Chapter 11 #2
His fingers begin to squeeze again in mine and fuck it feels good. “Steven and I have been together eight years now, but I’ve known him for about twelve.”
Twelve? Twelve fucking years. That would make Felix fifteen, and that asshole would’ve been thirty. I already know I’m going to hate this story. “Where did you two meet?” I grind out.
He looks away. “You see, I didn’t mean. I mean I didn’t—”
“Hey.” I rub my thumb over his hand. “I’m not here to judge or blame you. I just want to understand, okay? That’s all. Don’t feel ashamed about anything. Especially something that happened when you were a teenager.”
When you were a child.
Felix’s lip shakes. “I really liked him.” He wipes his eye. “I’m so stupid.”
“Not stupid. Just tell me.”
“Back at my high school . . .” Oh, I’m really going to hate this story, aren’t I?
“We had security guards. Our town is pretty low crime, so we’d have police officers come by the school, just walking through the halls.
Keeping the peace. Things like that. It was more just for show, I think.
Something for the department to do. I didn’t have many friends.
Well, actually, I had no friends. A lot of the times I’d eat alone.
He’d always walk the halls during my lunch.
He was really nice to me, and he used to come talk to me. I thought he was my friend.”
His shoulders sink, but he continues. “During my senior year we became close, but nothing went on. We were just friends. He was there for me. My mom wasn’t really around much, and it was nice to have someone to talk to.
He took me home sometimes. Once, he took me to the movies.
Sometimes he’d even buy me dinner if my mom was out.
For the first time ever, I had someone care about me. I had a friend.”
This cop groomed him.
I bite my tongue and keep listening quietly.
“After I graduated, I ran into him all the time. It was almost funny. He’d be in a lot of places I would be, and we started talking.
I got a job at a local dentist office out of high school, then I found out he also used that dentist. And one day he asked me out. I accepted.
Nope, don’t like this story one bit.
It’s obvious to me what really happened, but in Felix’s mind everything was consensual. That’s what predators do, they twist the way things are to make you feel like you’re in control. That man groomed him.
“Everything was great for a while. I was so happy. We got married. We couldn’t have a real wedding, though.
Not that it mattered. I don’t have any close family.
He couldn’t come out because of his job, but that was okay.
It was romantic. Just the two of us. It was amazing.
” His fingers rub together again. “Everything after that was a nightmare.”
“Can you tell me?”
His fingers start to massage my calf again. Slow strokes of his thumbs that feel so good.
“You know what’s so crazy?” He thinks. “It always started small. Slow. Like bursts of violence or words that made me rethink what I knew. It was always small enough to explain away. That’s not what he meant, or he really didn’t mean it.
That’s not him. Look how great he’s been.
Then it started to happen more. I was confused because the good days were so good.
He made sure of that. He made them good so that when the bad ones came, and they did, he could use them to look back on as a defense.
Then you’re fighting your own truth. Your own brain.
Fighting with him because that’s not who he is.
Look how great he’s been. He’s just under a lot of pressure or I’m not doing the things asked of me.
It’s was a war with him, and it’s a war with your own mind. ” He swallows, taking a moment.
“It happened so slowly. Before I knew it was even happening. I couldn’t stop it.
I had no one. When Steven and I got married, my mom found out and disowned me.
I don’t have any friends. I had no one but him.
” He swallows. “A few months after we got married, he started getting angrier and angrier. Sometimes it felt like he was looking for a fight. I couldn’t do anything right.
“After we got married, he suggested I quit my job. He made enough money for us both. I enjoyed staying at home, keeping the house, but I wasn’t really allowed to go anywhere.
We got everything delivered to the house.
I didn’t have a car, my own money . . . It was a trap and I fell right into it.
” He takes a deep breath. “I’m so stupid. ”
“No, you’re not.” I squeeze his hand in mine. “You’re not stupid.” His brown eyes blink up at me. I wonder how well he can see without his glasses. “When did it escalate?”
“Eight months after we got married, he came home, and I’d made pizza.
I’d burnt it a little. Our stove was really weird.
If you didn’t rotate it halfway through, it’d cook unevenly.
I got distracted folding his laundry before he got home and forgot.
It scorched the back. I was going to throw it away and make another, then he walked through the door.
I laughed it off even though my anxiety made it hard to breathe.
Up until then, he hadn’t been physically violent.
Good days started becoming less and less.
He was always angry, and before I knew it there were no good days left. ”
“You don’t have to go into detail if you don’t want to.”
