Darkest Before Dawn (18 page)

T
he light bounces
off the sleek book cover. It’s simple, really. Black, a keyhole of light off center,
Love Within the Dark: The Story of Ava Donovan,
in cursive white letters. I pick the book up, sweeping my fingers over her name before flipping to the back jacket.

Ava Donovan was abducted after two men shot her boyfriend in cold blood.

Sixty-four days in captivity. Sixty-four days to lose yourself—or find yourself.

Constantly wondering when and how you will die, that does something to you. To your mind. But what do you do when it does something to your heart? What on earth do you do when the man holding you captive seems just as broken as you are, when his mere presence becomes a comfort you crave—when you love him even though you shouldn’t? You smile and tell yourself it’s okay because love has no morals.

This is her story, retold by Tabitha Strong, acclaimed True Crime author of
Another Man’s Wife
and
Dying to Win
. Warning: There may be triggers for some suffering from traumatic events.

I swallow. Heat creeps over my chest, up my neck, and to my cheeks. I catch myself glancing nervously around, afraid I may look suspicious—afraid that someone will know I was
that
man. I am the man who held her captive. I made her love me and she still believes it half a year later.

I turn to the first page.
At nineteen, you’re worried about studying for finals and what party you’ll go to Friday night. But for me, I should have been worried about being plucked from my perfect life and locked away in a cellar…

She
didn’t
have a perfect life.

…
but that would have been the least of my worries because what I have endured since I’ve been released, well, that is crueler than you can imagine. Loving a ghost that everyone tells you is nothing but the devil, that is a slow form of torture.

There’s a loud snap when I abruptly close the book, so loud the woman next to me shoots an annoyed glare at me. I’m tempted to flip her the bird, but I refrain, tucking the book under my arm as I head to the register.

My palms slick with sweat as I wait for the cashier to ring it up. She scans the barcode, then pops her gum. Her gaze narrows and she glances at me. Smiles. Scans the book again and it beeps. By the time I’ve paid and taken the bag from her, sweat is trickling down my temples. Part of this reaction is guilt, paranoia, but part of it is something entirely different. It’s the thought of her. The thought of her thinking of me, loving me, the small bit of hope that the connection—that that was true.

* * *

I
t’s
past midnight and here I sit, reading a story I know all too well. Guilt consumes me with every fucking word.
As twisted as it sounds, even though I should have been scared—terrified even—there was something about him that soothed me. Something that told my soul I would be saved because even though he was a bad man, something told me he’d never be bad to me. And isn’t that what matters? Love is personal, and if he would make me his queen, regardless of whether that be of heaven or hell, that is all that mattered.

How terrible it is to love someone who
thinks
they love you.

T
he moment
I first laid eyes on him—there was something already there. My therapist has told me that it is a veneer. That because I was in a situation dictated by fear, the constant spike in adrenaline, that persistent rush—that is what has given me a
false
sense of love. Evidently, the rush you get from fear can mimic the physiological responses of love. So I was conditioned to love him. I have been told that time and time again. That he was a master manipulator, first by secluding me, then slowly forcing me to trust him, pretending he cared by giving me things, by spending time with me.

“A manipulator makes it so you can’t separate truth from lies. And, Ava, that is what this man did to you. He made you believe that you loved him, when the truth is you hate him.”

But I don’t hate him.

“You don’t even know him. You know only what he wanted you to know.”

Sometimes, all you need to know is found within a single look, a single touch. Occasionally, there are people our souls are bound to before we’ve ever met them, and that is why I know I truly love him. I didn’t
decide
to love him. My warped mind didn’t
chose
to love him. My heart—that has nothing to do with this.

We aren’t meant to understand a why or how to everything. No, sometimes we must just understand what is. Sometimes, no matter how evil and twisted it may seem, we just have to believe in fate. Life is not a fairytale, and I wouldn’t want it to be because we must know hate and pain to actually know what love is. They told me he was a monster—but that’s only because most people don’t know how to love things they don’t understand. And no one will ever understand this.

I may be alive. I may be free, but I am still a hostage only able to breathe inside the heart of a ghost. A man whose last name I don’t even know…and love is the cruelest captor. I know because I survived one form of captivity, but tell me, who can live when their heart is captive?

One more page. And do I dare turn it because this is beautiful and I don’t want it tainted. Slowly, reluctantly, I flip to the last page.

To my captor:

I am dead. Love has killed me, but the funny thing about this type of death—it is the only death you are alive to feel. Love is what makes us human, so without you I am nothing but an empty vessel. I love you. And if
you
love me, you’ll find me.

Is it right?

Maybe not, but the thing is, love has no morals—but I believe you do.

Please save me.

I close my eyes and take a deep breath. I’ve never been forced to see the destruction that’s left when a dead person is walking around in a living body. I’ve only felt it because for many years, that was my existence.

And suddenly, my stomach knots and kinks with a realization, one that strikes a fear so deep my blood runs cold and chill bumps sweep over my skin. The thought that Lila took her own life,
not
because she was miserable with the man who bought her, but that she was miserable because she was still in love with the man who manipulated her. That she felt this way about him and
that
is why she killed herself. Because she was already dead.

I drop the book to the floor with a thud and pace. I pace, dragging my hands down my face. I smoke a cigarette. I sit. I stand. I smoke. I pace. I smoke.

