36. Tracing Lines
TRACING LINES
LEV
A sher grimaced. “It’s humiliating—the things he did to me, what I let him do.”
The guilt in Asher’s voice was a knife to Lev’s stomach.
“Darling, you mustn’t blame yourself.”
“You don’t know the entire story.”
“That’s true, but you can’t take credit for how hard you flinched when I lifted the crop, and that’s not the first time you’ve reacted that way. If you tell me, I can help you.”
Asher chewed on his lip.
“Here, come sit.” Lev steered him to the bench and onto it, then joined him. “We don’t have to discuss anything you don’t want to, but perhaps you could tell me about art school in general and see how that makes you feel?”
Asher squared his jaw and nodded. “My hometown is… claustrophobic. There are more churches than schools and I was the only gay kid in my class. Well, the only out kid.” He chewed on his lip. “The cattle ranch industry isn’t known for its tolerance, either.”
Lichenmoor couldn’t have been more different. Lev had known his father was bisexual from a young age, and many of the guests Lucian hosted were queer too. The locals weren’t as accepting, but he hadn’t fraternized with them much beyond rugby.
Hate wasn’t a foreign concept, though. Silas had suffered growing up in a home where being gay was being damned, and he’d certainly been bullied at Catholic school by students and nuns alike.
“Watson was my sanctuary. I met people from all over the country, and many of them were queer. For the first time in my life, I could be my most authentic self without fear. It was like that for a few of us.”
Lev imagined Asher and his friends, flowers that hadn’t been able to bloom back home, thriving once they’d planted roots elsewhere; petals unfurling later than others, but no less beautiful.
“And your family? Were they supportive?”
“My mom and dad are great. Nonna is old-school Catholic and she’s gotten better over the years, but I’m pretty sure she still prays for me.”
Asher shrugged as if their support didn’t matter, but Lev knew better. His lad was sulky, and sarcastic, and stubbornly independent, but he still yearned for love and acceptance.
“My brothers were dicks about it for a while, but when my dad found out, he was so pissed he made them walk the fence line as punishment. Our ranch is a few thousand acres and that’s a lot of fence to check and repair. “
“Your dad seems lovely.”
Asher’s lips twitched into a faint smile. “He’s my best friend. My only friend until Watson.” His good humor dimmed. “Ben taught my introductory art history class.”
“Ah. Those who can’t paint teach art history.”
Asher shook his head. “He taught advanced color theory and painting too, but not to first-year students. I’m grateful for that. I don’t know what my art would look like, or if I’d be painting at all, if I’d learned my foundational skills from someone who hurt me .
“It’s still hard to tease out what I know instinctively as an artist from what he taught me, or from what I had to unlearn to find my voice again.”
Lev understood. Even now, he sometimes was uncertain whether he controlled his paintbrush or Lucian.
“Ben favored me from day one. He called on me often, and praised me for answering, even if I was wrong. When he told a joke, he always made eye contact. He asked my instructors for updates on my progress and spied on my unfinished work.
“Nothing happened that quarter. Nothing romantic, anyway. He tutored me in the evenings ‘to help me improve’ and arranged for me to attend his classes the next quarter.”
Asher exhaled an agitated breath. “He was grooming me and I fell for it. I just wish I knew why he chose me. Did he ever like my art at all? Did he pick me because I was weak?”
“If he thought you were weak, he was wrong.”
“I was fucking clueless. We spent all those hours together, and sure, I had a crush, but I never saw him as someone I’d date. He was my teacher. He was married. He had kids the same age as me.”
Asher pulled his hands free and raked his dark waves back from his face. “I don’t know. I was so stupid…”
“You were young.”
“Fuck.” Asher’s eyes smashed shut. He buried his hands in his hair again.
Lev took Asher’s hands back into his lap before he started ripping his hair out.
“Did you have your tattoos when you were with Ben?” Lev asked, hoping to disrupt Asher’s cycle of self-loathing.
Asher nodded. “I don’t think I would have ever shown them to him if he hadn’t forced me.”
“Forced you?” Lev inhaled through his nose and tried not to explode.
“We were doing a series of nude studies one night. I’d um…” He nibbled his lip. “I’d hooked up with the model a few ti mes, and he kept making eye contact, flirting without words. I tried to be professional, but I kept blushing.”
“Who among us hasn’t blushed during nude studies?”
Asher gave a small laugh, like he still blamed himself but didn’t want Lev to feel bad. “Ben was furious. He’d kept his emotions controlled so tightly, but his mask slipped.”
