His obsession. Wanted. Needed. Craved. The most important person in his world. It's what I felt when his eyes first met mine. It's the most thrilling thing to be told you are precious. That you are so valuable it puts you in danger. Nothing of such high regard can exist in this world without causing a storm. When a man covets something so strongly, he is its greatest threat.
He keeps himself deep inside of me, pulling me up tall so that my back is pressed against his chest. He holds one breast as the other travels past my womb and down to my clit. He weaves his hips against mine, the hand on my breast traveling up to my neck like a snake, the fingers coiling around my delicate nape.
He squeezes; threats mixed with pleasure. My guardian and my stalker. My lover and my enemy. A stranger. The father to my child.
“I want to make you feel everything, Vesp,” he grunts in my ear.
“You do,” I eke out, already feeling countless contrasting sensations. “Give me all of it,” I beg. He closes his grip so tightly I can't speak another word. My muscles lock around his cock and burst around him, sending pulsing waves through my legs and belly. I wheeze against his suffocating hold on my neck, and it prolongs the intensity of the bursts that radiate throughout my body. He grunts as his warmth fills me, one hand staying on my neck, while the other secures me firmly against him. His.
Night slides out of me, comes to his feet, and walks over in front of me.
“Show me,” he says, his dick still not settled. I know his needs already. I know mine.
I lick his thickness, coated in the mix of us as he softly caresses my hair. He watches me, his hazy eyes betraying the sexual dominance he displays.
When he's satisfied, he pulls away, walking into the lake to freshen up. I watch him, naked, my knees red and marked with rock indentations, his cum dripping out of me onto the mix of stone and mud below. I look across the lake. Physically, the swim is a possibility, but the world beyond these woods seems like another dimension.
I don't know if there is a world between that cabin and Sacramento. But I do know one thing: we are both hopelessly bound to the other, holding each other afloat. And if one of us snaps the line or sinks, the other will drown.
When we've washed up, Night reaches for the blindfold and puts it in his pocket, gesturing his head back to where I assume we came from.
“I, uh…if we're going to do this again, which I would love, I'm going to need shoes.”
He nods in agreement, reaching for his notepad.
Need a ride back?
“Please,” I sigh with relief.
He lifts me off the wet rocks, my long white floral dress draping along the ground. I wrap my arms around him. Unlike the walk out here, I'm not scared or distrustful. I'm hungry and tired, both more than usual with the hormones raging through my body, so I can't help but nuzzle my nose in his neck and rest my eyes.
“Why is it,” I ask through a yawn, “you only talk sometimes?”
His body tenses at the question. And as usual, he doesn't answer. His reaction, the way it's automatic like that, even after all that we have shared, finally helps me realize this is not some psychological warfare. It's another breadcrumb I have to find. There's a story there.
I doze off in his arms to the gentle rocking of our bodies over the terrain, eventually feeling myself being lowered onto the bed. I'm utterly exhausted and drift into a deep sleep as he lays a sheet over me.
It's not until I hear the door being latched a couple of hours later that I wake up. My stomach sinks when I realize I missed him. I'm finally discovering him, and it makes me eager to see him again to find if I can uncover new mysteries.
I look up at the skylight, a dusty blue and orange haze swirls in the sky. My stomach growls loudly just as I notice the food he's left behind. A couple of sandwiches, tea, milk. But it's what's next to it that steals my attention: A copy of Green Eggs and Ham. It's old, the edges and spine peeling and tattered. A token of his childhood, perhaps? I nearly race to it, curious for another crumb. The book falls open where there's a note.
Don't ask me that question again. You will never get an answer. But here is something I will give you. I flip the small paper over. There is no other writing. At first I think he's referencing the book itself. Maybe he considers it a gift. But when I look at the pages in which the note was tucked, I think I see the answer he is willing to give me. Circled in black ink are the words “Sam I am.”
He's no longer “Night,” “My Captor,” or just “Him.”
Sam.
A name so innocuous and kind. One befitting the boy next door facade. Not the name of a monster.
With each new puzzle piece he gives me, I am building a new picture of him. Over the one of the wordless, masked animal who hurt me. Slowly this new image is growing over the old one, making it harder to recall.
Why did I take her?