His hand stroked the underside of my chin idly.
“What’s the first thing you remember?”
“The very first thing?”
“And no bullshit about remembering when you left the womb. Those aren’t real memories.”
“No. I remember…”
I closed my eyes and thought back. Back to when I was four, maybe five.
“I remember my mom taking me on a picnic in the park. There was a field, a huge field of clover. It probably wasn’t that big, not really, but to me it looked like an ocean of green. My mom told me to look for a four-leaf clover. If I found one, it would be lucky.”
“Did you find one?”
I shook my head.
“I didn’t even look. There was a dandelion, big and yellow, and I picked that instead. You remember what they said when we were kids? You had to smell the dandelion while thinking about someone you love. And if your nose turned yellow that meant they loved you back.”
“Who did you think about?”
“I didn’t think about anyone. Is that weird? I didn’t care about that. I wished for my parents to love each other instead.”
“And?”
“It didn’t work. I don’t even remember getting home from the picnic. I must have blocked it out. He… I don’t think he loved anyone. I don’t know why my mom stayed with him.”
“It’s hard to leave. My mother didn’t leave, either.”
His hand had stopped moving against my skin. I could tell that he was off in the past, thinking about it.
“You couldn’t have done anything to stop it.”
His eyes narrowed, found mine.
“How do you know that?”
“You can’t do anything when it’s like that. They’re not going to change. I thought—I thought that if I stopped asking for toys, stopped wanting anything, that my dad would be happier. I thought that if I stayed locked inside myself that he wouldn’t be bothered by me. I didn’t want to be a burden at all. I didn’t want to make him angry. But it didn’t work.”
“It wasn’t you.”
“Tell that to a five-year old kid,” I said, laughing sadly. “But it wasn’t you, either. You couldn’t have stopped him.”
“I could have killed him,” he said.
I was quiet. There wasn’t any anger in his eyes, only regret.
“Where’s your father now?” I asked.
“I don’t know,” he said. “If I knew, I would have killed him already. Sometimes I think that’s the only way to stop the shadow from coming back. But I’ve looked and looked. He got away.”
“I’m sorry.”
“I’ve stopped looking for him. Maybe he’s dead already.”
The silence between us was so intimate. I wanted to lean forward and kiss him, hug him, pull him into my arms and tell him that it would be alright. But there was nothing that would be alright, not with him. Not with me.
“Your turn,” I whispered.
“What can I do now?” he asked. He didn’t expect an answer - it sounded more like a cry to heaven than a real question.
How could I answer him? I didn’t know what it was like to be a killer. I didn’t know what it was like to want to murder people, to have that dark of a need. I reached up and took his hand, brought it to my lips. All the while I looked into his eyes.
If I was never going to escape this place, I could do this for him.
“I want you to take it out on me,” I said. “Everything.”
His desperation turned into something else. His eyes boiled with emotion, so strange after seeing him blank for so long. The room was growing brighter with the rising sun.
“I don’t want to kill you,” he said, his voice cracking.
“Don’t kill me. Come close. Hurt me. Here.”
I lifted my wrists to him. What was I asking him?
For exactly what you want.
There was a part of me, long hidden, that had desires. Dark desires. When he’d bound me by my wrists and tortured me with his tongue, they had come out. When his hand spanked my skin red, they had screamed with pleasure. I wanted this. I wanted him. I wanted to be his.
“Tie me up,” I said. “Do whatever you need to do. I want it too.”
He looked up at me.
“You don’t want it. Not really. If you knew what my shadow wanted—”
“You’re not the only one with the shadow,” I whispered.
He paused for a moment, his eyes searching mine.
“I wanted to die for so long,” I said, my voice hoarse with emotion. “I didn’t feel anything but a numb kind of pain. When I’m with you... it goes away.”
“I’ll hurt you.” He said it so softly the words felt invisible.
“I want you to hurt me.”
“Badly. I might leave marks.”
I turned my wrists around, showing off the only scars I had.
“I’m already marked. Besides,” I said, “who else is going to see them?”
Gav
Take it out on me
, she said. And here the shadow slipped, revealing an emotion I haven’t felt in a while.
