Quintessentially Q

Tess made a strangling noise.

“You’re worthless. You can’t even follow orders correctly.”

Her mouth twisted. “I hate you for eternity. I hate your operation. I hate your stench. I hate your clothes. Your voice. Your lack of humanity.” Her eyes glazed, turning deeper and deeper into her nightmare.

A sharp burn started in my throat at the knowledge I had truly f**king lost her.

Tess put aside the flogger and picked up the cat-o'-nine-tails. The same tool I used to break the memories of her rape.

There was no warning, no build-up—she struck.

The multiple threads whistled through the air and bit into my clothes. The tiny beads shredded my T-shirt.

The next hit landed on my thighs, burning me through the denim. Tess went feral; double fisting the whip, she struck and struck. A particularly violent hit landed across my throat—it sent shock waves echoing through my body. Tess was nothing but pure rage, gushing from a soul that had finally had enough.

Time ceased.

Tess hit and hit and hit.

She broke my skin and blood ran free, dripping and staining the towels below.

My clothes ripped with every strike until they hung in f**king tatters. The pain amplified, building and building until every part of me trembled. I wanted to scream and rage and curse. I needed an outlet. I needed to run. But I never made a sound as Tess whipped me closer and closer to death.

Through swollen eyes, I didn’t recognise Tess anymore. Sweat matted her hair and tears shone on her cheeks.

My heart broke into a billion fragments for what I did to this wonderful woman. I wanted to wrap her up and never let anything happen to her again. I never wanted to lay another finger on her or cause her any pain. I just wanted her to be happy.

Her next strike caught my flayed chest, tearing deep into my skin.

I couldn’t help it— I cried out. The first sign of weakness and Tess pounced on it. “You like that, you bastard.”

She hit me again and again. “Die, you murderer. Just die.”

The ache of tears shot up my spine, bruising my eyes.

I’d never cried.

Not once.

I always thought I was incapable. And yet, as I lay taking the brunt of everything Tess lived with, I felt myself coming apart. I’d never had the urge to give up my life to save another. I was never weak or selfless enough to put another first. But falling in love Tess took away my balls as well as my heart, and now I would pay for it.

A single tear escaped my control. The caustic pain of salt burned the cuts on my cheeks. Another tear rolled silently, motionlessly.

One tear for what I lost.

One tear for what I gained.

One tear for being helpless.

One tear for being in love.

Six tears until my body gave out, my blood ran cold, and Tess beat me into oblivion.

*****

Cold water drenched my face.

I winced as my fiery eyes opened to a tearstained, furious Tess on top of me. An empty glass rested in her hand.

I looked down, noticing I was naked, dripping with blood, and crisscrossed with lacerations. She’d cut off my blood-soaked clothing, leaving them on the bed beside me.

“You used to wake me up like that every morning. Time to hurt another, you’d say. But now it’s over. I’m done hurting you. I’m going to kill you.”

She scooted off, moving to stand by the side of the bed. Her eyes no longer burned with hatred and the need to maim; now they held resolution and satisfaction.

My over-worked heart thudded with happiness. I might’ve been able to help her after all. My life for her life. I’m glad.

“This is for those women you made me ruin. For the life you made me take. I hate you and I hope you rot in hell.” She raised her hands above her head, fingers wrapped around the handles of sharp silver scissors, holding them like a dagger over my heart.

“Esclave—” I tugged on the rope around my wrists, not ready to die. I’m not ready to f**king die.

My life raced before my eyes: how much I’d miss. How much I hadn’t had time to do.

I couldn’t do it. I wouldn’t let her send me away. Not now. Not after everything.

I did the one thing I swore not to do.

I screamed.

Chapter 24

Own me, take me, you can never break me. Choose me, use me, you will never lose me…

I existed in blackness.

Nothing else entered apart from the metallic rust of blood and flashes of madness.

Q left me again.

Somehow, I transported back to the room where I shot Blonde Hummingbird, only this time, strapped down and tied up tight was White Man. He leered and cursed, telling me I wasn’t good enough. That I ought to kill myself because that’s all I was worth.

