Better When It Hurts

by Skye Warren

  * * *

  He said he didn’t need to watch, but I still thought he would. It’s somehow more unnerving to get undressed when I’m standing alone in the living room.

  It makes me feel ashamed, which shouldn’t even be possible after what I’ve done at the club. Blue is just gifted like that—gifted at making me feel like shit. I take off my dress with quick, efficient movements and toss it onto a chair in the corner. My heels get kicked off to the floor underneath. My bra and panties come next. Then I’m naked in a room I’ve never been in, my skin pebbling under the cool air from the vent above me.

  Blue returns from the kitchen with an amber bottle hanging from his fingers.

  Only one bottle. Of course he hasn’t offered me a drink. I’m not here to enjoy myself, and he’s not my host. We aren’t going to pretend this is a date. I haven’t forgotten what this is about, but if I ever do, he’ll remind me with the subtle digs.

  He nods to the couch. “Bend over. I want to see what those fuckers don’t get to.”

  And the not so subtle digs.

  My skin is covered entirely in goose bumps. Even my nipples are stiff and proud, like some cruel parody of arousal. I’m not even wearing my heels anymore, but my legs are wobbly when I cross the small space.

  The carpet is softer than anything I’ve ever felt. This is the floor where he walks with those bare feet. This is the floor he might lounge on or do push-ups on. This is the floor he might fuck some other girl on, a girl he actually likes, one he doesn’t order to bend over.

  The leather of the couch looks worn—artfully worn, like rich people have. Even in my shame and my nervousness, I have the sense to wonder where he got all that money.

  And why he’s corralling drunk assholes at the Grand if he doesn’t have to.

  “Now, Lola. Stop stalling.”

  His voice sends a shiver down my spine. Cool leather kisses the fronts of my thighs. I bend at the waist, using every ounce of grace, of strength I’ve built up while stripping. He wants to see something those fuckers don’t see, but that’s all I show him—the smooth descent, the blunt display of my ass, as if I were onstage and he were standing two feet away with a twenty in his hand.

  It feels like a victory, that small defiance. Like I’ve held something back.

  Especially when I hear his breath catch at the sight.

  Confidence steadies me as I dig my heels into the soft pile. My hands stroke the buttery leather before settling into place, fingers spread.

  The heat from his body touches me first. It breaks through my defenses, invisible and undeniable. A hundred men have touched me, have grabbed me, have ground their dicks against me. And just the whisper of his body, the evidence of his nearness makes my heart pound.

  His finger is featherlight against the small of my back. He touches me like I’m delicate, breakable, when we both know I’m anything but. He touches me like he’s tracing the lines of me, drawing the curve of my ass, dipping into the tender space between my legs.

  “You’re shaking,” he says as if remarking on the weather. “And you’re wet.”

  Of course his words only make me shake harder. They only make me wetter.

  He leans down, his forefinger notched to my pussy, barely invading me, casually possessive. His mouth is close to my ear, his whisper low and gruff. “Are you afraid of me?”

  “No,” I lie.

  Two fingers shove inside me, deep and fast. My body is lubricated, but not enough. I flinch and hop up on my toes. It presses my face into the cushion—and I think that’s exactly what he meant to do.

  “Tell me the truth,” he says, the spider to the fly.

  I’m already caught in his web. There’s no way out.

  My voice is muffled even to my own ears, mouth half-smashed against a leather couch that probably cost more than my car. “Candy says you’re not really going to hurt me. She says you…you just want to fuck me. That you’re not really mad.”

  His fingers stroke me deeply, intimately, soothing me after the rough burn of entry. “Five years would be a long time to hold on to a grudge.”

  Part of me wants him to agree, to say that all this was some strange seduction, to assure me that I have nothing to fear. But if he told me that, it would be a lie. He may hide his anger well, especially if Candy couldn’t see it. I can see it. I can feel it as he adds a third finger before I’m ready.

  I rise up on my toes again, breath held in my chest, cheeks hot with embarrassment. He touches the inside of me as easily as another man might hold my hand. No, this is less intimate than that. This is a man reaching inside his car to twist a knob. This is a man touching something he owns.

  “Are you going to hurt me?” I whisper.

