Chapter 14 Remembering December 14
Dolly Beckett
I don’t go home for Christmas Eve dinner.
I already knew Preston wouldn’t let me go, so I’m not surprised when he tells me I can’t.
I don’t even argue. He took my key and my phone, but he lets me call both my parents and wish them Merry Christmas and tell Dad I’m not coming over.
I try not to be hurt by the relief I hear in his voice when he assures me it’s fine.
That night, Preston comes to my room just as I’m getting ready for bed.
“I’ll be sleeping here from now on,” he says. “You look so pretty when you sleep, and I want you beside me every night, so I can enjoy you at will. Now take off your clothes. I want to see my queen.”
I undress without protest, forcing myself not to cover myself, not to show how vulnerable I feel with nothing but the wrappings over the tattoo of his name he had his tattoo artist put right above my mound while I was bound, spreadeagle on the bed.
At least he covered me. His friend showed no sign of surprise and asked no questions.
My pleas for freedom fell on deaf ears, and I remembered that I had no power, no say in anything in my life now. It all belongs to Preston.
Tonight, I’m still so sore from the belt strokes and his roughness that I’m trembling all over at the thought that he’ll want me again.
“Happy now?” I ask, holding my arms out so he can see my full body.
“I’ll be happy when there’s a ring on your finger and a baby in your belly,” he says, slipping his shoes off and setting them under the edge of the bed with military precision.
“But for tonight, yes. Now lie down and spread your legs and touch yourself until you’re ready to take my cock like a good girl. ”
I’m quaking, but I obey. He doesn’t turn off the light like he used to. He forces me to look at his scarred face while I climax, while he cums deep inside my aching core. I know if I’m not already pregnant, I will be soon. But there’s nothing I can do about it while I’m here.
In truth, in my deepest heart, a little part of me hopes.
I’d never admit it to anyone, last of all Preston, but I’m exhausted from my life in LA.
I’m secretly relieved to have a reason, an excuse, to quit without being a quitter.
If I’m forced to stay here, I don’t have to make that decision, to decide I’m not good enough. Now, I can’t go back.
In truth, I don’t mind sleeping naked beside him, even on the nights when he gets up and dresses before pulling me into the curve of his body.
Despite myself, there’s comfort in his warm arms around me, especially in the old house that creaks and groans and pops as if it might collapse under its own weight.
The wind shrieks through the eaves like a banshee, sending shivers down my spine, and once Preston’s asleep, I cuddle closer into his arms and wonder if I’m damned for enjoying this as much as I do.
When he forces me to call Nash and fire him, I fight back, though.
He’s cut me off from everything, everyone.
He took away my key, but he leaves the door between the workout studio and the rest of the east wing unlocked, so I can move around the rooms he set up for me to enjoy.
That’s all the freedom I get—visits from Mrs. Potter and Magnolia during the day, dinners in the dining room with Preston, sleeping naked next to him each night.
I know he’s wearing me down when I can’t help but feel grateful for each little freedom, even though I can’t go outside except when he comes to let me out.
He has all the power, and I don’t know what to do about that.
He’s impossible to bargain with because he already has everything he wants.
At last, I give up and agree to his demands that I fire Nash.
As I punch in Nash’s contact info, he kneels in front of me, pushes up my dress and pulls down my panties.
“What are you doing?” I hiss.
“I’m going to savor this cunt he’ll never touch again while you tell him as much,” Preston says, meeting my gaze with his steely blue eyes. “Now be a good girl and do as you’re told.”
Just as Nash answers, Preston’s mouth meets my center. I gasp and try to rise, but he grabs my thighs and spreads them wide, his tongue stroking through my slit and back to my clit.
“Tell him what we agreed on,” Preston murmurs against my swollen flesh. “And I’ll make it worth your while.”
I try to keep the breathlessness and the tremors from my voice as I talk to my manager while Preston skillfully eats me out, spreading me open and sucking and licking at me until I can barely hold back a moan.
I may not be free, but he spoils me with so much pleasure that sometimes I forget why I wanted freedom to begin with.
