I stared into his eyes for several heartbeats, finally leaning up and kissing him. There didn't seem to be a better response than that. He groaned softly. He loved me back. Unconditionally. I'd never dared to consider such a thing. Something seemed to break wide open inside me, some kind of wonder. He knew everything about me—all the ways in which I was damaged—and still thought my love was a gift. The world seemed to brighten all around me.
He unhooked the front clasp of my bra and worked it down my arms until it fell away. His hand brushed up my ribs to my breast, his thumb circling my hardened nipple. I gasped, lightning arcing from my breast to between my thighs. His mouth came down and sucked gently at the budded peaks until I was writhing beneath him, waves pulsating between my nipples and my core. My hands came to his hair, and I wove my fingers into it.
When I felt his hand come up the side of my leg to grasp the back of my knee, my core clenched in a way that made me gasp. He lifted my leg so I was open to him, and I noticed that his hand was trembling just a bit. When he pressed himself inside me, our eyes met, the moment seeming to pause and then resume in a bright flash of pleasure. "Ryan," I groaned, "Ryan, Ryan."
He spoke words into the side of my neck as he began to rock slowly, words I couldn't make out, but knew all the same. Words of love, of happiness, of pleasure. I grasped on to his buttocks, loving the way they flexed each time he thrust into me. When my climax seized me, I gasped, my back bowing slightly, my head pressed back into the mattress. My orgasm seemed to bring on Ryan's because just as I was drifting back to earth, he shuddered and groaned, circling his hips as he breathed harshly against my skin.
We lay together quietly for several moments as I stroked his back and his breathing slowed. "She walks in beauty, like the night," he whispered. My fingers slowed and I smiled. "Of cloudless climes and starry skies; and all that's best of dark and bright." We were still for another moment, the beauty of the words uttered in his love-filled voice repeating in my head. He pulled out of me but continued to lie there. Under my fingers I felt the familiar divots and leaned up slightly to look more closely. His back was a roadmap of scars, some small, round, and purplish, the divots I could feel with my fingertips—cigarette burns perhaps—and others thin and white. Oh God. "Who did this to you?" I asked, my voice hoarse with sympathy.
Ryan moved a piece of hair away from my face. "My father," he said.
"Your father," I repeated in disbelief. Sickened. He rolled to the side and gathered me close, pulling the quilt over us. I had told him my story in all its pure truth. And now, wrapped in each other's arms, he told me his. As he spoke of the beatings, the scars, the burns, and the cages, I learned that he, too, had suffered terribly, yet had somehow survived and even thrived, and I fell even more deeply in love. He was damaged, but not broken. He was beautiful and brave, and despite the pain he'd endured, he had managed to retain a heart filled with love and kindness. We will never be perfect or without flaws, the lives we've been given are not like that. But, Lily, in my heart, you are perfect for me. Perfectly mine.
And I was his forever, in this life or any other.
**********
I came slowly awake, attempting to open my eyes but squeezing them shut when the sudden light caused my head to throb with pain. I tried to bring my hand to my forehead, but it pulled against a restraint. My eyes popped open and I groaned at the sharp burst of pain, blinking against the light. I was in my bed at my grandmother's rental home, and my hands were tied to the bedpost with rope. I was still dressed in the clothes I'd worn the night before. My blood pressure spiked, causing my heart to hammer in my chest. My eyes adjusted to the light as I worked to control my breathing. What was happening? I grasped at my memory. I felt so woozy, as if I'd been drugged. Thinking hurt. Oh God. I'd come home from Ryan's the night before . . . we'd made love. Ryan. I'd been so happy. Ryan had wanted me to stay the night with him, but I wanted to be respectful to my grandmother, and so he'd driven me here. He'd kissed me good night . . .
The door opened and I went completely still, tense. Jeffrey walked in, wearing a white suit with a nametag. My vision blurred as he came closer and I let out a strangled sound of fear. His nametag had the Whittington logo. Oh God, oh no. What was happening? "What do you want?" I asked. "Why am I restrained?" I pulled against the rope. My voice sounded thick, garbled, as if I was listening to it from underwater.
He sat down on the edge of the bed and brought a finger to my cheek, stroking it. "You're so beautiful, Lily," he said. "So beautiful, but so damaged. So sick."
"I'm not damaged," I tried to say but wasn't sure if I'd managed to or not. He continued to stare at me with a look of such raw hunger, or was it anger? I couldn't tell. It was just like that other man—the one who'd hurt my mother. The world pulsed around me, the details of the room morphing into the black outlines of a scrawled drawing. I groaned.