One Dirty Night - Page 96

Whatever Nick had done to me had succeeded in ways my parents had failed in my youth.

They’d wanted me to feel.

To experience.

To fall and grow, try and fail, live and laugh and…love.

Damn you, you stupid jerk.

Curling into a little ball, I hugged the spare pillow and let sobs wrack me.

Sobs I’d choked on ever since my parents died.

The two people who made me and then left me all alone.

I’d unwittingly let Nick drag me out of the metaphorical library where I’d hidden my terrified heart and made me exist. Made me human and not just a recipient of knowledge.

He’d made me feel. He’d bruised me, marked me, consumed me…and now, he’d tossed me aside, all because he was too much of a coward to love me, despite death coming for us all.

I’d been brave enough to love him.

I let him change me.

I cried harder.

I could never go back.

Never turn it off again.

Never stop wishing for the more that he’d given me.

I wished I’d never gone to Spectacle of Secrets.

Wished I’d never confessed to Hunter how much I wanted someone to take away my power.

I would give anything to forget the joy I’d felt at being dominated. To never know what the act of being subservient did to me.

It wasn’t because I needed violence to get off.

It wasn’t because I’d read the books and fantasised about the lifestyle.

It was as simple as I’d told Nick.

As profound as finally learning the truth about who I truly was.

I wanted him to rule me because for those short few hours in the big top—for those wonderful moments where two men told me what to do, what to think, and how to obey, I’d been free.

Free from the pressure.

Free from letting my parents down.

Free from my endless expectations of myself.

In Nick’s arms, I’d found peace.

Peace I’d never known before.

And now, all I felt was torment.