Every night, he makes me cum before I fall asleep cocooned in his warm arms, listening to the spectral sounds of the house.
Silly as it is, I resent him for how good he is, how good he makes me feel.
I can climax myself, and I usually did with Devlin, but most of the other men I’ve been with haven’t made me feel comfortable enough.
And no one has made me feel like Preston does—irresistible, intoxicating, breathtaking.
No one has treated me like I’m the center of his universe, the air he needs to breathe.
No one has teased me until I’m literally begging and sobbing for relief, and then given it to me in an orgasm so intense I feel like I’m dying.
Sure, a few guys have been enamored with my looks, but no one has cared about me.
When they find out I’m just a regular person and not some empty trophy to drag around at a party and show off to their friends, they quickly lose interest. Preston’s interest is terrifyingly constant.
Not only does he want me every night before bed, but in the middle of the night, he takes me again, usually without waking me first.
Sometimes I wake when he starts touching me, but other times I don’t wake until he’s inside me, thrusting into me in the dark like a man driven by demons.
A few times I pretend not to wake the whole time, lying there without moving while he curses and powers through me with his endless fury before he empties his seed into my fluttering core.
He must feel it when my body gives in and responds to his coaxing fingers, tongue, and cock, but in the dark, he doesn’t make me look at him or say his name or beg.
In the dark, he never requires anything from me except to take his cum.
He doesn’t even require an answer when he whispers into my ear every night, without fail, “Marry me.”
I hang up the phone after talking to Nash, let my head fall back in the chair, and lift my hips.
Preston’s hands slide under me, cradling my ass and holding me up as he pushes his tongue into me, then withdraws and circles my clit, gives it a little suck, and goes back to my entrance.
I bury my hands in his hair, open my knees shamelessly, and grind on his face while I cum.
He sucks on my pussy, sucking my folds into his mouth and pulling until I’m whimpering in pain.
Then he cleans each of my lips before working his tongue against my rear entrance until I can’t take it and beg him to stop.
When he’s licked and sucked up every drop of cum, he lowers my ass back to the seat and sits back on his heel, smiling up at me. “Good girl,” he says. “Now get on the bed on your hands and knees and show me how you can take every inch of me in that pretty pink cunt.”
I obey, wondering what will become of me.
In truth, in my heart of hearts, I’m relieved that I don’t have to go back to California.
A few days later, I’m relieved when he says he had a moving company clean out my apartment in LA, and that they’re hauling everything here in a truck.
For the first time in months, maybe years, I feel light again, like I could fly.
The next morning, I slip into the most garish pink outfit in his closet. I fold all my slimming black and grey clothes from LA and tell Mrs. Potter to donate them.
When Preston asks me to go for a walk with him and Peanut, I let him take my hand.
I would never admit it to him, but I feel like myself again for the first time in a long time, like I’m slipping out of a series of long, frozen nightmares.
I’m not the same person I was before California, but then, I wasn’t really myself then, either.
I was Devlin’s ex. Before that, I was Devlin’s girlfriend.
I can’t remember the last time I was myself. I’m not even sure who that is.
But I feel a swell of hope that maybe, at long last, I’ll figure it out.
Maybe, for the first time in a decade, I can focus on myself.
I can’t remember who I was before that, before my life became a long series of chasing people’s approval, turning myself into the person I thought they wanted, and ultimately failing.
Even when I succeeded, it was no better.
Then I had to keep up the charade, and I was miserable and exhausted from never letting myself relax and just be.
Peanut romps ahead, racing back and forth to smell everything as we make our way through the garden, down the path by the natural stone pool and beyond it to the catfish pond, glittering in the stark winter sunshine.
Frigid wind whistles around us, and Preston pulls me close.
I huddle against him, burying my face in his coat and clinging to him.
“Want to go back?” he asks into my hair.
“No. Let’s keep going.”
We walk in silence a while, Preston’s arm around me. At last, we make it around the catfish pond and walk along the boardwalk to the gazebo, where we sit and watch Peanut frolicking in the sunshine, enjoying her outing despite the cold.
“It’s January tenth,” Preston says.
“Is that a special day?” I ask.