My Stepbrother's Dirty Little Secret novel Chapter 223

Chapter 223

Zen

The room was very dark and very cold. I crawled under my blankets, trying to find a place that didn’t sting, but it was like my whole body hurt and burned. Every time I moved, the pain jumped.

I bit my pillow so the guards in the hall wouldn’t hear me. I didn’t want Daddy to know I was failing.

I pulled my hand out from under the covers and looked at my fingers in the tiny bit of moonlight. There were small, round marks on the tips, angry red circles that turned into white blisters.

My feet felt like I had walked on hot coals, and the back of my arms were bleeding, like I had fallen on the gravel. I couldn’t even see the marks on my back, but when my pajamas touched my skin, it felt like a thousand tiny needles.

“Please,” I whispered, and squeezed my eyes shut, and the tears just kept coming, hot and salty against my cheeks, “Please, God. Just make me smart. Make it go away so the doctor doesn’t have to use the box anymore. If I’m perfect, Daddy will be happy. If I’m perfect, the pain will stop.”

I curled into a tiny ball, sobbing into the mattress. I just wanted to be like the other girls. I wanted to read the big books without the words dancing away. I wanted my brain to work so the man in the white coat would go away and never come back.

The sound of my bedroom door moving made me freeze. I held my breath, my heart thumping against the bed.

“Gianna?”

It was Leone.

Leone Caruso was the son of my Daddy’s underboss. My Daddy told me that I was promised to him. He said that one day, when we were all grown up, Leone would be my husband.

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