Chapter 14
FOURTEEN
Then
My thighs burned with the effort of squatting in the cramped, stifling darkness.
How many hours had passed since he’d locked me in here?
He never allowed me to wear a watch, enjoying the knowledge that each minute would feel like twenty.
I shifted, the metal hanging rail he’d drilled in halfway up the old wooden wardrobe, placed intentionally to reduce my head room, digging against my skull.
My neck cracked as I tried to stretch, finding myself boxed in.
I was hyper aware of the danger of toppling over, the long metal spikes he’d driven into the wood on the opposite side, the silver gleaming in the darkness, reminding me not to move.
I’d had to go to hospital after the last time I’d been shut in here.
Not because I’d been caught by the lethal spikes, but because my left leg had swollen and I’d realised I had a blood clot in my calf, brought on by dehydration and staying in this unbearable position for so long.
I’d hoped some part of him might feel guilty.
Remorseful. That he wouldn’t put me through it again.
And for three months, he had resisted. But today I’d known it was coming.
Known it would be my punishment for failing the task he’d set for me.
The games were an intrinsic part of our relationship.
The limits I set being continuously pushed, barrelled through, smashed to oblivion.
He’d started so slowly I hadn’t realised what was happening, though in hindsight I could look back and see how he’d trained me like a dog wanting to please its master.
The first time, it had been merely a comment, delivered in an offhand, casual tone, about my wearing flats to dinner.
I had never been one for stilettos, placing comfort over style.
He’d said, ‘I expect you don’t wear them because you’re afraid you’ll fall flat on your face.
’ Then he’d stared pointedly at a group of beautiful women, all dressed elegantly, all wearing sky-high heels.
He’d looked them up and down, appreciation shining in his dark eyes, then turned his attention to me, his gaze lingering on my flat sandals, a sneer marring his handsome features.
And like a fool, I’d fallen for it. Ordered a few pairs of the painful but sexy shoes he clearly favoured.
Taught myself how to walk in them. And when we’d next gone out to dinner, I’d strutted by his side, feeling his smile of approval with every step I took.
Somehow I’d let myself believe that it was me who’d manipulated him .
Learned the way his mind worked and won him over by watching and adapting.
But I’d been a puppet. And when I’d resisted, I’d been punished. The comments. The comparisons. The little digs and insults. And so slowly I didn’t realise, it had morphed to the physical.
The first time I’d made a meal with blue cheese, not realising he hated it, and he had slapped me.
He’d never apologised. Only said that next time I’d do better.
I couldn’t explain to myself why I didn’t walk away then.
I could reason that he was wrong, he should never have raised a hand to me, but somehow he twisted everything so that I ended up blaming myself.
And now… I winced, rubbing my palms up and down my thighs, tr ying to encourage the blood back into them as I held my position in the darkness, listening for his footsteps and hearing only silence.
Now the tasks had mutated from my needing to become exactly what he desired, to cater to his every need, into something far more twisted.
His sick need to control me, to make me do things that made me recoil in horror.
The person I was becoming at his insistence was someone I could no longer look at in the mirror.
I’d stolen for him. I’d manipulated. I’d lied.
And this morning he’d asked me to look at those images on the computer – violent, terrible photographs he’d sourced on the dark web of women being bound, broken, naked and vulnerable.
He’d told me to organise them into files for him, and I had thrown up.
I’d tried to switch my mind off, just carry out the task, knowing he was only making me do it out of his own desire to rule me in every regard.
But I hadn’t been able to. Like an idiot, I’d started crying, unable to stop myself from wondering where those women were now.
If they’d survived. If they had started out like me, trying to placate a partner who could never be satisfied.
My emotional breakdown had been unacceptable to Ryan.
And now, as a result, I was back in the place I dreaded more than anything, my knees screaming in agony, my head pressed into the solid metal rail.
It would have been better if he had just hit me again.
Taken his rage out in a few agonising minutes of violence, as he so often did.
But when it came to his tasks, his lessons in humility and obedience , as he referred to them, the punishment was always long.
To allow me to reflect. Reconsider. Become better.
I closed my eyes, trying to block out the pain, the fear of what would come next, and wished I’d just done as he said. There was no place for morals, boundaries in my life. Not any more. I would do better next time.