Song: Inna Song (Gin & Lime) - Darkovibes ft. King Promise (My love)

*Unedited* (I'm in love with tigers)

*Trigger warning* (Self harm)

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Michael and I sat in the car, both of us lost in our thoughts. I wondered if it'd be better for me if we didn't come here at all. In just one day, I found out that my father is a paedophile and my baby brother had been kidnapped by some unknown people.

Etornam claimed she'd helped the 'bad men' take my brother, which led me to believe that the person who had him had no good intentions. The question was, why kidnap a baby? What could they possibly want from him?

"Ellie," Michael said. He took my hand and squeezed it. "we'll find him. I promise."

"What if we don't? What if even if we do, it's too late?" The words were even painful to say. I couldn't imagine how I'd live without knowing where my brother is or knowing that I couldn't do anything to protect him.

"We'll find him." He assured me.

I looked at him. He smiled, but I couldn't find it in me to return it. I knew any attempt I made would morph into a grimace. The treacherous tears were clawing at me, begging to be released, but I didn't want Michael to see me cry.

I turned to the window and subtly wiped the tears away. He didn't try to comfort me so I reckon I succeeded. "What now?" I asked.

"Like I said, we're not going back to the mansion. You're coming with me to my flat."

"Michael... Michael you know I can't. I don't want to risk it." I complained.

"Risk what? If they can't find you, they can't touch you."

"This flat of yours, your father knows about it?"

"No. I share it with a couple of friends. We bought it to escape from school once in a while."

At that, I smiled. "Really? You used to leave school and stay at your flat?" He had gone to a boarding school; they didn't allow students to spend any nights off campus.

"Yes," his voice had a lot of mischievousness to it. "we used to skip school to sleep and eat. We threw parties sometimes too."

"I would've never expected that from you." I laughed.

"What? School got boring sometimes and at least I wasn't skipping school to have sex."

"People do that?" I asked, astonished.

He laughed. "You'd be surprised."

"In my opinion, people in senior high shouldn't even be having sex."

"Some of the girls at my school were so insufferable and thirsty. It was hard, but thank goodness I'm not the kind of guy who's into casual flings."

The topic deviation helped me calm down a bit, but once the conversation died out, I felt that pang in my chest that reminded me that my brother was somewhere out there, suffering. "Michael, do you think your father could've had anything to do with my brother's disappearance?"

He didn't reply for a while, probably contemplating. "I mean, I wouldn't put it past him. He's a very spiteful man. He doesn't just punish people when they wrong him, he also punishes those who are close to them. He's that kind of person."

I scoffed, taking in a deep breath. "How are you related to that man?"

"I promise you Ellie, he's a much different person to me. He's always been my best friend. He was always so kind and understanding. I loved him so much that I looked past his faults and all the things that were wrong with him, I thought he'd just been broken after my mother died. Now though, after seeing what he's done to you, I can't ignore his faults anymore."

"Do you think he's going to hurt them? I mean, my family. That call in the car..."

"I'm not going to let him."

"How will you stop him? You're all the way here and he's chief back there. His word is law."

"Elorm, trust me. Besides, I'm thinking he'll come after you, which is why I can't let you go back there."

"What if you're wrong and he's not involved with this syndicate?"

"He is. I'm so sure of it. I can't risk taking you back there. I know he's going to do something to eliminate you."

I sighed and leaned back on my seat. "When did this become my life? The fear, danger, how do I wake up everyday knowing this is the kind of life I'm trapped in?"

"You're brave Elorm." He turned to me and smiled. "Most people wouldn't have been able to handle this like you have."

I wasn't brave. I was scared. More scared than I'd ever been in my life. I squeezed his hand anyway and said, "Thanks for being here."

"Always," he replied. He leaned in and pressed his lips against my cheek.

Always.

My heart fluttered in my chest as I turned to him and smiled. "Let's go."

"What?"

"To your flat. Let's go. Even if they find us, at least I can go knowing I didn't make things easier for them."

He looked so happy; I always wanted him to be like that. Happy like that. "You just made me the happiest man alive."

I rolled my eyes. "Please, stop exaggerating. Let's go."

Just as he sparked the car to life, two big black cars parked on either side of us. I looked behind us to see that one was also behind us, and we were parked right in front of the hospital building. We were trapped.

