Chapter
6

God, you don’t exist. If you did, you wouldn’t let your children suffer the way you do. But right now, I’m praying a figment of you does exist and you’ll take me away so I can be with Tamara.

The prayer slipped through my mind amid clenched muscles and my fisted fingers. It bounced against unforgiving walls of my prison, reverberating through my sensitive flesh. Tiny rocks embedded in my back from when he’d dragged me back to the cabin were pinpricks of agony. And all I could do was fixate on the source of my torture. As blood trickled from my nose and slid over the throbbing flesh of my cheeks, I watched him. He sat at the table with a silver knife and fork, carefully slicing a medium-rare steak before taking a bite.

He leaned back and groaned, his eyes closing in rapt pleasure. “Once again, Sean, a perfect fucking steak. How long did you have this one marinating?”

“Made sure it got three good days of marinade. Wished it could have been longer, but we had to move.”

“No worries, man. You still got it.”

A steak. He was talking about a steak while I struggled to swallow against the pain in the back of my throat. I fought against the tears that wanted to fall. He didn’t deserve to hear my pain. I wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of knowing what he did to me. But inside?

A thick scream echoed.

Matt, why didn’t you save me? Why weren’t you strong enough?

Why wasn’t Tamara smart enough to call for the cops instead of running inside?

And that was the crux of my problem—my hidden anger at those I cared about, wanted to protect because they couldn’t protect me. Unfair. So unfair, but I couldn’t bite the words back. I was surrounded by men who did too much or not enough. When my father died when I was six, everything broke. My mother, weak and suffering from depression, slipped into drugs, thanks to Trace, her first child from another marriage. They slipped into a meth-induced fog and lived off my father’s life insurance policy until that faded.

Then, they found other ways.

A young, supple girl in their home could make money. Momma couldn’t go as far as to sell me, but she got close. Pictures of me in my tighty-whities and training bras spread through child porn sites like fire. And when they didn’t have me in anything? My brother and mother went on month-long binges, and I got to sleep. When they found out about my father’s money, and how it was attached to going to college, my education suddenly mattered. Trace brought in Jason to keep me in line and terrified. Jason always liked Tamara, his baby doll, the one who took it quietly. They didn’t post her up on sites or make money off her. No, the world was looking for sweet little Tamara, and we moved far enough away that no one knew us or came knocking. Tamara’s only place was keeping me in line.

School became my escape—the only escape I had from the monsters at home—and I regretted Tamara couldn’t share it, but I couldn’t give it up. College presented a new wealth of people to meet and a place to find myself. My family couldn’t keep the same eagle eye on me. As selfish as it was, I loved the freedom, the play at normalcy I got. But my guilt brought me home, the fear that they’d ruin her, end her life because of me. Then I found Matt and swore we could make it.

I was wrong.

The minute he could have done something, anything, fight harder, he crumpled.

But how shitty of me was it that I didn’t fight for myself?

I groaned, but it came out a strangled sound as I cut it off.

“Hurting, pet?”

I ignored him. I shouldn’t have. He threw a piece of asparagus at me.

“Don’t be a spoilsport.”

I should have screamed when he told me to go into the bathroom. I should have run away and disappeared. Hell, I should have fought him tooth and nail in that bathroom until someone came running. But I hadn’t. Trapped between my panic attack, Tamara, and fear of what would happen to Matt, I froze. But what good did it do me? He got me, and he’d tear me apart.

“Sean, bring the tablet in here, would ya?”

“Sure.”

Sean, in charcoal slacks and a white button-up shirt and black, tie left the room. I gritted my teeth and forced a deep breath through my lungs.

“You could have eaten with me, but now I’ve got to teach you another lesson.”

Sean came back with a thin, white tablet and held it in front of my face. I closed my eyes, uninterested in seeing what was on the screen.

Until I heard Matt’s voice.

“Red-26. Red-26. Hut-hut.”

My eyes flew open as players on a scrimmage line smacked into each other, their pads clanking. Matt took a sidestep back and then tossed the ball before looking over at the camera and clenching his fists.

“You see, your Pussy Boy knows how to play the game. He knows where his chances are. My boy Kyle there will stay with him for a while, you know, to make sure nothing happens to him. He’s not running to the police, Ash. No one is searching for you. And your bitch boyfriend? He’s more interested in making the draft than getting his fiancée back.”

I swallowed Caesar’s words and choked on them, the tears I’d held back trickling from my eyes.

“Or it could be he knows he has to act right or you will get worked over. Whichever the case, he’s still a fucker. You see,” Caesar said as he stood up. He paced toward me, his heavy boots alerting me as I stared at Matt on the screen. “I don’t let go of what’s mine. I’d have taken you to death with me instead of letting someone take you.”