My mind is unable to stop. My muscles tense as my breathing grows ragged. Anger bleeds from my fingertips up my arms, to my chest, constricting my throat. Without thought, I pick up the lamp on the end table and launch it across the room, watching as it shatters to bits. But that is not nearly enough to quell this rage flaming within my chest—in my fucking heart. I take the vase from the mantel of the fireplace and smash it against the wall. My gaze drifts around the room, looking for something to release this pent-up anger on, and it eventually lands on the poker hanging from the fireplace. I grab it, gripping it tightly as I go around the room smashing and breaking everything I can until sweat rolls from my forehead, until my entire body is drenched and my muscles ache.

And when it’s all said and done, when I am certain I am on the verge of a heart attack, I stop, standing in the middle of the den, embracing the ruin that lies around me.
This
is what I feel like.
This
is what I’ve done to her, and it breaks my goddamn heart. Does it make sense? No, but not one fucking thing in my life has ever made sense, so why start now? Dropping the poker, I collapse to the floor, the broken glass crunching beneath my back. The ceiling fan whirs above me, and I watch the dust as it settles around me.

In my haze, I think of Ava, of that first time I saw her. The way the fear in her eyes seemed to vanish when her gaze landed on me. All the other women, they were already destroyed when they were thrown into that cellar. All I did was shatter them so they could be rebuilt from the rubble that was their lives. Ava wasn’t completely ruined, she was cracked. She still knew what it was like to have hope. I drag my hands down my face as I allow my mind to dissect things. As I search for a sign that
maybe
I failed. Maybe I did
not
manipulate her, maybe fate did—me and her both.

Love…

Maybe fucking love manipulated us, and if that’s the case then—I jump up, nearly tripping over my own feet. The thing is, I never loved those other women. Not even a fucking slight of feelings for them—pity, yes; feelings, no. I did the things I did for Ava because I
wanted
to, because I
needed
to. There was not one ounce of falsity in the things I did for her described in that book, and those things are what she claims made her fall in love with me. So what is so wrong about her loving me? Is it wrong solely because she was in some earthly form of hell? For surely even love exists in the depths of hell.

What the fuck have I done?

D
ay in and day out
. Alone. In this house. In these goddamn woods. Solitude—it really is a terrible thing. I can’t go anywhere because they will know it was me that did that to her. And besides, I need to stay here and think about what I’ve done. Read her words over and over in an attempt to convince myself I am wrong. Maybe I am going insane because I feel the need to do this, to isolate myself, to experience what Ava did for that first week. Complete loneliness.

In her book she said you start to talk to yourself, and you know what? You do start to talk to yourself—to things that aren’t alive. Funny how the human mind works like that. And the daydreaming, to be honest, I’ve daydreamed about her so many times, I’m not even sure what is reality anymore. I’ve played out how things could have ended differently. I’ve pretended I never let her go and sometimes I lie here and talk to her, letting my mind conjure up the sweet sound of her voice for a reply. I can’t get her out of my head, it’s like an obsession. And I think maybe,
maybe
if I just pretend I can have her back, maybe that will help me get her out of my head.

You can have her back. Just take her.

Jumping up from the couch, I shake my head. “No, that’s ridiculous.”

Why is it ridiculous? She asked you to save her. It’s in black and white…

“She’s not stable enough to know what she wants.”

You’re not stable, Maxwell. Who are you to put words in her mouth? You’ll never know until you try. Do you want her to feel worthless?

“Of course not.” I’m pacing in front of the fireplace, dragging my hands through my hair.

You saved her before you even knew her. Fate. You fucked fate off, Max. She was your fate. You were hers and you abandoned her.

“I did not!” I shout, my voice echoing around the empty room. “I did the right thing.”

To certain people, the wrong things seem right and right things seem wrong. She can’t live in the light. It will kill her. Get her out of the light before she dies completely.

My eyes land on the door to the basement and I stop pacing, my pulse hammering in my temples. Dark things live in the dark…

* * *

I
scratch
through my thick beard, then wipe the sweat from my brow before climbing down from the ladder. The chandelier I just hung sways, the bulbs catching on the teardrop crystals hanging from it. I’ve spent the better part of a month tearing up the basement of this old house. The room that was once my father’s office was perfect. No windows. In the back corner of the house, completely underground. It was just ugly. Wood paneling from floor to ceiling, and it reeked of cigars. It’s easy enough to tear down walls and put up sheetrock. I painted the walls a nice lavender. The bed—it’s an antique I bought at a yard sale. A black, wrought iron canopy bed. I found some nice gossamer that I’ve draped around the frame. The bed’s made with a white down comforter because it stays cold down here and I wouldn’t want her to be uncomfortable. The closet—I turned that into a nice walk-in for her, and I have filled it with dainty dresses and shoes. I built the bookcase myself. I’ll fill that this afternoon after I rest for a bit. I want everything to be perfect.

It must be perfect.

I’ve done a lot of thinking over the past month. I’ve read her book to the point some of the pages have torn loose from the binding. And you should see the notes I’ve made. I won’t lose this one. I will keep this one. I will do it right because I won’t manipulate her. I won’t have to because she will love me on her own accord. She will.