Lev stroked Asher’s hand with his thumb, while inside he was crumbling. Lev had praised Asher gratuitously, shown favoritism, lurked over his shoulder like some depraved sex addict. He’d manipulated Asher into coming to Lichenmoor, and unleashed his anger on him.
“I’ve acted a lot like Ben,” Lev said, careful to keep his tone even.
“It’s not the same, Lev.” Asher shook his head stubbornly. “ I’m not the same. Ben and I never argued because I was too afraid to stand up for myself. I took his verbal attacks and let him cross all of my boundaries. Have I been that way with you?”
“No, you’re quite quarrelsome, in fact.”
Asher didn’t laugh, charging forward with his story instead like he had to get it off his chest.
“Ben asked me to stay after class. He locked the door and closed the blinds, then told me to strip and stand on the pedestal.”
“He did what?” Lev growled, anger flaring before he could stop it. He inhaled a simmering breath and patted Asher’s hand. “Sorry. Please continue.”
“I laughed at first. But he was serious. Watson was my sanctuary. I couldn’t risk losing my scholarship. I couldn’t go home. He uh… I um…”
“You don’t have to relive it if you don’t want to, love.”
Asher lifted his chin. “No. I want to tell you. This feels cathartic, like bloodletting.”
Lev forced a wan smile. “That makes perfect sense.” Now was not the time to tease him about how useless bloodletting was .
“First he just stared, mapping me mentally. That was almost worse than when he ordered me into position. My tattoos surprised him. I could tell. He scanned each one.”
God, he wanted to kill Ben.
“While Ben sketched in silence, I traced the lines of your art with my eyes and tried to dissociate. Your art kept me company and comforted me when I felt so alone.”
“Oh, Asher, I’m so sorry.” He cupped Asher’s cheek with tender reverence. “I wish I could have been there to protect you.”
“Me too,” Asher said distantly. “Then he sat on my stool and helped himself to my pencil, and sketched me slowly, dragging out my torment. I didn’t know what he was thinking. My own thoughts cycled between anxiety and shame and…”
Asher hid his face in his hands. “I wanted him, and there was an element of exhibitionism, and…” He cleared his throat. “I...”
“You became aroused?”
Asher lowered his hands and nodded. “Ben noticed. He mocked me and degraded me and I—” His sentence ended abruptly, like a cord ripped from a socket.
“The degradation turned you on?”
“Yeah, and I didn’t know what a degradation kink was back then, so I just felt dirty and deviant, and then he’d call attention to my erection again and… I believed him.”
Lev blinked back tears and swallowed. He couldn’t imagine how painful and isolating it must have been to believe something so devastating about himself.
“He was wrong, Asher. It’s quite common for sexual assault survivors to become aroused or ejaculate.”
Asher’s gaze darted up. “I wasn’t assaulted. All he did was sketch me.”
“Sorry. I shouldn’t have assumed. This is your story to tell. I wasn’t there.”
Asher nodded. “Thanks. ”
His vision grew vacant on the window. Thin wisps of fog hugged the valley, but the sun would chase them away soon.
“After he finished, I went to my station to pack up as if class had just ended. I don’t remember getting dressed. Muscle memory and routine took over, I guess.
“I wasn’t in my head. I wasn’t at the studio. I was following the lines of your art, even though I couldn’t see them anymore. Then I saw the sketch. I’d forgotten about it.
“I’d turned a corner and smashed into my doppelg?nger. It was me, but it wasn’t. My gaze was too hollow. I couldn’t look at the rest of it. Looking would have been like reliving the last two hours all at once.”
The poor lad. God. His heart broke for him. “What happened to the sketch?”
“He kept it so I’d,” he lifted his fingers into air quotes, “remember to behave.”
Lev inhaled and tried to stifle his fury. “He blackmailed you?”
Asher nodded. “I was sick to my stomach all weekend. I couldn’t paint, but my scholarship had a very strict attendance policy, and I didn’t want to give him more ammunition.”
“That was very brave of you.”
“Ben acted like nothing had happened. He showered me with praise while I painted, like he always had. I don’t even remember what I painted, just like I don’t remember getting dressed.”
“Trauma steals your memories.”
“I don’t feel like I was traumatized. I wasn’t raped.”
“Trauma isn’t a competition. Others may have suffered more.
That will always be the case in this world.
But that doesn’t make your pain any less valid.
