“I’m fine.” I raised a hand, gesturing to the door that she’d come through, and put my chin back on my knees.
The girl raised a dark brow. “Sure?”
I raised my own in return. I desperately wanted to tell her to fuck off, but I wasn’t sure of her role. Maybe she was close to Beast. Maybe if I told her where to stick her head, I would get something stuck in me. I ground my teeth, letting my eyes do the talking as the shining girl continued to advance.
She glanced over at a painting that hung across from the bed, looked at me, and frowned. She walked to a corner in the room. I looked at the painting as well, but all I saw was what I had been seeing: abstract lines. Maybe she was really into realism. Frowning, I focused on her.
“What? What is it you want?” I asked. My fear was like blood. Try as I might to stymy it, it flowed freely from me.
From the corner in the room, the girl raised her shirt, revealing a set of dark purple bruises. Some of them were turning a garish yellow color, but most were deep indigo, even black. I frowned, then looked up at her. She didn’t even flinch, but it must hurt. It had to hurt.
Before I could respond, the girl lowered her shirt. “We women have to stick together,” she said.
Hours later I sat on the bed, staring at the spot where the girl had been, seeing her bruises in my mind. Her name was Gabby and she’d only stayed for thirty minutes, but it felt like we’d talked for hours. At first Gabby seemed like a superhero to me the way she carried her bruises, someone to come and save me, but after talking with her, I knew otherwise.
She was only eighteen and she’d been married for four years.
My knees were still to my
chest when I heard the door open and close, the same door Gabby had walked through. I didn’t bother looking up; I knew who it was, and I doubted he would be as kind as she had been.
The weight of the bed shifted when he sat down next to me and I hugged my knees tighter. Seconds later his callused hands captured my chin, pulling my gaze to his. There was a softness in his features that I’d never seen before. In the brief glimpses of tenderness before this moment, hardness had always remained, like a turtle in a shell. Here, though, he was almost exposed.
Almost.
My eyes widened, trying to drink in this rare moment.
Don’t get me wrong—this wasn’t the moment where everything changed. The Beast didn’t suddenly become a prince with a name and normal human emotions. He didn’t apologize and let me go back to my family. The softness was just the closest I got to a sorry.
A normal person would say sorry. The Beast wasn’t a normal person, though. This wasn’t a normal situation. The Beast looked at me softly and tenderly, and I stared back. My eyes were watery but I hadn’t cried. Even when the girl had shown me kindness, I hadn’t cried. My blood might flow, but dammit, I would stop the tears. Eventually I tore my eyes away and with a subtle caress of my jaw, he dropped his hand from my chin.
I guessed his actions were his way of saying only he could have me, which, if I have to live in his world, was somewhat comforting. At least I only had to take abuse from him. Little by little, I was understanding the Beast. I didn’t always like what I learned, but at least I knew. I’d rather belong to one psychopath than an entire club of them.
When I glanced back, Beast’s gaze was on me, hard like a punch to the gut. I sucked in my breath and wet my lips. I knew I should look away but I couldn’t; his bluegreen gaze was hypnotic. He was done playing games, done apologizing in his own way. He was ready for what was his. Any other person would recognize that someone who had nearly been raped needed time to rest, but not the Beast. There was no off switch for the Beast. He could kill a person and then fuck someone right after without blinking an eye.
But it felt like more than that—it was animalistic, like marking territory. I could feel the need coming off of him in waves, and I at least begrudged him the restraint he was showing me. He was so wired, so tense, the need to mark what was his obvious by the veins on his neck, the need to make it indisputable that I belonged to him clear by the way his viscera coiled and throbbed. I was sure that should have terrified me, or at least pissed me off.
But as I focused on him, on the hunger in his deep bluegreen eyes, I felt it too—the hunger, the carnal need. It was so deep, I knew it would never leave me. It had somehow rooted itself so deep inside me, to remove it would mean death. It was petrifying but also exhilarating.
Suddenly the Beast shifted. With even, calculated movements, he turned next to me. My mind screamed at me. I was losing some kind of important battle. There was no coming back from this. Still, I didn’t care. All I saw was how he sat next to me and gently placed a hand on my shoulder, lifting up the tatters of my dress. All I felt was him peeling the strips of cloth off me, one by one. I studied him, fascinated. He was kind of gentle. It was like watching those YouTube videos of bears playing with humans. I kept waiting for the bottom to fall out, for the bear to rip the human apart.
He never did.
He peeled the tatters of my fairytale off one by one, the only sound between us our breaths—his even, mine increasingly erratic. When he was finished, I was in my sparkly, barely-there silver lingerie. I put my knees back to my chest, but he grasped one. I sucked in my breath, waiting for him to force my legs down. Instead, he caressed my knee. Wide-eyed, I stared at his thumb rubbing over my bare skin.
Gently, he pushed at my knee, and I let them fall open. Instead of looking down, I looked up, looked at him. With his eyes never leaving mine, he placed his palm on me, over the lace lingerie that guarded me. I gasped at the contact. It somehow felt more intimate this way, more invading. I don’t know why. I don’t know why this way, with fabric separating us, it was more intimate.
I waited, waited for him to rip the silver lace away or push me back against the bed. The lingering expectation became excruciating. His hand moved. Mine grasped the fabric of the bed. Breath left my body in a silent plea as he slowly stroked up and down.
I had a faint thought that I should say something, tell him to go away, but instead I arched up for him, my body asking what my words couldn’t. His stroking didn’t get harder or faster, just that same torturously slow, delicate rhythm. It was as if he knew I would have to press myself against him, move against him, writhe against him.
Puffs of air left my body faster and faster. My chocolate hair fell in front of my face and I felt mercy that I didn’t have to watch. Maybe if I didn’t see it, I could pretend it never happened.
That warm, melted caramel feeling swam and curled through me. My toes curled and uncurled. My head fell back as I let out a small sigh and wetness pooled between my thighs. Briefly, I wondered about how I’d promised I would never would cry again and how I was already breaking my promise. He climbed on top of me, bluegreen eyes shadowed under a demanding brow. I reached for him, held him as if the moment would shatter the minute I let go.
Because it would.
I knew that if I kept looking at him I would get sucked under, I would give myself up—so I turned away and released him.