An ultimatum

“Dad, you can’t possibly be serious right now! Please tell me this is a lie,” Sadie cried into her phone, her eyes watery with unshed tears.

She felt like she could barely breathe and was numb all over; she hoped this was all a dream.

Her hands were almost pale white, clinging to the grimy three-year-old phone in a tight grip.

She was barely making enough to replace the cracked screen after it had met with horrid accidents ever since she began fending for herself with part-time jobs.

She thought she could do it all on her own after returning to the States, but right now her father’s gambling habits were ruining her life.

“What do you want, Sadie? What is it this time? You’re the reason I call to grumble and complain,” her father, James Landry, said over the line, and Sadie saw red.

“My college fund, Dad—it’s empty. You know I have to enroll in college in less than a month, and all my college funds you swore you would never touch—”

“Look, I was in a tough pickle, okay? Jesus, you are so fucking ungrateful, Sadie-Quinn Landry.

I am your father—I am your blood. What is a little money that you think you have the right to talk to me like this?” James roared.

Sadie froze; she couldn’t even comprehend how selfish her father was being right now. That was $60,000!

She paced back and forth through the small meter space of her tiny closet bedroom, trying hard to hold her sanity together before it exploded.

The walls were far too thin for her liking, so she couldn’t scream or let out as much as she wanted to because of her roommates—who paid way more than her in rent and had the better rooms in the house—while she was left with the worst one.

“Dad, this is not fair… you can’t do this; it’s not fair!”

“Fair? It’s my account, and you’re the one who decided to take the year off, and the money was sitting idly. I told you I had something urgent!” he fired back through the line.

Sadie felt all the strength leave her body, her lips trembling as the grip on the phone tightened and her fingers whitened. She whispered,

“It’s because Mom died, and you know she had put money for me for my college fund too” matter-of-factly, earning silence from the line followed by curses.

“Don’t act all righteous now. Three years ago you acted like a snobbish princess who decided to run away with your mom to another man in Italy, so I deserve this money for what you both put me through,” he accused.

But Sadie knew better; Sadie knew how much her mom had suffered in his hands.

How she would wake up with bruises and couldn’t take it any longer, how she found a man whom she loved—

A man who took in all her trauma and loved them both, but she had begun to grow forbidden feelings that she shouldn’t have.

And the reason she had left was not to break their trust because she began to feel things, craving someone out of her reach.

And so she ran from that life, now back to a harsh reality. “So go ask those posh, snobbish Italians for money. Goodbye!” The line went dead.

“Dad? Dad!” She cried, but it was too late. Taking a shaky breath in, letting all that sadness rush back, she knew she couldn’t have expected better from him.

Her hand touched the gold charm bracelet on her wrist; the four charms made her recall four faces, and the charm was designed as a crown, wings, a skull, and a heart. Their initials were engraved behind each one.

Her thoughts were broken by the loud moan from the next room, and thanks to her room’s thin walls, she could hear everything.

Loud whimpers echoed more as her housemate Sherry sang at the top of her lungs while being fucked; it was like menacing torture reminding her of her place.

Of her reality. How did she get here?

Two years ago she was seen as a princess, the ground worshiped by four men who—no, she should forget them.

She had work anyway and needed to come up with money for her registration at least, knowing she had taken the year off after her mother’s death.

She had run away from Italy and decided to stay in another strange city all on her own at seventeen, and now she was hoping to be nineteen soon enough.

“Oh my god!” Sadie exclaimed as she walked out of her room to see Sherry wasn’t in her room anymore but was by the shared bathroom door in the hallway, on her knees, her boyfriend’s cock in her mouth.

Sherry’s moans were sloppy at one end, making a show of taking the man deeper down her throat as his cum and spit ran down her chest, her unnaturally dyed blonde hair gripped by the man.

His cock pushed down her throat while Sadie stood stiffly, knowing Sherry wasn’t at all ashamed by her actions.

Her breasts jiggled and held a trail of juices in her cleavage that made it more obscene, her moans louder as she held on to the man’s hips, letting him cum down her throat while he groaned out his orgasm.

His eyes met Sadie’s, who felt more than uncomfortable from his dark stare branding her.

The man who stared was Sherry’s boyfriend, whom Sadie knew as Travis. He dared to look at Sadie, a smirk showing an invitation to join them, but she looked away and ran to the door instead.

“Spoilsport,” she heard Sherry mumble, but she was ready to leave; she had opened the door to see a box and a letter. The letter had a golden familiar seal with a dark blue crest.

It screamed old money and something dangerous and familiar that sent heat pooling in her core, knowing who it might be from.

Just the seal reminded her of a life in a chateau estate, four dark pairs of stormy eyes on her, and memories she had tried to erase for the past year.

She let out a cool breath, trying not to act affected as she quickly placed the envelope in her bag, not daring to open or even peek at the letter.

She didn’t want to be swayed, and a part of her knew that might be too easy if she read it.

But seeing the next packet—a brown box, poorly put together—made her stomach plummet.

The shady box held unruly writing that immediately had her heart lurch to her throat in recognition. Goosebumps rose on her skin.

She was sure it wasn’t from the same person who sent the envelope, and she was frightened about what this strange package held,

She stiffened as she realized what it meant.

Her stalker had found her!

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