His heat reached me, pulling away the coldness in my limbs. The rough material of his jeans scratched my thigh as he leaned over me. Caesar. He took away the world, hovering in my face and blocking my view of Matt. Caesar. I hated the way I trembled at his words. I didn’t doubt Caesar would have been strong enough to hold what belonged to him.

“Do you understand, Ash? You belong to me, and I don’t let go of what’s mine. Ever.”

He traced my nose with a feather-light touch, but even that hurt.

“Your punishment won’t change since I’m a man of my word, but things can be so much easier for you. Remember that.”

Sean snatched the tablet away, and I mewled. That was my life, where I meant something, could walk around freely. College had changed me, made me want more and realize I could grasp it. But as Sean carried away my only link to my past, I felt it slipping through my fingers.

“It’s time, pretty girl, for me to see just how good that pussy I paid for is.”

Before I could comprehend his words, Caesar gripped my hips and yanked me down to the end of the table. Bound, the motion split my legs and stretched my arms until they locked straight. My ass was now between my feet, an awkward position that sent stabbing pain through my knees and thighs. But the fire at my back overshadowed it all. I screamed, unable to hold back the anguished sound.

“Aw, Ashy Lashy, we haven’t even started yet.”

His zipper opened, each tick loud in the air. Then his cock slapped my exposed pussy. I cringed. Big, too big. He’d split me. My sexual experience was centered around Jason. He’d taken my virginity and steadily fucked me through my weekly visits home. It was why I couldn’t sleep with Matt. Jason told me a man could tell when his pussy was sinking on another cock, and I’d been afraid of what would happen. Afraid Matt wouldn’t want me anymore.

Caesar was twice as thick and so much longer than Jason.

Heat pulsed through me; it made me sick. I fought my bindings, lifting my ass off the table. I couldn’t do it. Not this. Sex only meant pain. And when the pain was over, I’d do anything not to feel it again. To not feel the twisted need inside me melt and crave it. I didn’t want Caesar to have that sort of control over me. I needed to keep a piece of myself.

“You keep lifting that ass and I’ll fuck it raw. Lay there and take it like a good girl.”

He could have it. That place was dirty and full of shit. That part wasn’t who I was. I wanted a choice for once in my fucked-up life. A choice. I threw my hips up again, gritting my teeth against the pain. No more. I couldn’t take it lying down anymore. I wanted Matt. Tamara. I wanted the dream. I needed it.

No more darkness. No more.

Please.

Darkness has a way of sucking you up, licking at your raw insides, and never letting you go.

“Fuck my ass, then,” I growled.

Caesar leaned forward, an odd look on his face. Wrapping his long fingers around my throat, he pinned me to the table with his hard body. His flannel shirt warmed my breasts and stomach, and I hated it. His thumb pressed against my carotid, cutting off my oxygen.

“You’d rather have me in your ass.” His astonished voice flowed over me. “Tell me why.”

No, I wouldn’t.

“Such a contrary bitch. Fine. Pussy it is, not that I would have changed my course. I won’t give you something you prefer.”

I cringed away as he lifted his hips and used his free hand to angle his dick toward my core. He burned me, the head of his cock pushing against my labia, and I hated him.

“I hate you. I fucking hate you!” I cried.

“Oh, you say the sweetest things, pet. But you don’t know shit about hate yet. Let me show you.”

He slammed into me in one hard swoop, taking my breath away. My back arched, and the sensitive tissues inside my vagina melted as he sawed back and then rocked in again. He was a fucking horse, stuffing his cock into an orifice not meant to take him. The fingers from one hand bit into my hips as he reared back, the other hand putting more weight on my neck as well. I could barely breathe, and the depravation of oxygen only heightened what he did.

“That’s it, baby, get wet for me.”

Wet? Not possible. I opened my mouth to wail, but only a silent scream filtered out from my corded throat. Each dig pinched my insides and twisted me into knots. Too full, and he was too big.

“Let me get in there. All the way. Fuck, you’re so tight. Show me how much of a big girl you are and take all my dick.”

No, I couldn’t. “No more. Please. No more,” I begged.

“Oh, baby, I like when you beg. Let’s see if I can get you to do that again.”

He released my throat and put both hands on my hips, just above the bend of my thighs. But then he seemed to think better of it and reached under the table for something. Cold metal bit into the flesh of my stomach as he locked a bar in place over me that had two handles sticking up from the top.

“I like the idea of breaking a mare,” he said with a smile.

Torn between thunderous pain and infatuation with his abject ignorance of the pain he wrecked me with, I watched him grip the handles.

“Let’s see if I can pop that cherry again. Don’t you want to be mine? My little virgin turning into a slut for her man.”

One push, and I screamed.

Screamed for the pain.

Screamed because he shattered any preconceived notions I had over the agony a man could give a woman.

Screamed because I needed this, too.

Screamed because I knew this was just the beginning.