...What Doesn't Kill You

Fear raced through her--every intuitive sense within her shouted. The silk she wore stuck to her skin, as sweat trickled between her breasts...she had made a fateful error...yet again. Cara looked into the cold blue eyes of her husband of three months--her fourth husband. She saw now that he had planned it all! It showed clearly in the callously smug look on his face, an expression he made no attempt to conceal. The coldness that lay in the depths of his blue eyes, eyes he made no effort to avert. How could this be happening? One tragic experience after another. Her thoughts raced through all the minute signs, the innuendos of warning. The subtle nuances of danger. She had disregarded them all. The fancy cars; the lavish spending, the trips to Europe... all a ruse. The pressure to marry him...his words echoed in her mind: I can't do this much longer, make up your mind. She hadn't even asked him what that meant, she only assumed him to be consumed by love and passion...that is what he had said. She had been battered and abused beyond her imagination. Perhaps anyone's imagination. Always shocked at the inventive minds of men and her naiveties concerning their proclivities, or was she simply ignorant. Perhaps someone should have told her not to judge others by herself. What fresh hell was this?