Ashley Pov.
My eyes groggily snapped open. The heaviness of the effect of the pain on my head hit me hard. I groaned, trying hard to feel my hands and legs but everywhere felt numb. The room was dark and so little could be seen from the cracks that permitted the moon's ray penetrating to ease my vision. The floor was rough and cold. This was no home, I could hear the little chatter of night creatures, and the coldness of the wind only made my heart race with unimaginable terror. I had no idea where I was but I knew it wasn't anywhere safe.
"Help" I yelled and soon the little room door opened and three well-built men stood before me sneering like I disturbed their peace. "Shouldn't we get away with her already?" one asked, pissed, staring at another who looked more like the boss. "No-" he replied, scouting down to my level. My body lay on the cold floor too weak and numb to sit or stand.
"She is too perfect to die swiftly. It should be slow and painful, but first, we must wait on madam" his long fingers caress my pale face. His excitement at my terror was visible. "Such a pretty thing" I turned my face to the side but his rough hands held my chin steadily making me stare into his cold brown eyes.
"I love a challenge, it only makes the fun merrier" I didn't get the chance to digest his words when my body was roughly pulled from the ground and my back slammed against the wall so fiercely I felt my bones crack. He said nothing more, his hands rough the grip of the others unyielding. I barely caught my breath when another punched me hard across the face. The left side of my cheek went numb, and a mouth full of blood spilled out accompanied by a few teeth. I gasp for breath. I felt myself shoved back to the cold floor, my knees scraping against its hardness. I looked up and my breath was rigid. A figure walked in the darkness shielding her face but soon it all came out the malice in her eyes unmissed.
"Sammy" I choked, staring at the sister I had protected all my life. The one I had given up so much for her sake, the one I was once willing to lay my life down for. "What's happening?" my question was received by a yielding glare.
"Well, Well" Samantha's voice dripped with venom. "Wow! The mighty Ashley Mansfield is now miserable and begging. Who would have thought your proud self could be so humiliated? Did you think you could take that belonged to me and go free? He was mine from the start, it was he who chose and loved but a conniving bitch had to snatch him" My heart sank knowing the impending danger hovering over my head. "I didn't steal him- he came for me and I accepted with your blessings. How did I steal him?" Samantha laughed, a cold, cruel sound that sent a shiver down my spine.
"Do you think I am stupid? I know you seduced him, I found the hotel you met with him and you stand here to act innocent. Ashley, you are nothing but a slut and you do not deserve to be the path of my family" Her words made no sense. Before the arranged marriage, I had met up with him once for a business discussion, it had nothing to do with our relationship. " I have given him back to you, what more do you want?- I am done with him, I want nothing to do with you, our parents of Edward just let me go" My pleas fell on deaf ears.
"Let you go after all this? Youre are nothing, an insignificant nobody, a disgrace no one will miss. So no, I shall not let you go but watch you wither and the life in you snatched away, you do not deserve it, you do not deserve to breathe. You're dead to everyone so we might as well make sure youre gone from the world for good" My blood ran cold, her words hitting me like a speeding train.
I pinched myself so hard trying to wake from this nightmare but nothing worked. Her eyes determined and her orders sent the men raging towards me. I barely had time to register their actions, every punch and kick broke something within me. The immense pain had my body instantly crawl in a ball shape but nothing stopped them. I soon lost count of the kicks and punches, every part of me felt numb, my hands and legs still bonded and my mouth was coughing out slums of blood. She scouts down roughly pulling my face to meet her cold eyes. "In your next life- you will choose your birth wisely" She stood up and the men bounced back on me.
"You deserve this Ashley, you deserve to die" Her words and her back faded but the beatings did not. They were sure and determined to make me suffer and time passed painfully slowly, every punch registered in my brain. I soon lost count of everything including reality, I slipped in and out of consciousness but every time I came too I was welcomed with hard kicks and punches to my guts. The dark room soon became nothing but fragments in my memory and like the wind, my life slipped away.
It was hard to keep my heavy eyes open, the weight of pain and betrayal crushing me even deeper into the cold hands of death. With one last attempt I opened my heavy eyes staring at the shimmering moon, the only weakness to my pain, and its calm light seemed to say more than I could understand. It was finally over and with one kick to my head everything else was gone, the laughter or the men, the coldness of the world, and the pain in my heart faded into the darkness that consumed me and willingly let it take over me. There was nothing left, nothing to hold on to. All I felt was emptiness and void left in my heart and everything went black.