Chapter 56

-Sakura's POV-

It was the middle of the night after the sweet Valentine's dinner Sasuke and Gaara took us on when my phone went off, and I rolled over, grumbling at whoever dared wake me at such an early hour, but when I saw Sasori's name cross my screen, it was as though I'd never been asleep at all.

Since he and I have been sharing rooms so often lately, my initial reaction was to look over at the other side of my bed to see if Gaara'd been woken up by the sound, only to realize he wasn't there tonight. Then I looked over to verify the door to the bathroom was firmly closed, and when I confirmed it was, I gave myself a short, mental pep talk.

A few days ago, I sent all the members of Konan's band, other than Sasori, my updated phone number in hopes he'd somehow swipe it, and obviously, he did, or else he wouldn't be calling me right now. Step one in my plan to get proof of his awful actions against me was an outstanding success. I just have to keep being courageous. The well-being of potentially many more women, and maybe even me, hangs in the balance.

After calming down, I answered the phone in a hushed voice just in case Gaara was awake in his room, "Hello?"

There was a very long pause on the other end of the line, but the familiar voice of Sasori that brought terrified goosebumps to my skin eventually responded, "Why'd you change your number? I've been trying to get ahold of you for weeks now."

I sat up in bed and hugged a pillow for support, "I needed some time to think."

Another long pause, "We really need to talk, Babe. I'm not happy with how things went down at the party."

I swallowed the dozens of insults threatening to leave my mouth and did my best to play along with his mental instability, "I agree that things ended badly. Let's talk, then."

I held my breath, desperately hoping he'll be okay just speaking over the phone because I have it set to record all phone calls just in case, but he disappointed me, as usual, "When can we meet up? I want to see you again."

As I held back a defeated sigh, I reminded myself of my plan again. On Tuesday afternoon, there's about a two-hour window where I'll be the only one home. If any of my three housemates sees Sasori around, he might not make it out alive, so I have no choice but to keep this from them. The good thing is that one: if anything happens, it'll be on my turf, and I'll be more easily able to take control of the situation, and two: I can rig multiple cameras and recording devices without him knowing so anything and everything is documented. This type of thing is considered illegal in many countries, but not Konoha; for that, I'm eternally grateful.

Once I relayed the time and date to him, and he agreed, I hung up the phone without much of a goodbye so he wouldn't be tempted to talk more. Then I buried my face in the pillow I was holding, letting out a loud and anxious groan. If there's a god out there listening, let this go smoothly. I'm so fucking scared, but I have to do this. The last thing I need or want is to be hurt again.

Sunday, Monday, and the first half of Tuesday passed more quickly than I'd hoped, and suddenly it was time for me to see Sasori in person for the first time since he tried to force himself on me in that bathroom.

All according to plan, the other three didn't come home once our vocal lesson finished like I did. I know Sasuke and Hinata have an interview with the producers of True Talent. In this competitive television show, famous singers are challenged to write, compose, and perform a song from scratch. It's impressive just to have been invited to talk because there's not been a single celebrity on that show that's career hasn't benefited from it.

Gaara and I were also invited, but I said no for my mental health because I'm dealing with a lot right now, and worrying about something like that will just worsen it. Gaara said no for the dumbest reason ever, though. In his own words, he's not talented enough to perform solo and doesn't want to disappoint anyone by not doing well. Oh, I could've slapped him silly right then and there. He's completely wrong, obviously, but he wouldn't listen to any of us when we tried to convince him of it. So, the redhead said he had a few errands to run and disappeared before we could ask any questions.

After trying to productively use my nervous energy to pick up our already-clean house, I ran out of things to do while waiting for him to arrive and ended up pacing back and forth while biting my thumbnail. The memories of how he'd hurt me so severely were playing through my mind like a slideshow, making the skin on my lower back and around my neck tingle and burn uncomfortably.

I can still feel him gripping my wrists so tightly as he pinned them against my back and- No, no. Feeding into those thoughts will only make things worse.

I replaced the chain of the necklace he gave me for Christmas and put it in the box it came in yesterday. I plan to give it back to him because even if I have zero respect for a monster like him, I can't bring myself to keep something someone spent thousands of dollars on when I don't want it. Besides, knowing Sasori, if I don't give it back, he'll take it as some twisted sign that I secretly still want to be with him.

Another fifteen minutes passed before I checked my phone and realized he was almost an hour late. If he doesn't get here soon, the others might come home before he can leave, which will be another mess of its own.

Just like I planned, every room on the first floor of this house has at least one recording device, the family room having three, one of which is taking video and not just audio. There's no room for mistakes. If I'm not one hundred percent confident in his eyes, he may catch on to what I'm trying to do, and there's no doubt he'll get violent if that happens.