Fear.
Her wrists defied me to hurt her. How could I hurt her more than she had already been hurt?
“Why would you do this?” I asked.
“I’m trapped here.”
She stopped trying to beg me. Stopped trying to plead. Instead, she spoke calmly and rationally. Prescribing a course of action for my disease.
“Is there any other alternative?” she asked. “If you don’t want to kill me…”
“I don’t want to hurt you.”
That was a lie. I wanted to turn her flesh red and make her scream. But I wanted to please her at the same time. I wanted to plunge myself into her. I wanted to shatter her and put her back together.
“You’re too late. I can’t be hurt anymore. Not by you. Not by anyone.”
I took her wrists in my hand and pulled them up over her head. Her eyes went wide with fright. She was right to be frightened. I was frightened by what I was going to do.
“We’ll see, kitten,” I said.
Kat
I couldn’t stop looking at him as he got out the rope.
“Put out your hands,” he said. I did. I was obedient, a good pet, playing along even though it wasn’t a game anymore. The rest of my life was here with him, and I told myself I might as well enjoy it. But there was no need to pretend. When he wrapped the rope around my wrists four times, a thrill ran up my arms.
As he tightened the knot around the middle, I couldn’t help but smile. I was scared. I was already thinking about what he would do to me once he had me all tied down. Before, I was ashamed, thinking about what people would say if they knew I went along willingly. But there was a lightness that I hadn’t felt in a long, long while. Nobody was here to see me, nobody was ever going to know.
Nobody would know that I wanted this. No one except him.
The knots tied my wrists together this time, and he wrenched them above my head.
“Why are you smiling, kitten?”
His free hand slid down roughly over my body.
“Because I want this.”
For the first time in a long time, I let myself feel desire. The ache between my legs grew as his hand slid down between my thighs, and I embraced the ache, let it grow.
He kissed me roughly, insistently, his lips tearing the breath away from my lungs. I gasped as he broke away from the kiss.
His cock was hard through his pants, against my leg. He breathed hot and fast, one hand still pinning my wrists above my head. His hand rumpled my dress up at my waist.
I could feel how much he wanted me, and it made me long for him to fill me. No longer did I feel ashamed. This was my body, my desire, and I owned it.
His hand was kneading my skin through the fabric. There was no way to take my dress off now that my wrists were bound together. I grinned.
“Should have undressed me before you tied me up,” I said.
He slapped me across the face, hard. The shock of the blow ran through me like lightning, but he was kissing my lips before I could recover, biting my lower lip, sucking my flesh.
It hadn’t been a slap to hurt, just to surprise. And it surprised me.
He swung a leg over my waist, straddled me. Before I could lower my arms he had grabbed the collar of my dress and ripped. The fabric tore easily in his fists. Soon my dress was nothing but scraps of silk over my naked body.
“You’re not wearing underwear, kitten,” he said. I lifted my chin.
God, I wanted him. His cock was hot and throbbing; I could feel it against my stomach as he leaned over. He kissed me so softly, so tenderly. The gentleness of his kiss sent me into a spiral of pure easy bliss, so easy that I began to drift away.
Then he twisted my nipple hard. Pain shot through my chest.
I yelped, bucking underneath him. He pinned my wrists back easily and licked the side of my neck, then bit down gently. The pain in my nipple had turned into a burning that ran hot through my nerves. I felt every bit of his touch as he grazed the top of my hot nipple with his thumb.
His fingers pinched down again, and I squealed. God, the heat! Despite the pain, I felt myself grow wet between my thighs.
“I’m going to suck you,” he whispered. “Then I’m going to bite you.”
I moaned as his mouth moved down below my ear, his tongue flicking my earlobe. He was careful not to let any part of him touch me between my thighs, where already I was aching.
His hand kneaded my shoulder muscle as his mouth took my nipple inside. His tongue slipped down, sliding along the underside of my breast. Then he sucked, and I inhaled sharply. It was a different kind of pain than before, and it seemed as though his lips were sucking me down where I desperately needed it. I twisted under his hold.
