Page 10 of Darkest Obsession

It’s not exactly typical behavior for the middle of a party, but it’s not what I’ll be doing anyway. I just don’t want them to freak out. I find an empty room on the first try, thank goodness, I really didn’t want to see anyone hooking up, and I close myself inside. I can finally breathe. Thomas’ words remind me how easily I find myself at the center of attention. It’s not something I enjoy, it’s just what I practiced before the Fox Academy.

I wanted to come here to get away from all the attention. Maybe enjoying my first year of freedom has gone a little too far. I sit on the bed and kick my shoes off. I have three texts from my mom about the family’s latest upload.

Mom: 1 million views in 12 hours! New record!!!!

Mom: Your brother looks bad

Mom: phasing dad out as a character in ten videos. Sad!!!

Phasing dad out as a character. My throat tightens. The fans don’t know what’s coming yet and they’re going to lose their shit. I don’t want to be anywhere near that trainwreck. Sigh. I try to think of a response to help her feel better. She hasn’t asked me once how I like the new boarding school. She’s still upset that I won’t allow her to film me anymore. It’s been an entire year since I used my entire allowance to get a lawyer to back up. She was livid, but honestly, can mom blame me?

She uploaded every waking minute of my life on the internet since basically the day I was born and she still can’t see why I don’t want a camera shoved in my face long past turning eighteen. Making It With The Robinsons started with my mom and a camera and blew up into… too much for one kid to deal with. My brother’s still there dealing with it. Sigh.

I take my shoes off and crawl into the big bed, trying not to mess it up too much. I just need a few minutes of quiet because of the alcohol, because of the noise… and Thomas. His opinion shouldn’t matter to me at all. He’s just a big, stupid jock covered in tattoos who barely even speaks. All he does is stare with those ridiculous gray eyes or gaze down on everyone with a haughty look on his face. I can’t believe Sylvia considers that guy a ‘friend’. She’s the least snobby person I know and everyone at this school won’t stop talking about how her sister’s engaged to a billionaire. How can she tolerate an ass like him?

I don’t want to piss mom off even more by ignoring her text about the video. I hit the link and cringe at the familiar sound of our ‘theme music’. Kids at school teased me so much about it. I kept going back to public school anyway, tolerating the teasing and the thrice weekly bullying when my parents uploaded to the channel. Spending more time with my parents at home getting home schooled wasn’t worth the risk.

I just wanted away from the cameras. I just wanted to be a normal kid.

Mom and dad wrote another video where dad pretends to cheat on her and the camera captures mom’s totally not fake at all reaction. Sigh. How many times have they done this stupid prank? The worst part is knowing what’s coming after all of this. They’re leading their fans to the truth – the real reason I don’t want to be at home going through their inevitable public relations disaster. They’ve made millions selling online courses on how people can ‘get their relationship mojo’. And now… ugh. I don’t even want to think the words out loud, but I can’t avoid the truth.

They’re getting a divorce.

I flip over, facing away from the door and close the video so I can think of something encouraging to text mom. I could compliment her new weave, but I hate that she’s doing e-girl hairstyles to look younger. I could compliment dad on his acting skills, but he would just send me one of his articles about the importance of black women ‘finding a strong black king’ to have a family with.

My phone distracts me so hard that I don’t hear the door to the bedroom open until the footsteps get close to the bed. I freeze and flip my phone face down to drown out the light as if that could make me invisible. Someone crept in here… they know I’m a woman alone. I flip around, but in the dark, I can’t make out the figure towering over the bed. I want to say something, but my instinct tells me to run. I scramble backwards but it’s too late.

A large body lands on mine and I exhale sharply as all the oxygen leaves my lungs. It’s a man. The body on top of mine feels far too heavy to be female. I scream, but the pillow beneath my face drowns me out. His body struggles against my thrashing until he pins me to the bed using his hips and wraps one hand around my waist and another covering my mouth. The room falls silent except for breathing. My breath sounds fast and unsteady, but he’s slow and deliberate, his lungs pushing me deeper into the mattress with each inhalation.

He’s going to rape me. He adjusts his legs and exhales slowly before whispering my name.

His voice sounds familiar, but I’m freaking out way too much to place it. Who is this?

“Don’t worry. I won’t hurt you.”

I struggle again and attempt to bite his finger, which doesn’t work at all. He shudders and I feel something pressing against my ass. I move again to get away from him and realize he’s hard. That’s when I really start fighting, but nothing I do moves him an inch. He completely overpowers me with absolutely no difficulty and keeps me still until I give up and stop wriggling. I won’t be able to breathe at all if I keep fighting him. With his weight on me, I can still only take shallow breaths.

“Get off me,” I wheeze.

“Believe me, I want to.”

He shifts his hips again and terror surges through me. Fear unlike anything I’ve experienced before surges through me.

“Stop wriggling. I’m just trying to talk.”

Talk? There’s a dick pressed up against my ass so it certainly doesn’t feel like the man pinning me to a bed in an abandoned bedroom at a party just wants to talk. But I stop wriggling, because I want him to let me go. At some point, he’ll have to loosen his grip on me to free his cock and at that point, I can escape safely.

“Good girl,” he murmurs and a shudder runs straight through my core. I squeeze my thighs together tightly and attempt to thrash again, but he’s too heavy and I can’t fight back even if I try.

“You should really be careful, Clover. Very careful.”

You don’t have to listen to him, Clover. Just think of something else. Think of getting yourself out of here alive.

“Men of our status take what they want. We don’t face consequences. We lie. We cheat. We steal. We rape. We get away with all of it.”

His breath is hot on my cheek and I wish I could move my face to make out any of his features. All I know is that his breath smells minty and it feels particularly cruel that the only thing I observe about the man about to rape me is that he has good breath.

“If something were to happen to you, all that sleeping around… you would be finished.”