Chapter 40 #4
I sucked my lower lip into my mouth and nodded, tasting my tears.
I was still throbbing between my legs, but it was different now. Despite me being naked and bent over his desk, this wasn’t sexual anymore. It was more than that.
It was honest in a way nothing else could be.
Vulnerable.
Micah was breathing heavily, sweat glistening on the strong column of his throat.
He raised the belt again, then brought it down, hard. So hard I saw stars bursting behind my eyelids.
Something prickly I’d been holding in my chest released with that hit.
The tug behind my ribs finally loosened.
My tears came faster. I didn’t try to stop them. There were no real adjectives to describe the way I felt now, as if I’d pushed past pain to a sensation much deeper.
My body stopped bracing for each hit.
The physical pain was insignificant.
My skin stung and ached, bruised and striped with marks, but I didn’t bleed there. Not in any way that mattered. I bled from my soul.
I sobbed against Micah’s desk, messy and honest. The hits kept coming, and I had no way of knowing what number we were at now, or how much time he was giving me between each one. My brain had stopped functioning; my heart was the only thing still working.
I love you so much.
It was in every drop of blood, every bruise he marked me with, every tear sliding off my cheek onto the shiny wood.
But I was still paralyzed, terrified to say it, so worried that he’d shut down and I’d lose all the ground I’d gained since I knelt for him on the cliff.
Saying it out loud felt like handing him something he could break.
Every time my lips parted to say the words, I remembered his previous reactions to my care, and shut my mouth again, chest aching.
I was always one sentence away from losing him.
All the words I’d swallowed were slowly killing me.
Pressure released from my wrists and Micah was murmuring praise in my ear. I hadn’t even realized he’d stopped or untied me.
He sat in the chair, pulling me onto his lap, still naked, my hair loose down my back.
My backside was so tender I could hardly sit down, but Micah kept his thighs spread enough that there wasn’t any direct contact and I could relax somewhat.
He was still hard, maybe even harder than before, but he didn’t do anything about it.
I was still crying, but softer now. My body curled into his, relaxed and clinging at the same time.
This was the place where I felt safest, but also the place where I knew he could hurt me worst if he chose to.
“I think you’re the best thing that’s ever happened to me,” Micah said, his voice quiet. “You gave me a new purpose. And I really fucking needed that.”
I couldn’t really speak much, so I just kept crying against his chest, listening to his heartbeat and his breathing, feeling expensive fabric against my tear stained cheek.
“I don’t know what I’d do if something ever happened to you. I couldn’t take it.”
I pressed my face against him harder, squeezing my eyes shut. “I’m scared,” I managed to whisper. “That something bad is going to happen to me.”
“I won’t let it.”
“Okay.”
I love you, my heart said with its beats.
Will you let me say it? Will you let me love you?
“I promise, Masters,” he reiterated. “I will keep you safe. Nothing bad is going to happen.”
Even though I believed him, his promise couldn’t stop my worrying.
The same terrible feeling I’d had for months was always there—the feeling that I would die soon.
It lurked around the edges of my thoughts, a dark shape coming out of the recesses of my mind to scare me.
I knew now that it wasn’t coming from Aamon, but I wasn’t sure what it came from.
Mason, maybe. My brain understood it before my heart wanted to accept it. I would take my last breath then be pushed below the surface and kept there.
Or something else.
Or maybe this was an intrusive thought. An untrue obsession.
I wasn’t sure. It felt very real to me. But then again, my brain was capable of making ridiculously irrational things feel completely rational.
Micah’s hand stroked up and down my spine gently.
I wanted to stitch my lungs to his lungs so he could breathe for me.
Crawl under his skin and be held by him forever.
I was exhausted, even though I’d just woken up from a nap.
The bruises on my backside and the tears on my cheeks were enough to drain my energy again.
Micah pushed back, rolling the chair over towards an armchair in the corner. There was a blanket draped over the arm of the chair, which he grabbed and laid over my body, cocooning me safely against his chest. Then he rolled us back to the desk.
“Do you want to rest like this for a few minutes?”
I nodded.
“I’m going to try and do some work on the computer.”
“Okay,” I whispered. “I’ll just be here.”
He chuckled. “Okay. You be there. And tell me if you need more food or water.”
“I will.”
My eyes slid shut.
I love you.
I didn’t say it. I didn’t even move like I might.
But I felt he knew anyway.