If you’re cut, you still bleed. Even if someone else’s wound is deeper, any wound can fester and grow, tunnel under the skin and abscess into something far more painful. ”
“Yeah.” Asher crossed his arms over his chest, all but saying he didn’t believe Lev’s sentimental bullshit. “Ben asked me to stay after class again. Usually he’d pass me a note or whisper his request, but this time he asked in front of everyone.”
“So you couldn’t say no?” Bastard.
“I think so. He apologized profusely, said he had a gift for me. He seemed scared almost. I should have known then that I had the power to stop this.” He sighed.
“It was just some gouache paint and an antique travel easel—not the sketch of me. I accused him of bribing me, and asked for the sketch back, but he twisted the truth until I doubted myself. Then he confessed he’d been falling for me, and I believed him. I even felt guilty.
“He said I flirted with him for months, teased him and tempted him, then made him jealous on purpose. He’d been trying to resist me.”
Asher palmed his forehead and turned away.
Lev could never forgive himself for killing Silas, and he couldn’t condemn Asher to a future with him, but what if he could help Asher forgive himself?What if that was why they’d been drawn together?
“Things escalated from there. Ben was into BDSM and I was into whatever pleased him. Things got dark. Scenes bled together until they weren’t scenes at all. We weren’t playing BDSM anymore. I was his twenty-four-seven submissive.
“I could have stopped it at any time. I never said no or a safe word. I could have overpowered him, but I didn’t. I just took it and tried to be good for him. That still fucks with my head a lot.”
“How long did this go on?”
“A little over a year.”
Christ. “Did you love him?”
Asher nodded.
“You wanted to please him.”
“Yeah.” Asher rubbed the back of his neck. “You’re not jealous, are you? ”
“Heavens no. I’d gladly toss Ben down a stairwell. I’m trying to understand why you think you were some hapless frog in a kettle, when all I see is a very sweet lad who would have made the right person very happy if he hadn’t met a spineless, narcissistic cunt who took advantage.”
“Thank you for saying that.”
“It’s true.” Birdsong drifted through the window while he pondered how best to handle his next question. He didn’t want to say anything that could make him feel responsible for Ben’s actions. “What about Watson? Were they supportive?”
Asher shook his head.
“A few students figured it out and reported it. Ben kept me so isolated that the story spread through the school before I knew.”
Lev clicked his tongue.
“Yeah. I left on the verge of a panic attack, and when I returned later to defend myself, Ben sat on the same side of the table as the people determining my fate.”
“They protected him?”
Asher nodded. “They didn’t kick me out, but they let him keep teaching.”
Lev would use his vast swaths of fuck-you money to rearrange the entire school as soon as he convinced Asher to let him.
“Did the police ever get involved?”
“Nothing he did was illegal, and I couldn’t prove the things that were borderline. I testified at someone else’s trial, but Ben was acquitted.”
“Ben hurt someone else?”
Dorian snuffled and scraped his hoof over the ground like the scratch of flint shedding sparks.
“Yeah. We should go.” Asher scooted to the edge of the bench. Lev laid a hand on his wrist, not encircling it, merely recapturing his attention .
“He can wait a moment longer. What happened to the sketch?”
“He probably still has it.”
“I see.” Lev would find out, and dispose of it. “Your anxiety attacks…” Again, Lev paused, weighing his words before he spoke them. “Did they start with him?”
Asher nodded without looking, fidgeting with the zipper at the bottom of his jacket.
“Have you seen a doctor for them? Or perhaps, a therapist? Despite my inability to overcome agoraphobia, I’ve found my therapist and psychiatrist immensely helpful.”
“Yeah. I did all that. A men’s support group too.” Asher hopped off the bench. “Let’s go. I’m ready to ride.”
“Blakely, wait.”
Asher had already left, but he’d forgotten the saddle and blanket.
With a sigh, Lev climbed to his feet and gathered Rebecca’s things. He found Asher brushing Rebecca’s mane, a task he’d already completed.
“Thanks,” Asher said and looked away, walls back up.
Lev hoisted the pad and saddle onto Rebecca’s back and moved to help him with the girth belt.
“I’ve got this.”
“Are you sure you’re alright?”
“Yep. I’ve been doing this since I was a kid.”
Lev wasn’t asking about the horse. They both knew that. Suppressing a growl of frustration, he headed back to the saddle room.
Nothing made him feel more powerless than waiting for a broken man to tell him what had happened.