Someone got down from the car behind us. I recognised him as Kofi as he started getting closer to us. I shot a panicked look at Michael, but he didn't look back at me. He looked angry and reckless.

"Michael," I warned, telling him not to do anything stupid.

Before he could reply, Kofi came and pulled open my car door. "You really thought you could get away that easily?"

"We weren't trying to go anywhere. Etornam woke up and we came to visit her," I said dryly.

"Not that where we go is any of your business." Michael added.

"It is my business. You know what, Prince Michael? You were right. Your father is the third partner of the crime syndicate."

"I knew it," Michal replied, not even sounding the least bit surprised.

I felt like a huge burden was lifted off my shoulders. Michael was safe.

"And he's tired of your shit," Kofi continued.

As if on cue, someone opened Michael's door. Before any of us could react, the huge man hit Michael on his head – very hard.

"Michael!" I yelled. He fell out of his seat like a ragdoll, losing consciousness immediately. "Michael," I tried to crawl over to him, but Kofi grabbed onto my foot and yanked me out of the car. I fell to the ground, but not without hitting my head against the bottom of the seat.

The man roughly yanked me up by the arm. I muffled a cry of pain at how roughly I was being handled. "Where are you taking him?" I asked, just as the man who hit Michael over the head shoved him into the car.

"He's going back to his father. He'll marry a beautiful educated woman and take over the reigns of the village. Looking at how things have turned out, he won't be introduced to the businesses as soon as his father wanted, because of you."

"I was right all along."

"And? It's not like this knowledge has done you any good. Move." He shoved me in the direction of the car that he got off of. I watched as the door was shut behind Michael and his car was driven away.

My chest clutched and my breaths quickened. Always, the word he said to me just minutes ago repeated itself in my mind. "Will I ever see you again?" I whispered, more to myself than anyone else.

"Maybe in your dreams." Kofi laughed. "Now move." He shoved me even harder. I bit onto my tongue to stop myself from crying as I led the way to the car. My throat was tightening itself when he opened the door.

I obediently got inside just as my stomach began to coil itself. Always.

I pressed my fingernail into my palm, my heart beating too fast and too painfully. The car moved, and we were on our way back to the mansion. I wondered how I would be able to sit still for the entire car ride.

The mansion was so far away from civilisation that it had taken Michael almost all of that morning to get there. By the time we get back, it'd be late afternoon. I would have to go to bed that night without knowing where Michael was and whether he was safe.

I looked down at my palm. A bloody crescent moon was engraved into my palm by my own fingernail.

"Why are you hurting yourself?" Kofi asked me, looking down at my palm.

As soon as he spoke, I felt the anger wash over me. He had no right to be talking to me. "Leave me alone." I hated the way my voice cracked at the end. I hated the way that my voice didn't betray my anger. I hated how broken I sounded.

Kofi shook his head, chuckling slightly. "You must be so down right now. You just got him back and now he's gone for good."

"You don't know that."

He laughed. "I can assure you that you're never seeing him again. Even if you do, by then he'll be in love with his future wife. He won't want anything to do with a filthy prostitute."

Always. "A filthy prostitute." I repeated.

"Yes. Because that's what you're going to be now. I hope you learnt something from when you did it with him. You're going to be needing a lot of skills to please the clients."

I squeezed my fingers, the feeling of dread in my stomach and heart being to hard for me to bear. I didn't even know what my next plan was going to be. How could I escape this life? Was I going to become a prostitute for the rest of my life?

I was all alone now, and it was the scariest thing ever. I had no one to fall back on now.

"That sounds scary, doesn't it? The life you were trying so hard to escape, it's your only option now."

I bit down hard on my tongue as my stomach felt like it was going to burst open. Death seemed like a better option than this.

Kofi came closer to me, and I turned to him, alert. He touched my head and I flinched, shrinking away from his touch. The feel of his skin on mine revolted me, but part of the reason why I flinched was because of the sharp pain I felt when he touched me.

I touched my own hand to my head and was surprised when pain jolted through me. The place felt swollen.

"You hurt yourself." Kofi said.

This time, I glared at him. "You did this to me."

He rolled his eyes. "You're so dramatic, it's annoying."

I sighed, realising that I shouldn't be wasting my time on him. There was probably a large boil on my head. I'd always laughed when the kids in my village fell and had big boils form on their heads. I wondered how stupid I looked myself.

