to your parents. Was that all a lie? Was there ever a rich family and a house in the Hamptons?” I watch her warily, trying to piece this altogether. My head going back to before, and everything I thought I knew about her.
“No……. I’m a runaway from London, whose smack head mother used to pimp out to dirty drug dealers to keep her in heroin. I was hustling street corners from the age of twelve to keep her in supply. I ran away as soon as I saved enough and well… here I am.” She raises her brows with a sardonic smile that screams ‘broken little girl’ and for a moment that tug of empathy gets me low down. One tiny little hint of someone I can maybe understand a little, looking at her and wondering how much of her cold heart was created by scars from a childhood she didn’t deserve.
“We’re not that different you and I, but I would never use people the way you do. Even if I did end up homeless on the streets, instead of with my family.” I pull back the sympathy, despite a little deeper insight into why she is the cold bitch she is, I still hate her too much to care. Just can’t forget what she tried to inflict on me, as payback.
“Well, good for you! Some of us must actually survive any way we can. We don’t all have a rich family to sweep us off to happy ever after. Some of us are dirt poor and left to run again, even after everything we try to build for ourselves.” She lets out another sob. Feeling sorry for herself and it’s wholly unattractive on that normally attractive face.
“Building a life based on the suffering and abuse of others is not an admirable success… You deserve this. I’ve no sympathy for you having to run.” Girls like us don’t continue the circle of abuse, we learn to rise above it and help others… But Camilla is another type of beast, who uses her pain to close her heart off to other girls and does to them what was done to her. She has more issues than I do, and her trauma obviously runs far deeper than I allowed mine too.
“Easy to say when mummy and daddy keep you in a lifestyle, right? Fuck off, Sophie, you have no idea what it’s like to be scared and hungry and running for your life.” She scowls at me and moves to walk off, dismissing me with a cold glare.
“What the hell would you know? I’ve been all of those things and more. They adopted me, at fourteen. I was a runaway, living on the street, fending for myself and hiding from someone who raped and beat me daily, since before I can ever remember it starting. Don’t fucking tell me what I don’t understand or can never empathize. My father made me run for my life; either he was going to end up killing me, or I was going to end up killing him.” I snap at her viciously, choking on the raspiness of my own voice, full venom on show and no hint of weakness anymore when talking about that scum bag. My scars concerning him are toughened now, not open gaping wounds, and it doesn’t hurt to say this out loud."
