It all happens too fast for my mind to even take it in. One moment my father is offering me this wicked grin, looking at me with no emotions, but still terrifying me to the bone when he confesses that he has tricked me once more. I feel hollow, but only for a moment, because the next I'm being pulled out of the black truck by my hair, with excessive force, by someone who is not my father.

I don't recognize the man who is treating me with so much brutality, but I know he is working with my father. My scalp is burning as if someone has set my head on fire, and my hair feels like it's being stabbed slowly with sewing needles. I cry out, but no one hears me, as there is no one for miles around. There is nothing that surrounds this monstrous building, and I know why Zayn chose this location.

Part of me hopes there is someone inside as I'm being forced to walk on the sidewalks, but there is no dogs and no one in the watchtower today. I wish I had payed attention to Zayn telling me the schedule, I wish I had fucking listened to him when he told me not to open my mouth, but I've never been one for instructions.

I keep telling myself that if I live through this, if I ever make it back alive, I will listen. I will not fucking open my mouth, I will not lie, I will not be the monster I was before. That all seems so far away, doesn't it? I wish things would work out, but I know someone is going to die tonight, death clings in the air like fog. And I've never been the girl who defies death, but I can feel it crawling on my skin like insects. I know this feeling too well, it goes beyond anxiety. I felt this way when Zayn left me the night my godfather was killed by his hands. I could feel death crawling on Zayn's skin long after he returned, when he bathed me, I could feel how insidious his touch was.

"Hurry up, Robert," my father instructs the man handling me to walk faster and he does, forcing me to pick up the pace when he holds me by the roots of my hair.

All my thoughts return to Zayn, what happened in the cabin. I wish it had never happened and now I've betrayed him, all because I'm so naive and foolish. I've been a fucking liar, I have, and I can't even make it right anymore, look at the mess I've made.

They stride confidently to the front door, where the lock pad is and where I am of no further use.

"What is the code?" My father asks nonchalantly, raising a brow at my tear stained face.

He doesn't even seem phased.

"I don't know," I respond truthfully, but an idea rises.

"Do not lie to me, tell me!" His voice grows impatient and loud.

"Try 75392."

He murmurs something under his breath and is visibly annoyed when the red light turns on, followed by a loud buzzing noise that suggests that it's the wrong code. He tries it again, this time typing the numbers much slower, only to receive the same response from the machine.

My father shakes his head, his eyes not leaving the lock pad for one moment. "Give me the code again. This time, give me the right one."

I take a deep breath. "Right. Okay. It's 75391."

When he puts the code in, he's greeted by a different response. Instead of a red light, he's gotten a brief yellow, then green. But instead of those mighty doors clicking open, a siren louder than an ambulance in your ear starts to go off at a rampant speed. It's like a storm of ear wrenching noises begin to battle each other to see which can go the loudest, and when my father begins to walk towards the truck in a fit of rage, with me following suit along with his guard, who clutches my hair like a ragdoll, they're greeted again by something unexpected. The fence door we once walked in through has been activated, not allowing us to walk through without being tortured by the electric fence. Someone is in there and I know it, they know it too.

There is adrenaline running through me despite the pain that I find myself in. My chest is swelling up in hopes that I will be able to get away from my father and this guard, and hopefully never see them again.

"You stupid, stupid idiot!" I hear my father yell, his hand making direct contact with my face.

The stinging immediately paralyzes me, the stinging in my eyes accompanying the pain I feel on my cheek. I can taste blood in my mouth, the metallic flavor not unknown to me at this point. My face feels extremely hot, but i'm not sure if it's because of how much my head hurts, or how badly I'm hurting in general.

My father becomes another man in a few seconds, the terror on his face extremely clear to me. "You're dead, Anastasia, mark my words. Dead."

Something inside me breaks, a breath I didn't know I was holding. It's like this big wall of nothing falls to pieces and all of a sudden I'm bare, exposed, feeling like a lost little girl. My father doesn't mean anything to me, but I'm so heartbroken hearing him say that to me. Perhaps it's not so much guilt that I feel, but disappointment, because it dawns on me that every man has groomed me to be whatever they want, even him. It suddenly hits me that every man has seen me as an object, a pawn, a piece of meat, and no one has ever actually seen me.

Except Zayn, despite it all, and look what I've done.

It doesn't take long before truck after truck shows up, along with men showing up at the watchtower. I see a familiar black Benz, my heart in complete panic when I see who steps out. The most hateful expression written on his perfect features, dressed in all black like he always does, cigarette in one hand. He looks beautiful in the leather jacket, hair slicked back, exuding genuine power.

My father's guard pushes me behind him, out of Zayn's sight.

"Well, well, well," he simply says when he sees my father, but not me. "Who do you have there?"

My heart is racing. "No one," my father replies, "this is all just a big misunderstanding."

"Now, now, you think I don't know who you're hiding from me? Give me the girl, now."

His words surprise me and I stumble when Robert pushes me forward out of nowhere. The man that I love stands there in shock when he sees my bloody mouth and messy, tangled hair. Zayn just stares at me for a few seconds, not knowing what to say I'm sure.

"There, see, everything is fine." My father speaks as if he wants to assure himself he'll be spared, but he is faltering.

Zayn throws his cigarette on the pavement, a clean sneaker stepping on it to put it out. "Come here, baby, come."

I do as I'm told, the softness of his voice melting away the pain I had from being away from him. He takes my hand and holds it gently in his, placing me behind him, to guard me.

He lets out a chuckle. "Why are you here?"

"Anastasia wanted to see her mother," I shake my head at my father's response, tears threatening to spill out of my burning eyes.

"You've fucked with me, with us, for the last time. Do you understand what's going to happen here?" Zayn's voice is icy and sure, I get chills.

My father doesn't say anything, and Robert doesn't either, they both look like deer caught in the headlights. I've never seen him so terrified of anything in my entire life. It's strange, how different someone is when they're full of fear.

My stomach is in knots, and I find myself wondering if I'm going to die too. I don't know why Zayn is protecting me, especially after how we left things, and it makes me uneasy when I see Liam and Harry as well.

"Get on your knees." He commands, pulling out a gun seemingly from the inside of his coat pocket. It just takes a second for them to do as told, the severity of the situation doesn't hit me until he points it at my father's forehead, the cold metal hitting him so hard he almost falls back. Beads of sweat form, the anxiety clear on his once emotionless face.

And then all I remember was Zayn carrying me to the car, my lip busted and jaw aching from how hard it was clutched. I remember speeding off into the night like a criminal, I remember my hair being smoothed in the car by a familiar touch, but I don't remember seeing my father's dead body, or Robert's. I don't remember hearing them fall to the ground, but I remember the precise sound of two gunshots, like fireworks in a deserted city, the deadly sound always terrifying, but beautiful nonetheless.

He takes me home with him, and with my head on his lap, I'm happy.