We didn't talk again for the rest of the car ride. I shifted to the door, the farthest that I could get away from him. He didn't seem bothered as he tapped away on his phone.

Like I predicted, it was quite late when we arrived back at the mansion. It must've been four o'clock. I spotted an unfamiliar car parked in front of the mansion, which meant that someone had come to visit.

I said a quick prayer, hoping that it wasn't Chief Amegah coming to give me a piece of his mind. When we disembarked and Kofi saw the car, he froze over for a second, which had me wondering how horrible our visitor was that he reacted like that.

Before I knew what was happening, Kofi rushed into the mansion, probably in pursuit of the person. I stood in front of the mansion, dreading entering. I briefly contemplated rushing out the automatic gates which were slowly closing, but one look at the guards littered all over the place squashed that idea.

I was stalling, and if Kofi was thinking about me, he was probably wondering why. The mansion had suddenly become a dark, horrific place to me. The thought of going inside there was unfathomable. Its beauty was now of no relevance to me.

"Miss, please go inside." It was the man who had driven us. His body was identical to the one who hit Michael. It was packed with muscle.

I nodded, but felt my feet glued to the ground. I couldn't move.

"Miss?" He repeated.

I wonder why he was even being polite. I had expected him to shove me or carry me in.

"Yes, yes," I replied. I fisted my hands and felt the pain spike as my fingernails dug into my palm. The miniature cuts brought me a masochistic sense of relief. I dragged myself into the mansion.

As soon as I got into the living room, my eyes fell on Wolfgang and Kofi. So it was just Wolfgang then. It made sense that Kofi was shocked and probably slightly elated to see him. After all, they'd parted on a very bad note.

When I came in, Kofi had put his hand on Wolfgang's shoulder and Wolfgang viciously shrugged it off. "Don't touch me." Wolfgang said.

"Brother," Kofi sounded pained. It was very weird. "I didn't tell you before because I feared that you'd let her know, but I have orders from the chief. I can't let her go."

Then their eyes landed on me. That was it then. Kofi didn't want me around because he liked me or he wanted me 'broken'. He did it because he had orders. If anything, it made me feel worse. If Kofi had feelings for me, at least I could make him suffer by rejecting his advances, but he didn't.

Chief Amegah was the only reason why I was still here, and it was even scarier still because that meant I wouldn't be leaving if he didn't want me to.

"Elorm," Wolfgang said. He came forward and immediately wrapped his arms around me.

I stood there, limp in his arms. I knew that he didn't kidnap me for fun now, but even though he was just following orders, it didn't make it any better. I couldn't find it in me to forgive him for taking part in my kidnapping.

Kofi was glaring at me. He looked like he wanted to rip my throat out and feed my body to the dogs. I swallowed and pressed my forehead against Wolfgang's chest.

"Are you okay?" He asked.

How do I answer that, really? I wasn't, but I didn't feel like he could understand me. It felt like I was dead. It felt like I was a dead person walking. "Yes." I nodded.

Wolfgang turned to Kofi while I stood behind him. "You're acting like we don't have just as much or even more power over the syndicate than he does."

"I'm just trying to preserve the peace. Our father and Chief Amegah aren't on the best of terms right now, and I don't want to do anything to worsen the situation."

"This business of one of the laid-back ones. We don't force people into it. You know why we don't do that? The prostitutes have freedom, they spend a lot of time outside the mansion, they're not in captivity like the others."

The others.

"Not only that, but they meet with some of the most powerful people in the country and the world. Coupled with the right people, they can cripple us, Kofi. That is why we only take people who are willing for this business." Wolfgang continued.

"Please, stop pretending. You only want to let her go because you have feelings for her." Kofi said dryly. He looked severely irritated.

"I care about you. I care about our family. I don't want us to end up behind bars."

But he didn't care about the countless lives they were destroying.

"She already knows too much anyway. If she's as much of a threat as you say she is, then I reckon we should just get rid of her. To my knowledge, the chief wouldn't mind."

"No!" Wolfgang bellowed, making me flinch.

My heart plummeted into my stomach. They were discussing my death now? This is what it has come to?

"You're not getting rid of her, Kofi."

"But according to you, she's a threat, isn't she? And you don't have any feelings for her, right?"