“Impatient kitten,” he murmured.
“Please—”
His hand was at my throat, choking me. The pressure made me tight, my throat aching along with the rest of me. He kissed me on the lips as he choked me, stopping any attempts for breath.
“No
,” I tried to moan, but he pressed down harder, cutting off my air. I thrashed underneath him, my legs kicking. I didn’t want this. I didn’t want him to kill me! I wanted—
I wanted to live.
At the last second, he released my throat. I coughed, gasping for air. My throat wheezed as I tasted the delicious oxygen, drawing it deep into my lungs.
“Scared now, kitten?” he asked. His eyes blazed with desire, desire that I echoed. I wanted him, yes. I wanted him badly. I wanted everything he could offer. But I knew that he would only hurt me more if I told him this.
His fingers plunged between my thighs and I gasped. His lips parted and he brought his hand up, his skin gleaming with my moisture. He licked his fingers.
“You taste delicious.”
I whimpered. I wanted his mouth on me, wanted him to ease the ache that shot through my core and made me twitch against the bedsheets.
“Do you want me to taste you, kitten?” he asked. There was a danger in his eyes.
“Yes,” I said softly.
He smiled, a dangerous smile.
“It’s too bad we’re not doing what you want today.”
Before I could even open my mouth to ask him what he meant, he had his hands on my hips. He flipped me over onto my stomach, and I landed hard, my breath rushing out of me. As I inhaled, he spanked me on the ass, his hand landing with a smack that sent a spasm through my body. I kicked out.
“Lift your ass up for me, kitten,” he said.
I moaned, obeying. I raised myself to show him, in the most vulnerable position I had ever been in. Like a bitch in heat. It should have been degrading, but instead it turned me on intensely. I was so wet, I could feel my juices running down my thighs.
“Dirty kitten.”
He spanked me again, then again. The fourth time, my skin was so sensitive that it stung like flame. I jerked on the bed away from him, but he dragged me back. The spanks came hard and hot, sizzling on my skin. I cried out, twisting under his hands, but he did not stop. Every blow seared me, and despite the pain I began to rock back to meet him. I wanted it, every bit of pain, every fiery spank.
Then I felt his fingers slide down over my slit, stroking the outside part of me.
“Yes,” I moaned. “Yes, please, oh god, please—”
He spanked me hard and I cried out.
“No begging, kitten,” he said. “I’ll do what I want to, when I want to, and nothing you say can stop it.”
I choked out a sound of assent. His hand came back. Hot. Teasing. His fingers slid around the outside of my slick flesh, then probed in lightly.
More. Oh god, I needed more. I needed it now.
“Mmmmm,” I said. I rocked back, trying to get him to put his fingers in farther. Again he spanked me. I cried out. This was agony, all of it, wanting him and hating him and needing him.
He thrust two fingers in up to his knuckle, and although it was not enough it was better than before. I bit down on the sheet in front of me and tried not to make any noise as he slid his fingers in and out. The rhythm was slow, his long hard fingers pressing, probing me.
Then I felt something else. His thumb, pressing at my asshole. I froze.
“Ah, kitten,” he said. “Something that scares you?”
I breathed fast, trying not to move at all. I’d never done anything like this before, and it scared me, maybe more than anything else he’d done. His thumb circled the sensitive puckered flesh, making me clench. His two fingers continued their rhythm again, plunging deep into my slit. Sliding out. All the while his thumb circling, circling wet and slick around the place I’d never thought could feel good.
And it did feel good. His thumb massaged me, kneaded me, grazing over my opening and then pressing down on the muscled ring around it. When he finally pushed down with his thumb and entered me, though, I cried out, my body tensing around him. The aching pressure inside of me leapt to a new edge of desire. This was a sensation I’d never felt, and it sent thrills of pain and pleasure through me.
He left his thumb inside me, his fingers still working themselves in and out of my slick folds. I tightened and relaxed in alternating spasms, until my body relaxed around him, accepting him. Then he began to push again, his thumb penetrating me. He rolled the pad of his thumb around the inside of my pucker, slicking me with my own juices.