Finally, a knock came at the door that made me physically jump. Slowly, I took a deep and calming breath before opening it and moving to the side so Sasori could enter. I regret to admit that he looks as handsome as always, which makes me want to be physically sick. Someone capable of the things he's done should have to wear their crimes on their skin, like ugly tattoos or scars, to warn others of the danger.

To my surprise, he didn't utter a single word as he pretended to be polite by removing his shoes from the door and hanging his coat on the rack. Then he dropped the act and helped himself into the kitchen to pour himself a drink. When he offered me one, I accepted only because I watched to make sure he didn't put anything in it, and if I refused, he might get offended. Once we sat on the large sofa in the family room, he angled his body slightly toward me, and I mimicked him.

"You've been doing well."

It wasn't a question but a statement. He's right, too. Prestige's popularity has skyrocketed since our newest album was released, more so than even Kakashi or Tenten anticipated. Unbeknownst to him, I've also been making much progress in therapy. For example, my ability to manage my fear has improved substantially. If it hadn't, there's no way I'd be able to sit in front of him like this and at least appear calm and collected.

Feeling the tension thicken, I nodded, "How have you been since…?" I really want to ask how he's been since he tried to assault me for the second time, but understandably couldn't just say that, or my plan would be ruined.

Sasori sat his glass down on a coaster on the coffee table, and I mirrored his action to show him that I was giving him my full attention, even if he didn't deserve it. When he reached over and pulled one of my hands from my lap so he could hold it between his, I came so close to flinching but somehow managed not to. Where his skin met mine, burnt hot like an iron. His face looks so apologetic, but I know he's faking it, which makes me want to punch his lights out.

"I can't begin to find the right words to describe how much I regret what happened. How I acted was completely out of line."

I silently searched his face for a few moments, waiting for him to continue. Rather than do so, he squirmed a little under my gaze, and that's when I realized that's all he planned on saying. With those two sentences, he thought everything would be okay and I'd forgive him.

Biting back my anger and disbelief, I took another deep breath before gingerly pulling my hand out of his grasp. I could tell immediately that he didn't like that one bit, but he didn't move or say anything to stop me.

"Sasori, I thought you wanted to talk about why you did what you did, not just acknowledge the fact that it happened and you were in the wrong." I tried my very best to keep my tone as sincere and non-accusatory as possible to not trigger his mean streak.

The redheaded man remained silent while studying my face before averting his gaze down to his hands and speaking sternly, "I don't know. I haven't really thought about it."

My face got hot in an instant, the disbelief and hurt and anger overwhelming me, but I desperately tried to use what I've learned in therapy to keep it under control, "Y-You're saying you haven't thought about why you hurt someone you care about like you did?"

Fuck. My voice wavered. Light brown eyes locked onto mine the moment it did, and it was apparent he was done playing nice because he realized he still had power over me. Sasori knows I'm still scared.

"I did what I did because I loved you. I still do, babe. I thought you wanted it."

My breath hitched, and I could've actually hit myself when tears began rising in my eyes. Those god-awful memories started playing again. Blinking rapidly to try and keep the waterworks at bay, I tried to argue. My ability to stay on task is slipping right through my fingers. These emotions are just too strong. I'm too affected by all this to keep it together.

"Exactly what part of me crying and telling you to stop said I wanted it?"

His brow furrowed, "I thought you were just being a baby. It couldn't have actually hurt that bad."

The tears finally overflowed, and I reached up with shaking fingers to wipe at them as calmly as possible, glaring at him firmly, "I had to go to the hospital, Sasori. You did a lot of damage."

The drummer shook his head, leaning back against the back of the sofa with a frown, "You're lying."

My mouth fell open in shock, and the last bit of self-control walked right out the door. I stood and started walking toward my bedroom to retrieve the package Dr. Nobu sent me, "No, I'm not, and I'll prove it!"

As I knelt down to reach the bottom drawer of my dresser, my new hiding spot for the traumatizing items, I heard the door to my bedroom shut and cringed, eyes squeezing closed. I fucked up. I turned my back to him, and being the predator that he is, he took advantage of the opportunity to gain the upper hand. Very much visibly trembling, I retrieved the package and stood while pretending not to be affected, hoping it'd intimidate him enough not to approach further.

"Here, look at all of this."

He accepted the package and pulled out its contents, eyes widening slightly as he looked at picture after picture before making it to the written doctor's statement and silently reading it. Then those sand-colored eyes darted up to meet mine, narrowed dangerously, "You told them I raped you?"

I shook my head, my fear rising tenfold. These things did the opposite of what I hoped and only pissed him off, "No, they figured it out on their own. I-I didn't tell them your name or anything."

"Then why do you even have these pictures? Is it your plan to use them against me or something?"

The blood drained from my face, and I lifted my hands slightly in defense, "N-No, Sasori, that's not it!"