The vacancy inside swirled like a crazy hurricane, rattling at the walls of my tower, tearing away my chains, smashing bricks to dust.

The guilt I’d been running from sucked me deep and I was sure my heart would stop. I was a murderer, a torturer, I deserved to die paralyzing regret.

But fate had given me a chance to right the wrongs I’d done. I had the puppeteer in front of me. Hatred and fury slithered like reptiles in my blood, and all I wanted was revenge. To make him pay.

The wash of emotions I’d been hiding from crippled me. Dumping me into a pit of grief and insanity.

White Man represented all the evil in the world and I wanted to take and take and take until there was no more. I wanted to extract every last thread of life until he existed no longer.

By killing him, I would gain redemption. I might finally be able to live with the guilt.

He didn’t move as I hit him. He just sneered. My muscles ached from delivering abuse. With every strike another brick crashed free from my tower. With every lash, cracked and fissured my guilt, allowing me to breathe.

Parallel images of the past kept me company as I hit him over and over and over. I saw myself—emaciated, drugged out of my mind, scratching and breaking…delivering their wrath on innocent women.

I sobbed and hit harder as my apparition shot Blonde Hummingbird. I doubled over with agony as I watched a replay of myself swallowing the gun, pulling the trigger to end my life.

Never again. I’m strong enough to survive. I don’t need a tower to exist. I didn’t do anything wrong!

The thought was a comet, blazing with truth.

I didn’t do anything wrong.

It was all them. I did the best I could to survive.

The knowledge that they’d made me doubt, that they’d filled me so full of sin, gave me a new lease of energy. I struck harder and harder until I couldn’t recognise White Man from all the cuts and blood.

Every time I drew blood, I rested easier, knowing this man would never do to others what he did to me.

When he passed out, I thought I’d killed him. I wanted him dead, but I had to be sure. Checking for life, I cursed when his pulse thrummed beneath my fingertips. I knew what I had to do.

I would wake him, look straight into his eyes, then I would stab him in the heart.

This was my duty, my honour, my destiny.

I taught him the lessons he taught me. Pain equalled power. Pain equalled pleasure.

As I stood above him with sharp scissors in my hands, ready to bury them deep into his chest, he looked up with such panic and love I paused too long.

He screamed.

It bounced around the cavern of blackness, tearing down the veil between me and the real world.

The vision disintegrated, catapulting me from dark to bright. The dungeon switched to become a decadent room with gold and red accents—it seemed familiar, but I couldn’t place why.

I blinked, unable to understand. Where the hell am I?

My body ached, shoulders trembled with holding my arms ready to strike. My hands were cramped and slippery with blood.

Then my heart stopped.

Q lay on the bed in front of me, his na**d body covered in blood, completely unrecognisable. He barely breathed, his face swollen, eyes muted, hidden by injury.

I dropped the scissors; they clattered downward, nicking the top of my bare foot before bouncing to the carpet. Air lodged deep in my lungs and I couldn’t breathe.

An earthquake began in my limbs, and the angry, righteous tears I’d shed were replaced with horror. “Q—Oh, my God.” I reached out with shuddering hands to touch his cooling chest. His beautiful sparrow tattoo hung in tatters with wounds and blood. His beautiful c**k hung useless and bloody between his legs.

“What have I done!”

Then I was flying.

My front collided with the front of the bed before I was jerked back and pressed deep into the carpet. Someone wrenched my arms behind my back, pinning my cheek to the floor. “Don’t move,” a livid man’s voice ordered.

The man sat on my back, holding me in place. He changed position to look toward the bed. He sucked in a rattling breath. “Fuck, Q. What the f**k.”

A woman’s high-pitched scream made my shaking worse. I gave up crying and turned to sobbing. I did this. I hurt Q so much he looked ready to die. How did this happen? Why did he let me go so far?

“Merde. Q. Oh, my god. Oh, my god,” Suzette cried.

The man got off me, discarding me as if I was nothing. He jumped to his feet, rushing to the bedside.

I fumbled to sit up. I needed to know Q was still alive. That there was a way to fix this.