touch. I can feel the skin splitting open again beneath my bandages, dried blood tugging against the cotton as fresh drops seep from the wounds.
I expect him to deny it. Expect an argument that I’d chosen to cheat, and it was my fault what happened. But that’s not what he does.
“Your husband is going to die for what he did to you. I promise you that. And I’ll never forgive myself for having a part in it.”
He pauses. Lets his words sink in.
“But that’s not what’s important right this second. You need to calm the fuck down before you hurt yourself more.”
A burst of laughter flies from my lips, humor utterly absent. “Calm down?”
I crack my eyes open to see him standing near the bed, close enough that he could lunge and grab me. His face is a blank mask, grey stare locked on me with no emotion rolling behind it.
“How the hell can I calm down when I just heard you tell someone else that you have no intention of letting me go?”
“Fuck.”
The word comes out on a hiss as he steps back, his eyes never moving from my face, his stance broadening as if readying himself to stop me from running from the room.
When he doesn’t answer, I fill the silence.
“Who were you talking to?”
“I can’t tell you that.”
My voice hitches higher. “What is your real name?”
Silence. One beat...two...
“I can’t tell you that either.”
I crumple to the bed, my body shaking with angry sobs. I’m so fucked. So ridiculously fucked that I can’t believe this is my life.
Swearing the universe hates me, I remember all the shitty luck I’ve had. Every horrible thing that’s happened to me, whether outside of my control or a consequence of some stupid decision I made.
How is this even possible? How is any of this fair?
My voice cracks as I beg, “Will you please just let me go? I haven’t done anything to deserve this.”
He doesn’t answer immediately. Doesn’t move from where he stands watching me.
“I’m afraid I also can’t do that.”
Fuck him, I think. Fuck this. I’m tired of being a woman men like to push around. I’m sick of being their victim.
Renewed strength bursts through me on a burst of adrenaline. The need to fight. To survive. To escape the fucking chains people keep trying to attach to me as if I’m not a human being who has a right to her opinions or thoughts.
Launching from the bed, I attempt to run around him for the door. He catches me easily, pain shooting over my body as he traps me against a wall.
One of his hands cushions the back of my head so it doesn’t slam against the plaster, but the other grips the front of my shirt to hold me in place. I thrash against him, but he steps closer, pinning me with his body, his voice a deep warning.
“If you continue to fight, I’ll have no choice but to hurt you. I’m doing everything I can to avoid that now, but I only have so much patience for this shit.”
His hips hold my abdomen in place, his chest so close to my head that I can’t turn away from him.
Ari’s scent washes over me as he calmly holds me against the wall while I twist and jerk, trying and failing to get away from him.
It’s unfair that my nose breathes him in, that my body wants to soften against him even when he’s doing this to me.
But the body never forgets. And his scent is a lure that draws me to him like a moth to a flame.
Earthy. Masculine. A hint of spice that reminds me of exotic places and secret sin.
I tremble in response to it, tears streaming as his body heat holds me in place as much as his hands.
Only a fucked up person can want the man who’s holding her captive, yet I find myself melting against him finally, my will to fight lost.
Ari is such a silent strength, his arms coming around me with so much gentleness that the air catches in my lungs.
His voice a whisper above my head, he reminds me, “You texted me asking for help. And I’m giving it to you. The only way I know how.”
“By holding me against my will?” I ask against his chest, the words muffled.
Fingers brush down my hair and I stiffen in response to it. Not because it’s Ari, but because the last man who touched me like that hit me so many times afterward