Chapter 37 Chapter 37: Was I Mistaken?

Chapter 37 Chapter 37: Was I Mistaken?
Aliana Slate's POV:

Can I possibly be mistaken? The memory was quite distant. I remember a woman standing in front of me, and I appeared to be young in age, and she called me Ana. The only thing I remember about that particular memory. The name she said. Ana.

"Ana," Sebastian said, hearing him repeat the word that I had previously given him as he was still kneeling down in front of me as I sat in a chair in a new room. "I like it. You happen to know what your last thing might be, Ana?"

I thought hard, trying to remember anything else, but everything else was too much of a blur. The only thing that was readily available in my mind was everything that had happened to me over the past ten years.

"I have to say, that's the best news I've heard all day," Sebastian said as he looked at me and raised one corner of his mouth. "I'm very pleased to meet you, Ana. And knowing that, I will do everything in my power to take care of you, all right?"

I couldn't help but feel warmth in my cheeks, causing me to look away. It had been so long since somebody smiled at me that I didn't exactly know what it looked like. The only smiles I have seen were sadistic ones.

"Now, how about we see to getting you into a shower?" Sebastian said at that moment, and upon hearing that, I immediately looked up at him with fear flashing in my eyes. "Or a bath. You're more than welcome to take a bath if you don't prefer a shower."

I swallowed again, and this time, the hurt caused me to reach up and grab my throat.

"Easy there," Sebastian said as he reached up with his hand and placed his palm on the side of my cheek.

I don't know what it was about him. Every time he touched me, it was like he radiated heat. I don't know how somebody can be so warm and not melt. If I were that warm, I would probably melt, but let's face it. I wasn't. I was not even remotely that warm. I have been so cold for so long that it made me think my heart was surrounded by a shell of ice.

"Don't worry," Sebastian said in that moment as he could tell I was rather nervous upon hearing that. "Nothing is going to happen to you."

Sure, I thought to myself. Nothing is going to happen to me. I sarcastically ran his phrase over again in my head. If only that were true from all those years ago. But how was I to know that was gonna happen to me? How was I to know that my apartment had four men in it who brutally used me in ways I could never have imagined?

"Can we get you to stand?" Sebastian asked in that moment as he stood up and reached out with both of his hands, waiting for me to place my hands in his.

I looked up at him and then looked back down at my lap, and my hands were still placed, holding onto each other.

"Here, do me a favor," Sebastian said as he clicked his tongue, causing me to look up at him. "Look over there in the corner of the room."

I saw that he turned his head and looked over to an open door in the corner of the room on the same wall where the exterior windows were located.

"You see that open door?" Sebastian asked, causing me to look back at him as he looked at me, then back toward the open door. "That is the entrance to the bathroom suite. Your personal solitude."

I furrowed my eyebrows. Solitude? Honestly, I've never had solitude.

"Let's go ahead and get you to stand, if you are able," Sebastian said as he reached out, grabbed my hands from my lap, and pulled my arms slightly apart as he assisted me in standing.

Instantly, my knees tried to give way as I was unsure about anything.

"It's all right, there you go," Sebastian said in a reassuring tone as I was still cowering, having yet to sit back down. "There you got it."

It took everything in me just to be able to attempt to stand on my own at that moment. I don't know how I was able to run when I left my captors. All I remember was telling myself to run. Keep going, I recalled hearing myself saying, keep going over and over in my head.

As I stood there in front of Sebastian, I looked down at my completely bare feet. They were still extremely sore.

"Don't you worry," Sebastian said as he took a step back, and instinctively I took a step forward. "The carpet is soft. We can go as slow as you need. Just take one step at a time. You will have to regain your strength at some point. Now is a great time to start."

I don't know what it was about Sebastian. Something about him, as I held onto him, I could feel the strength in his arms as he lightly held onto my hands. He was cautious, careful with each step that I made. He would take another step back towards the open door of the corner. Before I knew it, I was standing in the open doorway of my so-called bathroom suite.

"Look up," Sebastian said in that moment, as the entire time I was looking down, watching his feet move so I would know when to move my feet according to his movements.

It wasn't until I looked up and saw everything for the first time that I realized what a real bathroom was supposed to look like. I could have only dreamed of having a bathroom that was this big. I mean, the room that I was just standing in was even bigger than the entire apartment I was supposed to have. This bathroom was half the size of the bedroom. There was even a fireplace in the exterior wall.

My jaw dropped open at the mere sight of everything around me. I couldn't believe my eyes. It was astonishing, really.

"What do you think about that?" Sebastian asked as I looked up at him, and he was looking over his shoulder at everything that was in the bathroom.

All I could do was shrug my shoulders and look around at that moment. I had no words that I was able to speak. It was hard to say anything in a regular conversation anyway.

"I want you to know that all of this is yours," Sebastian said as he turned back to look at me and our eyes met once again. "Everything in here. It's all yours."

I couldn't help it as I felt tears swell in my eyes. I was unable to cry, but that didn't mean that I didn't have tears that swelled in my eyes from time to time.

"Thank you," I whispered the words as I blinked, shedding a tear from my eye. I couldn't believe it.