I’ll come back for you, Billy. I promise, I’ll come back.
Cold sweat broke out over my skin as one violent tremor after another ripped through me. I wanted to believe it was my body’s endless craving for that fleeting high I’d gone seeking earlier tonight, but I knew better. The reality was that what the man in the next room had given me had been more all-consuming than any substance my captors and my pimp—and later myself—had used to extinguish the burning need to fight back.
My encounter with him today had been the ultimate mind fuck, just like it’d been eight years ago. Only I was no longer the stupid kid who believed in shit like hope.
I closed my eyes and tried to slow my breathing as I let my back slide down the smooth wood of my bedroom door. I knew I needed to reach up and flip the lock above the knob, but I was afraid to release the hold I had on myself. Besides, Luca had already proven that what I’d considered decent quality tumbler pin locks weren’t going to keep him out. The only weapon against mind-fucking was mind-fucking. I might not have understood that when I’d been fourteen and he’d promised me things he’d had no intention of delivering on, but I’d had plenty of time to practice the concept.
Too bad I hadn’t remembered that fact when I’d needed it most.
Like when Luca had eyed me up and down like I was some kind of tasty treat. While I’d been drowning in recognition even before Aleks had introduced me to the man, Luca hadn’t suffered from the same problem. At most, he’d seen something in me that might have been vaguely familiar but nothing more.
It’d been the perfect opportunity for me to escape the entire encounter with no one being the wiser. If I’d just brushed off any kind of attempt at polite conversation after the introductions, my best friend and his boyfriend would have briefly wondered about my odd reaction before forgetting about it entirely, and Luca might have passed the whole thing off as me being shy or quirky.
But instead of swallowing the realization that the man who’d changed the trajectory of my life had had no clue who I was, I’d let the white-hot anger inside me off its leash and I’d punched the son of a bitch as hard as I could.
If that hadn’t been bad enough, I’d actually forgotten how the game was played and I’d let the fucker see what he’d done to me… what his empty promises had done to me.
Game.
Set.
Match.
I might have gotten my say after finding Luca in my apartment, but it was a hollow victory. I’d won the battle but lost the war.
Though, admittedly, I hadn’t really won the battle. I’d just walked away from it, declaring myself the victor before he could.
Some victor I was.
I reached up to run my hand through my hair but caught myself at the last second. Instead, I dropped it and ran my fingers over the bruised knuckles that were now a dark, ugly-looking purple color. I hadn’t thought to see if Luca wore any kind of matching mark on his face and I was kind of glad about that.
I wasn’t sure why that was, though.
Probably because I didn’t really know if I wanted there to be a bruise there or not.
I knew what I should want, but what if what I should want and what I did want weren’t the same?
I dropped my hands so I could wrap my arms around my legs as I drew them up to my chest. I was actually grateful for the painful sensations that began firing beneath my skin as my body’s physical needs began to show themselves again. My stomach cramped at the same time that saliva flooded my mouth. I could practically feel the heroin at the back of my throat and the pinch of the needle as it pierced my skin.
That was something I knew I could do battle with and win.
Heroin or meth or whatever drug I chose to pump into my bloodstream was just another guy trying to pin me down so he could use me like I was nothing. And maybe that guy was right… maybe I was nothing, but that wasn’t something he or anyone got to decide for me ever again. I’d paid for my freedom a hundred times over and when I was ready to give it up for good, it would be my decision.
Not some drug’s.
And not some slick asshole’s who dressed the part.
I shuddered as I tried to wipe the memory of Luca from my mind. But just like the stubborn bastard who’d actually had the balls to try and save face with a worthless apology, the image of him in even the furthest recesses of my mind ignored my silent command to leave me alone.