Endless (Merciless 4)

“Fuck you! I hate you!”

She screams it like she truly means it. Like her hate is the only thing keeping her alive, and I know that’s what it is. I’ve been there. I hated her before she even knew my name.

“I knew you did. I know you hate me. It doesn’t change that you’re mine.” I can’t hide the lack of control, the unraveling of composure as I stare her down, watching her chest rise and fall with chaotic breathing.

“I won’t let you do this to me,” she speaks with conviction and the dry laugh that erupts from my lips is dark and genuine as I grip the doorknob to keep from approaching her.

“Fuck you!” she sneers as she rips her arm away from the bedpost. Not tugging, but yanking her wrist against the cuff. Pain echoes in her face and in the shriek that tears up her throat. My heart slams in my chest as I watch her do it again. And again. My body temperature drops and for a second I don’t believe it. She wrenches her body away until a horrid scream comes from her lips. Tears stream down her face as her arm lays limp, and her wrist, still cuffed, is red and raw with cuts from the metal.

“Fuck you,” she cries, her words low and full of suffering. She rips her arm away again, although this time she can only use the weight of her body and the action is done without conviction.

Fuck.

I’m too fucking weak for her. Her agony destroys any rational thought I have. I can’t get to her quick enough, although I’m not thinking logically and I don’t have the key. In an attempt to help, I grip her as gently as I can to push her back against the headboard to loosen the tension of the cuff, but Aria’s hate is stronger than her reason.

Even with a dislocated shoulder, she shoves me with her uninjured hand. “Stay away,” she screams at me with tears still falling freely. “Get away!” It’s only when she tries to push me again that her body refuses to obey and she clutches at her shoulder.

“Aria,” I start to say, ready to plead with her to be reasonable and let me help.

“I meant it, I hate you!” Her confession is sobering. Her face is red as she swallows down the pain and stares me straight in the eye. “You wanted me to be like this? To chain me up and make me pay? You can’t go back. That’s your thing, right?” She pauses for a moment to breathe and then backs up against the headboard, holding on to her shoulder and sniffling. “Well, you can’t go back.” Her breathing’s unsteady and she speaks softer. “You did this. You made me hate you.” Her face crumples with the last confessions. “This is what you wanted, and now you can have it.”

The pain is numbing. It takes a minute and then another for me to even retrieve the key to uncuff her. She doesn’t look at me at all while I put her shoulder back into place.

And when she sobs, I want nothing more than to hold her, but she pushes me away and lies on her side, her back to me and her injured shoulder in the air.

I’ve never hurt so much in my life.

I remember everything from that night years ago. And even that pain doesn’t compare to this.

The whiskey is more than tempting this time and it goes down easy.

Each glass is easier than the last, and each brings the picture of our past to me like the way Aria paints. Each moment seems made up of beautiful strokes on her canvas. She could paint a painful past, yet make you desire to touch it with the masterful way her brush moves when she’s creating art.

For the longest time, all I see are the moments we’ve had together.

The next glass brings out my jealousy. And the thought of sending Nikolai a video of me fucking Aria and showing him how much she loves it.

She brings out a possessive side of me I’ve never known. She makes me lose my control. She ruins everything, but she’s the reason for it all.

She’s mine.

That’s the only thing that matters.

I would never do it; I’d never let a man like Nikolai see her cum. He had a chance with her, and he lost it. I fucking refuse to lose her like he did. I won’t let it happen.

At the thought, the tumbler slams down on the desk. For a moment, I think I’ve broken it.

I haven’t, but the whiskey is humming in my veins and knowing that, I push the glass away from me.

I get down on my knees, feeling lightheaded as I pick up all the shit I threw down from my desk earlier so I could have her. Placing the last few items where they belong, I let my hand rest where her lower back rested only hours ago. The hard chestnut is bitter cold and nothing like her warmth.