Tender Mercies - By Kitty Thomas Page 0,9
you should be past the point of breaking dishes when I bring you food. How do I know this isn’t some rebellion on your part?”
She remained silent because it was the smart thing to do. She’d long ago learned that when in doubt, just be silent. Her master loved hearing himself speak. When he wasn’t calling her pet or telling her she was a worthless piece of shit, he used the word you, as if only when he spoke to her did she have form or life. When she spoke of herself, it was always in third person, as if she were an inanimate object that could not have thoughts or feelings or needs. If she ever spoke the words me or my or I, the punishment was swift and severe. He’d broken her of the habit of seeing herself as a person in the first two weeks.
Even her name felt like some disincarnate thing that had long been separated from her being. Grace. Grace. Grace. Grace. Just a sound. An odd sound. She could barely remember what it meant. Or maybe she just didn’t want to. Grace was like pet. And she could only handle being slapped with one of those words right now.
The whip came down over and over. He’d stopped speaking, more interested in hearing her screams and begging. She always begged; she couldn’t help it. And it only made her more ashamed that she would give this monster anything he wanted, that she would continue to play into his hands so predictably.
She could feel the trails of blood flowing down her back when he stopped. Then he was inside her, fucking her. She couldn’t bring herself to think the word rape, even though she knew. To heap that ugly word on top of everything else was the last little straw that would make her mind come undone.
“So wet,” he growled in her ear. “You like this shit, don’t you, pet?”
She shuddered as the tears fell harder. No matter what a sick fuck he was, her body still responded. Her kink had never been something she’d seen as an aberration or something that was wrong with her before Lucas. But now, in light of how he’d broken her, how could she see herself as anything but disgusting? Because no, she didn’t like this shit, and yet, her body answered his as if together they were a symphony of something beautiful, the kind of something she’d hoped they could be but weren’t.
Lucas gripped her throat hard enough she knew there would be a bruise. “Answer me, slave.”
“Yes, Master,” she gasped out. Only because it’s what he wants to hear.
“Tell me you’re mine, you worthless slut.”
Tears pricked at the corners of her eyes. “This slut is yours, Master.” Only because it’s what he wants to hear. She had to hold onto that thought and repeat it in her mind so she wouldn’t forget. Her body may have submitted to him, but she hadn’t yet lost her mind. She prayed she could hold onto that one secret space within her. The thoughts Lucas could never know about. The thoughts of him dead and broken before her. And somehow being free of him. He always kept her locked in the dungeon when he couldn’t watch her because deep down he had to know she wasn’t really his.
When he was finished with her, he unlocked the chains and let her fall. “Clean yourself up. We’re going out.”
The sound of his boots receded, and the door slammed behind him. Normally those were the sounds that made her body unclench and allowed her to relax, but not tonight. He wasn’t done with her yet.
She lay on the stone floor, catching her breath. There was a crude shower and toilet on one end of the room, as well as a sink and a cabinet that contained first aid supplies. Over the sink hung an old mirror, the one thing in the room that allowed her to witness the life slipping from her day by day. The only evidence she had that she wasn’t already dead.
Showering would hurt too much. She’d have to run water in the sink and clean off the best she could. The bandage supply was running low. She’d have to ask for more soon, something she dreaded. Asking for anything only meant more suffering for whatever it was that she needed. He always made her hurt before he gave her anything. He wanted her to remember he was God. But how the