Chapter 97 CHAPTER 077
Amelia POV:
"Mom?" Tyler's face falls, and his tone goes from the anger of a few seconds ago to confusion. He turns away so I can't see his face, though the phone speaker is still loud, he wanted me to hear him taunt Linc and when I heard his voice, though dominating and resonant like I remember him to be, it broke my heart into a million pieces.
I imagined that this would be the last time I hear his voice and if Tyler didn't have me gagged with a dirty piece of rag, I would have screamed my lungs out so Linc can hear me on the other side.
"Tyler! What is this? What are you doing? Why...?" The woman's voice breaks out into a loud sob. I cringe from the heartwrenching sound.
"Mom, what the fuck are you doing there? Did Linc bring you here? Why are you here? What the fuck is going on?" Tyler huffs down the line. His neck gets splotchy when he is angry, it is currently turning a shade of violent red.
I try to make myself invisible in the high ceilinged room so he doesn't turn this anger on me. I don't understand what is going on but it is obvious that Linc has thrown him a curve ball. And he is freaking out. He believed he had the higher hand here. Advantageous standing. I told him not to fuck with Linc and now he is about to find out.
I turn to look at Ashley, to give her a conspiratory smile. She returns it weakly. Her left eye is swollen shut and her cheeks are turning purple. She is in terrible shape and it breaks my heart to see her like this.
When Tyler came back early this morning as he promised he would, I refused to give him Linc's private number unless he did what I wanted. Which was to be able to see Ashley and for him to give her a drink of water at least.
She was fatally thirsty and I was willing to risk his rage and my life for her. Over the long dark quiet night we spent together, I have come to be truly scared for her safety. She sounded weak and would often pass out mid sentence, leaving me to scream and call out her name for minutes before she responded.
I couldn't see her and it was agony. I don't think I slept a wink overnight, but eventually I probably, out of exhaustion, because Tyler woke me this morning with a splash of cold water to the face.
I screamed and he smirked. Enjoying the show. The bastard. The psychotic bastard.
He shoved the phone at me and then as if just realising that he has tied my hands behind me so I couldn't move, he clicks his tongue and asked me to call out the number. I refused to say a word. He got mad and hit me across the face. I tasted the blood in my mouth but I am used to it, I stood my ground till frustrated, he asked me what I wanted.
When I told him, he laughed in my face like he knew all along and then turned the chair so I could see Ashley, I screamed when I first saw her. She was in far worse shape than I imagined. It was unbelievable to see. My heart broke. He had her tied to a metal chair, like mine too, but her face was all messed up.
I know he beat her yesterday night when she interrupted his story, but I didn't know that he beat her even worse when he took me at our apartment complex. I remember her screaming and it cut through my chest.
"Baby, this can still be resolved amicably. You just have to let her go. Linc has promised not to press charges. Please. Tyler. Don't do this to yourself. Please. This is not you. This is not my bright beautiful boy. Please, Tyler, stop this. You are breaking my heart." His mother's pleading voice over the phone makes me nauseous. Tyler is breathing loudly, clutching the phone to his ear tightly. He has forgotten about me ot that the phoen is still on loudspeaker.
I don't know if I believed Tyler's story about his mom and Linc being young lovers and all that rubbish about Linc abandoning them when she fell pregnant. If anything is clear to me by now, it is that Tyler is very mentally unstable and dangerous.
I like to say that I don't know Linc all that much. That in the three years since I have known him, it is only the bare minimum I know. But deep down, I know that is not true. Because all I know of Linc, is all he is.
A deeply empathetic man. I don't know anybody else who would continue taking care of the kid of their ex wife who cheated on the marriage in the most embarrassing way. And now there is proof of that infidelity everywhere on the internet.
Linc Dmitri is not a saint but he is a man who wakes up everyday and embodies all the attributes that make up a saint.
This Tyler's business must be some sort of mixup. I am willing to risk my life for that fact. And it is not only because I am hopelessly in love with Linc, but because I know him and I know he is not the kind of man to abandon his kid no matter the situation or circumstances.
"How about what he did to you, Mom? To us? How can you forget?" Tyler says, he sounds eerily like a boy not older than twelve.
Ashley looks at me, and I signal her to stay quiet. I stay still, too, trying to hear as much of the conversation as I can without him remembering I am in the room with him.