"You can't just kill her like that. I don't know if you will get it, but after getting to know someone and spending time with them, it's just hard to kill them."

"Not for me."

"I know," Wolfgang replied. "I know you."

Kofi looked away. "Why did you come here?"

"I came to make things right between us."

"Why didn't Nate come?"

"Nate? He doesn't want to see you. Not yet."

I was, yet again, surprised when Kofi's expression became so despondent. He loved his brothers so much; it was obvious. "Why do you?"

Wolfgang pulled the corner of his lower lip into his mouth. "I don't know. I miss you, brother. I hate how things have gotten between us. It's never been this bad."

"And it's all because of her," Kofi's glare returned to me.

"No, it's not because of her. It's because of all this," he gestured to space around us. "the life we were brought into."

Kofi rolled his eyes. "Can we talk? Please?" He asked his brother while looking at me.

"Yes, but later? I want to talk to her right now, please."

Kofi shot me another glare. I was beginning to believe that he felt that I was destroying his relationship with his brothers. "Of course. I'll be in my room. Come and find me when you're done."

Wolfgang nodded.

We waited until Kofi was out of sight, then Wolfgang turned to me. "Princess. You don't look well."

I sighed and went to rest in one of the sofas. "Inevitable."

"Hey." He came and sat beside me. "I know I can't get you out of here, but I'll try and convince Kofi to not let you work."

I scoffed. "He'll just tell you he won't let me work and when you leave, I'll be back at the job."

"Do you want me to stay here?" Wolfgang asked.

"You'd do that?" I asked. It seemed Wolfgang really did have feelings for me. If he did, I wondered why and how.

He looked away. "If you don't work, you won't have the freedom to go outside like the rest of the prostitutes. Which means that you can't connive with any of our enemies, and you can't escape."

I sighed again. Perhaps, he didn't have feelings for me. Maybe he just had his family's best interests at heart.

"That sounds... nice. Won't the chief have a problem with that?"

"What he doesn't know won't hurt him." He winked at me.

I averted my eyes and focused them on the bloody crescent moons in my palm.

"Do you want to know everything?" Wolfgang asked after a while.

"Everything?" I repeated.

"Why you were brought here."

I shook my head. "It doesn't matter anyway."

He went ahead and ignored me. "One evening, I was sitting on the balcony of this mansion and enjoying a can of beer when Chief Amegah rang me up. He said his son was going to make the biggest mistake of his life. He said his son had gotten engaged to a 'whore'."

"Why are you telling me this?" I asked.

He ignored me again. "I asked him what he wanted me to do about it. He said that you'd like it here, since you loved to open your legs for everyone and everything."

I scoffed, feeling mildly annoyed. I was the kind of woman who believed that sex was the physical bonding between two souls. It was more than just a few minutes of pleasure for me. In fact, it was very weird for me whenever I saw people on television having sex with many strangers. "How can you share something that intimate, that private, that special with just anyone?" I would think.

Even from when I was young, I promised myself that I'd only be with someone who loved me. The less men I'd sleep with in my lifetime, the better. I mean, I only imagined sleeping with more than one man in my lifetime if I fall out of love with the man I was in love with and in love with someone else, or, God forbid, if the love of my life died.

It annoyed me so much when people were throwing such untrue and such vicious rumours about me around. I don't and will never stand for slut shaming, even if the person's sexual history is indeed true. I don't believe anyone should either be shamed or praised for the number of people they have sex with.

I didn't understand why people believed them. I barely even spoke with any of the village boys because of how vicious my parents were. I didn't even go out at night because, to be honest, I felt unsafe. I'd seen how most of the men looked at me. The fact that I wasn't the kind of girl who'd sleep with someone just for pleasure annoyed them even further.

Furthermore, the girls didn't even like me, so I didn't have anyone to play with at night. Most of the time, Edinam would come over to my house and we'd practice some of the things we learnt from watching television while the other villagers gathered around the television to watch telenovelas at night.

My point was, there was no sensible reason why everyone believed Etornam's rumours. They were foolish and gullible people. They were all horrible, terrible people, led by a corrupt, heartless chief.

"I asked him why he wouldn't just give you the chance to decide whether you wanted to come or not, since you liked sex so much. He said you were too ashamed to admit how much you loved sleeping around. He said that in the long run, he was doing you a favour by allowing you to live just as you wanted without the judgement of society."