The sound of shredding cut through the air like thunder, and I watched in disbelief as he tore every item in his hands into small pieces, letting the remains fall to the carpet at his feet. His enraged eyes bore into mine for what felt like a lifetime, but then he was coming at me. A small scream passed my lips as I tried to fight against him and failed, my lower back slamming against the dresser's edge.

He wrapped his hands around my throat and glared, "You won't pull something like that again. Do you understand me?" I nodded, all but sobbing as I clawed at his wrists in an attempt to loosen his grip so I could inhale.

After choking me for a few seconds, he loosened his hold and shoved his lips against mine. I didn't dare move until he finally removed his hands from around my neck to grasp my wrists and wrestle my hands down to the dresser behind me. Then I tried to bite him and succeeded in bloodying his bottom lip.

He cursed as he pulled away, eyes alight with ire, "You bitch!"

Taking advantage of his weakness, I brought my knee up as hard as possible between his legs. When it connected, he gasped as though all the air in his body had been sucked out and released me so he could cup the injured area of his body. I shoved past him and made a break for the door, but he somehow reached out and grabbed my arm with one hand.

I sobbed loudly as I tried to claw his hand away, pulling with all my might, but he recovered enough from my hit to slap me hard across the face. The force of it threw me off balance, and when he tried to go for another one, I caught his hand, and he ended up wrestling me down to the ground.

"S-Stop! Please stop!"

His knees were at my hips' sides as he held my arms above my head with one hand and ripped my t-shirt with the other. I hit his back with my knees and tried to buck him off, but he took all the damage with a terrifying expression. Then he buried his face in my neck and bit and sucked at my skin, obviously trying to put marks on me again since his other ones had faded entirely. I could wrench my arms out of his grasp and began hitting his shoulders and trying to shove him off me, but he wasn't budging.

Rather than try to pin me down again, he ignored my struggle as he covered my mouth with one hand to muffle my cries and pulled my shirt's torn cloth off my shoulder so he could sink his teeth into it. My scream was muffled by his palm.

A familiar pressure began pushing against my lower stomach, and bile rose in my throat. How is this turning him on? He's disgusting! He's a fucking monster! The dread from before and the gut-wrenching and soul-sucking feeling of doom finally set in as I realized I could not escape. This isn't worth it anymore if I'm just going to be hurt like last time all over again.

I can tell he's biting me hard enough that I'm bleeding, and it hurts so damn much. My nails are bloody, too, from clawing at him.

His lips moved against my skin as he removed his teeth from my flesh, "Don't go to the hospital this time. I mean it."

My vision became so blurred by my heavy crying that I couldn't even see the ceiling above me, and my lungs burnt from breathing so hard and trying to yell at him to stop. Sasori straightened his spine, straddling my hips, and unbuttoned and unzipped my jeans. I shoved his torso and tried to slide out from under him, which only seemed to piss him off further because he struck me across the face again before pulling my wrists up against his stomach and holding them against him as firmly as possible. At the same time, he moved to unbuckle his belt.

I sobbed, realizing somewhere in my hysteria that he'd just busted my lip, "S-Sasori, please! Sasori…" My nails tried to dig through his shirt to hurt him in any way, shape, or form, but he ignored it.

The begging and pleading seemed to throw him off guard, and he released my hands and moved back on top of me to try pulling my jeans down. I sat up, kicking and punching him, "Get off of me!"

Sasori couldn't get my pants lower than even my underwear before I landed a good hit to the side of his face, and then he was trying to come down on top of me again. I managed to slip my legs out from under him and almost reached my feet, but he grabbed the side of my head and slammed me against the wall, knocking me senseless.

A ragged gasp passed my lips as I tried to reach up to see if I was bleeding, but my legs gave out from under me, and I became too dizzy to fight nearly as hard. I hit the ground hard, a sickening heat rising from my chest to my face, then into my head as it throbbed.

When Sasori straddled my waist again, I weakly tried to push him away, but it was all in vain. His lips shoved roughly against mine, my fingernails digging into his shoulders as I tried to shove him back.

Suddenly, there was a loud slam, and he wasn't on top of me anymore. Everything begged me to rest, to allow myself to pass out, but I couldn't. The sound coming every couple of seconds from nearby is undoubtedly someone getting hit repeatedly, and I don't know who it is.

Shaking with effort, I rolled over onto my hands and knees before grabbing the edge of the bed for leverage and pulling myself upright. My vision swirled and blurred, making me stumble, but I somehow managed not to fall and looked over to realize it was Gaara there, beating the living hell out of Sasori with a dark, calm expression as though he was in some sort of trance. My abuser wasn't moving, and I realized he might kill him if I didn't do something.

