Page 84 of Take Her
Unlike the cranes, my words had taken flight, and once they were in the air there was no way to bring them back.
—Sarah, from One of a Thousand Wishes by A. R. McGeorge
Iwas too post-sex high to process what he’d said quickly—but then he slammed back, sitting on top of my hips again as he reached for my arm.
“Fuck you!” I shrieked, trying to yank myself back. “No no no no no!”
But he didn’t care, he just held my hand, grabbed my sleeve, and shoved it down, exposing everything I’d ever done.
Thready white scars, going both directions, for the times I meant it and the times I didn’t, the times I wanted to, and the times I hurt myself just to feel.
I felt him look at them, his hand around my wrist now squeezing unbelievably tight, as his head swiveled down to look at me. “I assume you’ve got a matched set?” he asked, his cold voice stabbing me like an icicle.
“Fuck you,” I whispered at him.
“No, Lia—fuck you. For ever thinking that this was okay.” The look he gave me was of such profound disgust that it made me hate myself. “If I could go back into the past, I’d be tempted to wring your neck.”
“Give me my arm back,” I said, yanking, but he wouldn’t let me.
“No. It belongs to me.” I struggled with him. I didn’t understand. “If you can’t be trusted with this body, I’m taking it from you. It’s mine now. And the only person who gets to hurt any part of you, from here on out, is me.” He roughly sent his other hand up my chest beneath my top to palm a breast. I gasped then hissed as he pinched my nipple, hard. “Just me,” he said as I whimpered. “You ever sit around at night thinking about something stupid? You remember that this body is mine and cut it out. You need to get hurt just to feel alive? I’m just a text away and I would enjoy hurting you—so much, little girl, so very, very much.”
He released my nipple and blood rushed back into it, making it burn.
“I. Own. You,” he said slowly. “Say it.”
He was hurting me, right now this very minute, and he didn’t realize it—because he was giving me everything I’d ever wanted—and everything that would kill me if it stopped.
“Little girl,” he warned, setting his jaw.
“You own me,” I confessed. It was my deepest truth. “You do. You don’t even know how much.”
He made a thoughtful sound and released my wrist. “Take off your shirt.”
My hands flew to the buttons of my pajama shirt and undid them before I shrugged it off, leaving me still trapped and naked beneath him, and him in his clothing. His eyes roamed over my body, his gaze a strange combination of lust and scrutiny. “You ever hurt yourself anywhere else?”
“No.” If I’d had more sense between the ages of thirteen to seventeen, I might have. There were a lot of places in the world it sucked to have to wear long sleeves year round now. Thanks, global warming.
“Good,” he said, then looked like whatever he said next would cost him. “I need you to be careful with yourself, Lia. I don’t take owning things lightly. And if something happened to you, no matter the cause—I don’t know what I’d do.” He sat back on my thighs and looked around my room again. “I’m going to install cameras in here.”
I rose up on my elbows. “What?” I asked, my voice rising.
“Yeah. Until I’m sure I can trust you with yourself—and, because I want to see you all the time.” He dismounted both me and my bed and started inspecting my walls.
“Rhaim,” I protested, sitting up.
He looked back at me, his expression cold and his inflection flat. “What part of me owning you do you not understand?”
I curled my hands into fists and put them to my face, like I was trying to stop from screaming. “You can’t just torture me back to mental health, Rhaim. I’m trying—I’m trying so hard you don’t even know, but it’s just not a thing.” I couldn’t even meet his eyes, surely this was the part where he was going to turn and run away, because I was a fucking mess.
But the bed shifted as he sat down nearby, and he took my hands in his, slowly pulling them down, and then I didn’t have any choice but to look at him. His expression, while still concerned, was softer now. “I know, Lia. But that’s what I’m telling you—you don’t have to try anymore.” His hands squeezed my wrists, not with anger, but with kindness—which was somehow twice as cruel. “All you need to think about from here on out is one thing: does this make Daddy happy?”
His words sucked the breath from my body and stopped my heart—because that was what I truly wanted. I was never going to be able to chase away all the voices that taunted me inside my head—which was why I needed someone else’s.
Just one echoing voice that I could trust.
I curled forward and started sobbing.
“Oh, little girl,” Rhaim whispered, scooping me up. He pulled us to the top of my bed where he could set his back against my headboard, and I cried like I was shattered, plastered to his chest. His hands and arms were chaste, just rocking me, while he made soothing noises, and I cried like I had never cried before, pulling up all the tears I’d ever swallowed down to give to him.