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Chapter Twenty-Two
Sitting in between Vance’s legs and leaning against his thick torso was the comfiest she’d ever been. It was the best place to watch a movie from and he’d dropped kisses on her head and wrapped around her to give squeezes throughout. Plus he’d prepared a basket of snacks that they’d nommed on, and kept her sippy cup filled.
It was evening, the skies darkening from the sun going down and not from storms. Just like Daddy had said, he hadn’t let her out of bed all day. Well, except to carry her into the bathroom and give her an enema. She’d had a few before and didn’t mind when they weren’t meant to punish her. This one definitely hadn’t been.
Vance had been very sweet to her and gotten her off while he made her hold the fluid, hadn’t even let her out of his sight when she’d had to expel. Which should’ve made her dissolve into liquid embarrassment and get flushed down the toilet along with the contents of her stomach but somehow it didn’t.
Maybe because he’d been so steadily adamant that every inch of her, every need, was his responsibility today and she wasn’t permitted to even empty her bowels by herself.Okay, Daddy, if that’s what you really want.
She was still wearing her cuffs but they weren’t attached to anything. It was technically possible for her to get out of bed but…why would she? All snuggled up with her daddy who’d been so caring and attentive and had also given her half a dozen orgasms and it wasn’t even dinner time yet? Best daddy.
And she’d been following his orders so she couldn’t even really feel guilty about not having done any job hunting. Not in the vaguely hazy little state he’d been keeping her in.
Vance let the credits roll all the way to the end before flicking the TV off, and then nuzzled his beard against her neck. She sighed. When was the last time she’d been this relaxed? She hardly recognized herself.
Lilith was almost nodding off—again, because cuddles from Vance were better than NyQuil—when there was a low vibration in his chest. She felt his words before she heard them.
“So I thought we might talk about what happened last night.”
There went all of her cozy drowsiness; his words were a bucket of cold water on her head. Her whole body went rigid and though she didn’t actually move, she wanted to vault out of the bed. Probably sensing that her fight-or-flight reflex had been kicked in, Vance wrapped his burly arms around her and rocked her gently.
“There’s no storm now, lil bit. Nothing to be afraid of. I’m sorry it’s so hard to talk about. And I don’t…”
She could picture him shaking his head, how the crease between his brows would deepen and the corners of his mouth would turn down in a thoughtful frown.
“I’m not just being nosy. I thought, I don’t know… If there’s a reason you get so upset about thunderstorms that maybe I could help. Make it better. That’s all.”
That was sweet, really sweet, and Vance was a terribly generous person. Exhibit A, she was living in this beautiful cabin while figuring out her shit instead of being brought up on trespassing charges. But there was nothing he could do. There was nothing anyone could do. Trauma couldn’t be fixed with a bandaid.
She let him pet and soothe her, counted the seconds that were his patience made manifest. He really was a good daddy.
“That’s nice, but you can’t fix it. I can tell you if you want but it’s not going to change anything.”
“If you can stand it, I’d like to know,” he told her, the pressure of his body surrounding her a comfort.
She could, although she had to step outside herself a bit to tell it so she wouldn’t fall down a chasm of grief. Shouldn’t be so visceral after all these years, but since when did hearts and minds act the way they should? Jerks.
“I’m a twin,” she said.
She supposed some people would say they had been a twin, as if it was over now, as if that were a label you could divest yourself of like Night Manager or Sexiest Man Alive. But “twin” wasn’t like that even if sometimes she wished it were; she’d be a twin forever.
“I’m a twin and my brother died when we were four.”
This was when that feeling of being outside herself usually started. What was it that fancy psychiatrist had called it? Dissociation? It was disorienting but also nice in a way because it meant she didn’t feel so much. Hopefully it would envelop her soon. Apparently it wasn’t healthy but it sure felt better than the stabs of anguish that pierced her whenever she thought about Damien.
“I’m so sorry.”
Lilith shrugged, grateful that she didn’t have to look in Vance’s deep blue eyes while talking about her brother. Her daddy’s ocean-deep empathy would’ve made it even harder. And could that occupying-a-balloon-only-attached-to-her-real-self-by-a-string feeling kick in, please? She’d had enough of hurting and it would only get worse.
“We were living in a piece of shit ramshackle farmhouse in the middle of nowhere. No running water, no electricity. No fire alarms.”
Now that she thought about it, it was possible they had been “borrowing” that house. Apparently the Belladonnas had a long and illustrious history of squatting. Lovely. That was definitely not something she was going to admit to Vance who’d probably been born with a silver spoon in his mouth and baby’s first Brooks Brothers suit already hanging in his walk-in closet.
“There were so many holes in the roof that it felt like it let in more leaks than it kept out. Every time it rained, it would drip onto my sister and me, and onto my parents’ bed in the next room. Damien had his own bed and somehow it was wedged into the one corner that stayed dry.”
She could still picture Damien huddled under a Batman blanket they’d found at a thrift shop, only his little blond head peeking out. He’d loved that blanket so much he wore holes in it. Never went anywhere with out it.
“One night there was a really bad storm. So much rain, lightning and thunder really close.”
