“So you’re still attracted to me?”
“I’ve been having more cold showers in the last week than in my entire life! Of course I’m still attracted to you, do you think that just disappears?”
She dropped her gaze. “I thought maybe the pregnancy had turned you off. Not every man would be attracted to a woman carrying another man’s child.”
“Look at me.”
He waited until she raised her gaze to his. “This baby isn’t just a part of him. It’s a part of you, too. How could anything that is a part of you turn me off?”
Wow, he always knew just what to say.
“Jacey, tell me why you were living on the streets.”
She sighed. Part of her wanted to hold back to protect herself, the other part wanted to share her burden. “I was at a work function with him, chatting to a younger business associate. Stephan was all smiles and charm until we got home. He slapped me so hard that I feel backward and hit my head. When I woke up, he had me tied to a hard, metal bench in this room I had never seen before. Turned out he had a room in his basement set up for play. He would take women there, even when we were together. It had a separate entrance as well. It was a room he’d forbidden me to enter and I, like the stupid idiot I was, obeyed him.”
“Hey, I don’t want to hear you talk like that about yourself. What did he do to you?” Derrick asked in a tight voice.
Jacey lifted her head from his chest. “Are you sure you want to know?”
Derrick tilted her head up, staring down at her. “Tell me. I have to know.”
“Well, I woke up cold, dazed and unsure of where I was. I couldn’t move, he had my arms tied above my head, a strap around my waist and my legs were raised in the air. They were split so far apart it hurt. Stephan appeared just as I was about to scream, he yanked my jaw open and stuffed a ball gag into my mouth. I hated being gagged. Of course, he did a lot of things I hated that night.”
“Like what?”
“There was the flogger, which I’d always enjoyed, but this one was much rougher, coarser, then he moved on to a paddle then the whip,” she shuddered. She hated that whip. “I was never really into pain. I finally reached a place where the pain didn’t even seem to reach me anymore, like my body had gone into overload. That’s when he put aside the cane he was using and forced me to take an anal plug.”
She swallowed hard.
“Oh baby.”
She felt Derrick tremble. Was he disgusted? Did he want her to stop?
“Keep going.”
“We’d been working toward anal sex. I thought he was being so patient, starting with a baby plug and working our way up. But this plug was massive and it hurt. Then using his own spit as lube, he had sex with me.”
“He raped you,” Derrick said in a tight voice.
“That’s not how he saw it. He told me I was his. That I wasn’t allowed to flirt with other guys, touch them, and that I was his only to do with what he liked. He untied me after that, told me to go wash up and get into bed. Do you know what? I did just that. I was so numb, in so much pain, I just washed up and curled up in bed.”
“Oh, Jacey, you can’t blame yourself for that.” He hugged her tight. “Christ, I’m just so glad you left him after that. I hope you pressed charges.”
She shook her head. She couldn’t tell him the truth. That she’d been too scared to leave him, frightened because she had nowhere to go. She’d known that her parents wouldn’t help her and she had no real friends. So she’d stayed, until the day she’d known he would no longer allow her to live.
“Stephan has friends in high places. I could never have made any charges stick.”
“So he’s out there? Free? What’s his last name?”
“Whoa.” She sat up and stared down at him. “No way.”
“No way, what?”
“No way am I telling you his last name. You are not going after him.”
He raised an eyebrow. “I assure you, I can take care of him. Quickly and quietly.”
Jacey frantically shook her head. “You don’t understand, Stephan is powerful, he could ruin you. No, I’m not telling you anything more. Besides, you said it didn’t matter, remember?”