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Silence stretches between us, broken only by my soft sobs. I don’t know why I’m crying exactly. I sensed there was something not right with Tasker as soon as he touched me. If he hurt that woman and other people, as Charlie said, then he deserved whatever he got. But I don’t want Charlie,myCharlie, to be the one who did it.
Even if he did it for me.
That same not-rightness dulls his eyes now and promises only death, with enough sadist in them to promise suffering first.
The only senseless death, here, is my naive trust in this man. A murderer.
“Don’t cry for him, Ranay. He was a horrible person.” His voice breaks and he looks away, running his hand up into his hair to tug at his own curls. “I’m a horrible person. I tried to keep you from touching that filth in my life, but it wasn’t meant to be.”
Even now, knowing what he did, he’s still my Master. I still ache for his big hands and his smile. I understand better, now, that those glimpses of the soft, kind Charlie are rare and priceless. Something he doesn’t show to just anyone.
Who’s the real Charlie? The killer? The dog lover? My Master? The sadist who hurts me so well that I want to die from sheer bliss?
Even knowing that he killed Tasker, I can’t see him as horrible. He killed a man who killed many other people. That doesn’t make it right, but I can understand it. Especially if he thought the man might hurt me. Remembering how Tasker glared down into my eyes, I have no doubt that I would’ve suffered in his care, and I wouldn’t have enjoyed a second of it. Not like with Charlie.
“You’re not a horrible person. Not you.”
“You don’t know the real me, kitten.”
He says it so wistfully it breaks my heart all over again. I want to jump down off the table and wrap my arms around him. No man who looks at me like this, all broken dreams and shattered hope while calling me kitten and taking care of me, can be horrible. I don’t believe it.
“Say the word and get it over with. I promised to free you when I became bad for you, and this is bad. I’m not feeling very stable today.”
He thinks I’ll tap out. Red. Over and done. That’s why he ensured I could say it when I needed to. So I could force him to let me walk away.
That would be the smartest thing to do. After all, the man I love more than life itself just told me he killed someone. To protect me.
I wait until he looks at me, dark, sad eyes of grief and despair. I open my mouth, watching the way his eyes ice over, preparing himself to lose me. I hope I’ve given him joy and pleasure. I think I have. I’ve tried so hard to please him.
I say one word only.
“Charlie.”
22
Cotton tears and shreds beneath his knife, an awful sound in the silence. Watching him slice up his own T-shirt, I can only imagine what it sounds like for that knife to cut through flesh instead. My stomach heaves, but I don’t budge from the table.
He won’t hurt me. I know it. I know him. Better than anyone.
Do you? Really?He killed someone. Maybe you’re next.
He grabs my foot and a whimper escapes. Using a strip of cotton, he binds my ankles together. Then my knees.
I can’t look away from his empty eyes. That first night, when he took me in complete darkness, did his eyes look like this? He’d been hiding the truth from me even then. There’s a monster in there with him. Sometimes the monster wears a Charlie mask, but right now, the monster is fully exposed in nightmarish detail.
My Charlie is nowhere to be seen.
And yet I sit here, crying, waiting for the monster to tell me what he wants me to do.
I hate my weakness. My stupidity. I deserve to have my throat slit and my naked, abused body dumped somewhere in a ditch if I’m stupid enough to sit here and let a killer tie me up and do whatever he wants with me.
“Give me your hands.”
Waiting for me to comply, he watches my face, a small smile curving his lips. He sees the battle between my will and my flesh. My fruitless struggle against the weakness in me that demands I obey without question. It’s a different kind of pain, wholly internal and soul deep, and he revels in it. I’m trapped by my own urges and completely unable to refuse him.
I don’twantto reject his orders in any way. Even if he’s a monster. And that’s what he wants most of all. My trust, even when I know what he is.
A killer.
