The thought stayed with me, but it took an entire week for me to figure out what to do with it. The answer came to me, lying here with a head full of vile images. All the things that had been done to me, all the things I’d been forced to do. Never a choice. I never had a choice. Even Derek rescuing me had been against my will. I’d protested, and he’d ignored me.
He’d chosen to kidnap me, to make me a slave, to sell me, and then not to sell me. He’d chosen where we ran to, and then chosen to track me down when his choices had landed me in hell. I didn’t blame him for that. He’d done everything he could to protect me, to keep me safe, and I wouldn’t have lasted as long as we did if I’d been on my own then. I knew that.
But when did I get to decide? I could be forced to my knees, but I couldn’t go there willingly?
No. It was my turn to decide. I knew what I needed, what would help me heal and become whole again. It made absolutely no sense, and yet it made perfect sense to my fractured mind. I needed to replace old images with new ones, so similar in many ways but with one glaring difference—choice. I was choosing this.
Now, all I had to do was figure out how to explain it to Derek without risking him having me committed.
He’d said he would do whatever was necessary to help me heal, and I knew exactly what was necessary.
This is what was necessary.
This is what I needed.
And the man lying next to me was equipped with the unique skill set to give me exactly that.
To be continued…
Coming soon - the last book in the Beauty and the Captor series, Her Dom.