Chief Amegah was such a convincing liar, it was shocking. I shook my head and scoffed, shocked, but not too shocked by what I was hearing. "Why are you telling me this?" I asked again.

This time, he looked at me. "I just want you to understand where I'm coming from. From the moment he told me all this about you, I was intrigued by you. I thought, 'Ah well, we're doing her a favour anyway.' I met you for the first time at the chief's palace."

I remembered that day very well. "Did Linda really lead you into my room? Is she in on all this?"

"Who, the girl with red locks? No." He smiled mischievously. "She didn't send me into your room. I just wanted to meet you. When I saw you for the first time, I must admit, I was mesmerised. You're probably the most beautiful girl I've ever met."

I rolled my eyes. "Do you watch television? Have you seen Madison Beer?"

"I said 'met', not 'seen', and I'm not into white or skinny girls. I like my women colourful – preferably black – and thick." He smirked. "To be honest, all white girls look the same to me."

I rolled my eyes and chuckled. "That's racist, but continue."

"I liked you. You were carefree and fiery. You had the most beautiful smile. I loved how tough and brave you tried to look all the time."

"Tried?"

"Tried." He laughed. "Good attempt though. With your height and non-intimidating frown."

"Okay, I get it. I'm not the least bit intimidating." I rolled my eyes.

He laughed. "But you are brave. And courageous. You've handled yourself very well, especially with my brother. He can be a handful sometimes, but you handled him very well and quite often put him in his place. That takes a lot of courage."

"I hear you." That was the second time I was called brave that day, but I still wasn't any closer to believing it. I wasn't brave.

"That night, you had been drugged by Justus. We didn't know that then. I thought you were just high. I did like you..." he trailed off shyly. "...I thought maybe... you'd want to... you know..."

"Sleep with you?" I asked humorously.

"Yes," he scratched his head.

"You did have some selfish reasons."

"Just one, please," he rolled his eyes. "I... I regret it all now. I can't promise you that if I knew the chief was lying, I wouldn't have kidnapped you, but I want you to know that I regret it all now. I'm sorry."

I looked back at him and shook my head again. "So this was just one long apology?"

"In disguise, yes." He said, making us both laugh. "So? Am I forgiven?"

"Who do you think I am? God? Wolfgang, give it time."

"Right, okay." He said shyly. "I'll go and talk to my brother now."

I nodded.

He left and I sat there staring at the wall until it got dark. He still wasn't back. I got up. I didn't know where my feet were taking me to. I just went along. Before long, I found myself in the kitchen.

It was empty. Apparently, the prostitutes had dinner already. It was a big mansion so it wasn't a surprise that I didn't hear or see anyone. I felt tired of sitting on my butt doing nothing and I realised that I'd never explored the mansion. Plus, I was hungry.

I opened the large fridge and was shocked by the number of food items in it. So much food. It looked like a miniature heaven. I settled for an apple. It was late and I didn't know how to use the gadgets in this expensive looking kitchen.

I went over to the counter and spotted a knife rack. I picked out a small knife.

I needed a bigger knife to cut into the apple – I knew that – but for some reason, I didn't let go of the knife. I clutched it.

My wrist was dangerously close. The knife was hovering over it.

I bit onto my lip. What... what was happening? What was I thinking?

I looked at the knife, then I looked at my exposed wrist. "Put the knife down." I told myself. "Put it down."

I dropped the apple and looked at my palm. The blood had dried, outlining the shape of the crescent moons. They were ugly. I didn't want anyone to ever see them, but I loved making them. It brought me relief. Temporary, but it was relief nonetheless.

If my small fingernails could bring me such relief, imagine a real knife. The knife was getting dangerously close to my skin.

Compulsive disorders. I'd seen them on television. Cutting, self-harm, I'd seen all that. Why then did I want to do this to myself, knowing that I won't be able to stop, no matter how hard I tell myself that I will?

I was just about to put down the knife when someone forcefully grabbed my wrist, turned me around and slapped me.

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Hello my people! This story is getting too dark for my liking. I don't want to have to make it mature😢 

Anyways, if I write a chapter every day, I'll be done by August, which gives me enough time to edit for the Wattys2020, so, maybe, I'll update every day. Thanks for reading!

Don't forget to vote! 🌟