Tears rolled down my face; I tried to go to his side but stumbled and fell to one knee. When I tried to get up again, the pain in my head became too much to bear, and I winced as I looked up, "Gaara…Stop."

He froze instantly, bloody fist raised, ready to go in for another hit. He was trembling; I could tell even in my dizzied state. Oh God, he's so angry. I can tell he doesn't want to stop. He wants to keep going so badly.

I sobbed, "I-I'm sorry, Gaara, but please…."

My bandmate's head turned slowly so he could meet my eye, and then it was like he snapped out of whatever stupor he was in, and he gasped, getting to his feet and coming around the bed to kneel in front of me, "Are you alright? I didn't hurt you, did I?" Teal eyes frantically looked over my torn clothes and bloodied and bruised shoulder.

I shook my head and came down to both knees before him as I wiped at my face with severely shaking hands. Sasori… almost got me yet again. He might've killed me this time around if Gaara hadn't shown up when he did.

A gasp came from behind me, and I tried to turn and see who it was, only to get overwhelmed by my dizziness and fall slightly to the side. Gaara quickly wrapped his arms around me, and I closed my eyes, turning to press them against the inside of his elbow because it somehow helped manage my instability.

"Call the police." His voice was low and dangerous, but he held me gently.

Hinata's voice came from right next to us, and I wanted to look up at her but knew it'd be impossible, so I just listened, "D-Did he…?"

"I don't think so, but she's hurt."

Then Sasori suddenly spoke again, his voice ragged after undoubtedly having at least his nose broken and bloodied, "Of course, you'd be the one to play hero, you sad, jealous fuck."

The unmistakable sound of someone being hit met my ears again, and I struggled upright in Gaara's arms, not caring how dizzy it made me because I had to be sure it wasn't one of my friends getting hurt. To my utter shock, Hinata was holding a handful of his shirt, and her fist was raised in his face after clearly just landing a good hit to it. Her expression was one I'd never seen and never wanted to see again. She looked ready to commit murder.

Sasuke quickly came around and pulled her away from the redhead, "Back up, you idiot! What're you thinking? Go call the cops!"

"If she gives you a chance, it's only because you look like me, asshole." Sasori, somehow still conscious after all that, taunted.

Gaara and Hinata looked like they were about to fight Sasuke so they could have another go at him, but I cut them off by rising onto my knees so I could meet Sasori's eye over Gaara's shoulder. "It's him…."

Everyone looked at me, and I weakly wrapped an arm around my redheaded bandmate's neck and rested my chin on his shoulder in an attempt not to fall again, "I-It's always been him, not you."

Sasuke and Hinata made eye contact before she wordlessly turned and left the room while dialing the police on her phone. He turned Sasori over onto his stomach to pin his arms behind his back and prevent him from moving.

The arms around me tightened as I gave up and collapsed against Gaara. He shakily guided my head to his other shoulder, where I buried my face into his shirt to muffle my crying, so he could move the cloth of my torn t-shirt away from where Sasori bit me, "You're bleeding!"

I just hugged him tighter and tried to put the more significant concern into words, "My head…." Now that the adrenaline's fading, the throbbing is almost unbearable. He switched his arms so he could hold me with his right and gently ran his fingers into my hair to feel for a bump. When he found it, I winced.

"Don't go to sleep, okay? Stay awake."

I nodded slightly, and we were quiet for a minute or two before sirens could finally be heard in the very far distance. Worried he might feel weird about what I said to Sasori, I tried to explain, "I'm sorry about before. Please don't feel like-"

"We don't have to talk about this right now." A tug at his voice made my stomach churn unhappily because it was similar to when he was talking badly about himself and saying he wasn't talented enough to go on True Talent.

Trembling, I pulled back to meet his gaze, my vision blurry, "I-I'm trying to tell you that I love you, Gaara."

His jaw flexed, and the concern on his face only got more potent, "Sakura, you're delirious. You don't know what you're saying right now. Just relax until the ambulance gets here." He tried to pull me down to rest against him again, but I put my hands on either of his shoulders to still him.

"No, I mean it. I've been trying to keep it to myself for weeks because your friendship means so much…." A sharp pain rang through my skull, and I winced, lowering my head, but kept going after taking a strengthening breath, "If you don't feel the same way, please be honest, and we can act like this conversation never happened. Just don't pretend, for my sake. That's the last-"

"I love you too, so stop talking, okay? You're hurt, Sakura, please."

This time when he tried to get me to relax, I let him and squeezed my eyes closed, "Are you serious?"

He held me more firmly against him, minding my injured shoulder, "I've loved you from the moment I first saw you at Yoko's."

My heartbeat picked up substantially, and I tried to hug him, but he held me still, so all I could do was cry happy and relieved tears into his shoulder and wait for the paramedics to arrive.