After I Finally Became His Perfect Donna Chapter 03

After I Finally Became His Perfect Donna Chapter 03

Somewhere between sleep and waking, I heard Dorian confirming the treatment plan with the doctor.

I also heard him make a phone call to the Academy.

His voice was tight with unmistakable agitation as he demanded, “Why is she like this? What in the world did you people do to her?”

The voice on the other end was polite and cautious.

“Don, this is perfectly normal. Everything Mrs. Voss is doing right now could very well be an act. After all, just last month she was still saying she wanted to kill Miss Croft…”

I heard Dorian’s breath catch. Privately, I felt wronged.

If all of this was an act, then I was one heck of an actress.

The next evening, I was out of danger and Dorian brought me home.

Between the allergic reaction and years of malnutrition, I’d wasted away to almost nothing. The red welts on my neck hadn’t faded yet. I must have looked like a wreck.

The moment I stepped into the living room, Mike came running over.

He stared at the marks on my neck, reached out a chubby little hand, and pointed. “Lady, does it hurt?”

I looked into his innocent eyes and shook my head. “It doesn’t hurt.”

At the Academy, injuries a hundredfold worse than this, and I still had to smile and say it didn’t hurt.

Mike burrowed into my arms, his warm little face pressing against my ear.

“I know who you are.” His voice was barely a whisper, so quiet only I could hear. “Ever since you came back, Mommy’s been really unhappy. She even held me and cried last night.”

“You’re like those evil mistresses on TV who try to steal daddies from their mommies. Why don’t you just disappear?”

“If you disappear, then Daddy will belong to Mommy all by herself.”

I went rigid. Something small and sharp pricked the center of my breastbone.

Not a piercing pain. More like a fine pin, thin and slow and endless.

Before I could react, Mike suddenly clamped his arms around my waist and threw his weight backward.

We tumbled down the stairs together.

In the split second of free fall, I instinctively wrapped myself around him, turning my body into his cushion.

When we hit the floor, I felt like every bone in my body shattered.

“Lyra, what in the world are you doing!”

The shout came from upstairs. Dorian.

He charged down the steps, shoved me aside even though I was covered in injuries, and carefully scooped Mike off the ground.

Mike burst into hysterical sobs, shaking as he burrowed into Dorian’s torso.

“Daddy, the lady pushed me! She said she hates me and Mommy!”

Dorian’s hands went still.

He slowly turned his head to look at me. Behind his eyes was that familiar disappointment and disgust.

I braced my palms against the floor, trying to stand. Cold sweat ran down my back from the pain.

“I didn’t…”

“Shut up!”

He rose to his feet and looked down at me. “Mike is four years old. Would a four-year-old lie?”

“I thought you’d actually learned something in there. Turns out it was all an act. Do you want to go back to the Academy? Is that what you want?”

I froze. My body started shaking beyond my control.

The mocking laughter. The hands stripping my clothes off. Being made to crawl on all fours like a dog. It all came flooding back.

“No. Don’t send me back.”

I dropped to my knees almost instantly, pressing my forehead to the floor, begging.

“Don’t send me back. It was my fault. I pushed him. I’m sorry. I’m sorry…”

He said it was my fault, so it was. Five years had been more than enough to teach me how to take the blame.

As long as you admit you’re wrong, the punishment is always a little lighter.

Dorian was silent for a long time. So long I was sure I’d be dragged away again, locked back inside that windowless isolation cell.

In the end, all he said was, “Lock her in the basement. Let her think about what she’s done. Three days. Nobody lets her out.”