I push up on an elbow, lean in to get a closer look at the damage I did.
She’s got a silver dollar–sized bruise on her collarbone, just one of many hickeys I sucked into her skin at some point last night. There’s an even bigger one on her shoulder, another one on her jaw, a couple small ones on her neck…and those are just the ones on the parts of her body I can see. Who knows what’s buried under the covers?
Just the thought has my stomach churning and before I can think better of it, I’m tugging at the sheet she is currently burrowed under. She moans a little at the disturbance, but doesn’t protest as I drag the fabric down. Then again, how can she? She’s practically comatose, completely exhausted from everything I put her body through last night.
Not that I blame her. Every muscle I have aches like I’ve been through a war—I can only imagine what she feels like considering I kept her bound to my bed for hours. And that’s before I get my first look at her nude body in the harsh light of day. Once I do…
Jesus Christ, how the fuck is she supposed to film today? She looks like a fucking vampire went after her.
Or a fucking sadist.
I shut the thought down as soon as it forms, refuse to give in to the darkness that comes with it. But it’s still there—of course it is. It’s always there, lurking in the corners of my mind as I concentrate on cataloging the damage I caused her instead. There’s a lot to keep me busy.
Wide red marks on the outside of both wrists from the belt she twisted and pulled against.
Whisker burn on the delicate skin of her breasts, her stomach, her inner thighs.
Hickeys of various sizes and colors sprinkled liberally all over her body.
And worst of all—finger-shaped bruises on her hips and thighs and ankles from where I held her down while I fucked her.
Jesus. I close my eyes, run a hand through my hair. Try to convince myself it isn’t as bad as it looks. But then she moans again, mutters something in her sleep as she grabs at the sheet and rolls over onto her side.
And that’s when I see the redness on her ass—not bruises exactly, not yet, but definite hand shaped marks from where I spanked her last night. It’s going to sting when she sits down today. Maybe even tomorrow.
Fuck.
Fuck, fuck, fuck.
I wrecked her last night. I fucking wrecked her and I don’t even know how it happened. How I let things—how I let myself—get so out of control that I could do this to her.
The churning in my stomach turns to all-out nausea and for a second I think I’m actually going to be sick. I roll away from her abruptly and out the other side of the bed. Then I just sit there for long moments—elbows on my knees, head in my hands, sucking in deep, harsh breaths through my mouth—as I try to get a grip on my roiling, fucked up emotions.
It’s not easy, not when the woman I all but assaulted last night is only a couple feet away from me. And not when she looks like she’s been ravaged by an animal.
What did I do? The question circles my mind again and again and again. What the fuck did I do?
I don’t have sex like this. I just don’t. Sure, things get intense sometimes—it’s the nature of the act. The nature of desire. But tying up my partner? Spanking her ass until she bruises? Putting a hand around her throat and squeezing? Holding her down while I fuck her? That’s never been me.
I’ve never let it be me.
I knew when I was with her two nights ago that sex with her was going to be unlike any other I’d let myself experience. She needs someone with a firm hand, after all. Someone who can get inside her head for no other reason than to get her out of it so she can enjoy her body’s response. But that’s not what happened here last night.
Sure, it’s how things started out with that goddamn game—me giving her what I thought she needed and taking a little of what I needed in return—but it’s not how things ended up. Because somewhere in the middle of the game, I got caught up, too. I forgot strategy, forgot the endgame, forgot everything but making her come.
Making her bend.
And because I did, I took things from her I had no business taking. Did things to her I had no business doing.
I lost control. And that is something I never, never do.
I’ve spent my life studying deviants. Men—and women—with poor impulse control, sociopathic tendencies, and the desire to hurt, to control, to destroy other people. I’ve seen their darkness up close and personal, seen it in the subjects I study and the brother I don’t talk to anymore. I’ve even seen it in myself, but I’ve always turned my back on it. Always kept it locked down, hidden away, ignored. Until last night.
Until Veronica.
Fuck. FUCK. FUCK.