He sniffs, shaking his head. “I hate what he’s done to me. I’m scared all the time. I can’t relax. I’m supposed to be free, but this doesn’t feel like freedom.”
Gently as I can, I pull him in and curve my arm around him, my hand lying firmly on his lower back. My other arm goes around him and I cup the back of his head as he caves and lies against my chest. I soothe my hand along his spine, letting him cry softly. My mind is racing.
I don’t know what to do with the mess I’ve found myself in, but it’s a mess I’ll fight to protect.
He’s not going any-fucking-where. My nose grazes against the sweet-smelling strands of his chestnut hair.
“Can I ask what happened to bring you here?” He lifts off my chest, and I miss his warmth there. “Those bruises. Were they from him?”
Felix nods. “I don’t want to say what he did to me.”
Rage fills me. “Is it what I think he did?” While the bruises on his ribs have me seething, it’s the ones on his hips that make me want to snap that fucker’s neck. “The bruises on your hips, they—”
“Yes.” Felix nods quickly confirming what I already assumed.
Rage boils in my gut. “I woke up in bed alone the morning after. For a year I’d been stealing money from him meant for the delivery driver.
For tips. I feel bad that I stole the tips, but I needed to get out of there.
After a year and a half, I’d saved up about a thousand dollars.
I swore to myself I wouldn’t spend another birthday there.
“I had a phone. He used to go through it, so I had to be careful, but I saw the listing for your position and I applied. I didn’t think I’d get it, but Alyssa called me.
When I knew I had the job and she asked me when I could move in, I knew this was my shot, and I left that morning.
I got a rideshare. I had a bag of clothing I’d hidden in a bush outside, but it wasn’t there.
I don’t know if he’d found it or what. I didn’t want to risk going back inside and packing another, so I figured I could just get anything I needed later on. ”
“A secluded job in the middle of the woods where you have free room and board.” I smile. “Too good to pass up.” A soft blush hits his cheeks. “That was very smart of you.” I think about our day. “That’s why you didn’t want to go into town, huh?”
He nods. “I don’t know how he found me.” He shudders. “I was so careful.”
“He didn’t find you. You’re not going back with him.”
He smiles sadly. “He will find a way, Greyson. He saw my shoes. I know he did. I can’t stay here now. I have to leave.”
This is all happening a bit too fast for me. I’m not sure what I’m going to do, but I know there is no way I’m letting Felix leave this house if he doesn’t want to. “Listen to me. You’re not going anywhere. He’s not taking you anywhere. He doesn’t own you. You are not property.”
“It’s too dangerous.” He swallows.
I don’t know what to say. I know what I want to do, and that’s go find that asshole and make Felix a widow. My violent streak is reserved for hockey and abusive fucks, and I’m ready to let it fly. “You’ve done nothing wrong.”
“It’s not safe for you.”
“The only way you’re leaving this house is if you truly want to. It’s your choice. Do you hear me?” I hold his hand in mine. “I mean it. Everything that happens to you while you’re in this house is your choice.”
His fingers slip from mine. “I’m scared. I don’t think I can sleep.”
“Do you want to sleep in here?”
Felix blinks those brown eyes at me, and I think about the ones in the picture Steven showed me. There’s life in them now, that wasn’t there when it was taken. I’m determined to keep that light in them. “With you?”
I laugh softly. “Only if you want to. This house is armed to the teeth. The second an alarm goes off the local police will be here. If it helps, you can sleep here next to me. I have a gun in my gun safe too. I mean it, Felix. You don’t leave this house unless you want to.”
“You don’t mind?”
I insist like you wouldn’t believe. I think this is as much for me as for him. After hearing his story, I’m shaken. I know that man won’t get in here undetected, but having Felix here next to me will ease my mind. “Come on, get in here.”
Felix smiles, sliding in beside me. I’m comfortable like this, my knee aching less as Felix pulls the blankets around us. I take the extra pillow from behind my head and hand it to him. “Tomorrow, I’m going to clean your room.”
I laugh. “Are you calling me messy?”
He smiles. “I want to help you. Let me help you.” It’s only been weeks, and he’s already helped me more than he realizes.
“Get some sleep, okay?” I fight back the urge to kiss him on the forehead as he settles into bed against me. I watch him for a moment, my mind still reeling through the story he told me. I don’t know what’s coming or what that man might do to get him back.
I just know one thing.
Everything going forward is Felix’s choice.