  There. I’ve asked the question, and I know that if he does answer me, it will be honest. Whatever his answer, I can take it. I’ve felt pain before, felt hate and rage. Even if it seems like it will be different coming from him—sharper and more personal. I’ll survive. If there’s one thing I know I can do, it’s survive.

  His hand stills. I imagine him looking directly at me, staring at the pink skin stretched around his fingers. It’s humiliating being this open to him while he’s still dressed. Humiliating with the light on. Humiliating when he takes a swig from his beer bottle with one hand while the other is still pressed inside me.

  “And ruin the surprise?” he asks mildly.

  My jaw clenches tight. My eyes shut too. “I’ve never been a fan of surprises.”

  “No,” he says thoughtfully. “I can’t say that I’m a fan either.”

  I cringe knowing he’s thinking of that awful night. It had been one hell of a surprise when I’d accused him of raping me. He would hardly be a fan of them after that.

  “So I’ll tell you the answer,” he says, pulling his fingers from me with a wet sound. Those damp fingers press against my back hole in an answer more eloquent than words. “Yes, you’ll probably be hurt tonight.”

  I swallow, knowing I shouldn’t feel disappointed. And definitely not scared. I knew what I was getting into when I came here, didn’t I? And if I had clung to some stupid fairy-tale idea of him, something clearly false, at least when it came to me, that was my own damn fault.

  He leans forward, resting his arm on my back. I feel like a piece of furniture, like an extension of this sofa, something soft and sturdy for him to rest on.

  “And tomorrow night,” he adds. “I took you out of rotation.”

  I gasp in shock and indignation. “What the hell?”

  “And the next night after that.”

  “Are you crazy?”

  “Three nights, Lola. I don’t think that’s too much to ask after what you did. I don’t think it’s enough, actually, but I can be lenient.”

  I struggle, I fight. I want to be standing when I yell at him for doing this. I want this to be an even playing field, but he’s already resting his weight on my back. I went over the arm of this couch willingly, and now I’m trapped. “You had no right to do that. Just because I agreed—”

  “Unless you want me to tell Ivan about those sticky little fingers of yours? He’s lenient with you girls, but I don’t think he would like thinking you’re stealing from the customers. Or from him.”

  “I don’t,” I gasp. “I don’t steal from him or from—”

  His body moves as if in a shrug. “Who can say? And to be honest, I don’t give a fuck.”

  I fight again, but it’s like trying to move a mountain. One that’s resting comfortably, casually on my back. The anger seeps out of me, replaced by worry, by sadness that we’ve come this far. I turn my forehead into the cushion, hiding and self-soothing. “I can’t go three nights without getting paid,” I say into the leather.

  There’s a long pause. “I’ll make up the difference.”

  He’ll pay me for sex? God, even when he’s being cruel, he’s kind. “No.”

  The thought of it makes my stomach turn over. If this is about a debt, then we need to be square at th
e end of it. I fucked him over once, and he’s giving it back. It’s supposed to hurt.

  “No money,” I say, staring at the blur of light and black leather. “If we do this, we do it on my off days—like today. I work my regular schedule. That’s my deal. Take it or leave it.”

  This pause is longer, and I wonder what he’s thinking. Is he going to try to force me to miss work? Is he going to force me to take his money? I think that would be the worst punishment, to be made his whore as well as his plaything.

  He strokes a hand over my back like I’m an animal—petting me. “One night a week.”

  My skin tingles, and I force myself not to arch into his touch. “How many weeks?”

  He doesn’t answer. He just grabs me by the hair and lifts.

  Chapter Ten

  “This is very important, Hannah. Mrs. Moreno has the pictures of your bruises. We need to know who hurt you.”

  I refuse to look up, to meet his eyes. My voice is a whisper. “I told her.”

  “We have her statement, but I need to hear it from you.”

  After a long beat of silence, I look up into the kind eyes of a judge. He looks sorry for me. Everyone is sorry for me. They just can’t help me. Isn’t that what Blue told me? That they don’t understand what it’s like in the system. They shove us around like dolls in cardboard houses.

  I grasp the wood handles of the chair, already slick from my palms. “What will happen to him?”

  The judge looks tired. “That depends on a lot of factors.”

  “Like what?”

  He doesn’t want to tell me. I can see that much. “It depends on if there’s a trial or not.”

  This isn’t a trial. It’s just a hearing to figure out if I should be left at the house or removed. Blue probably has a hearing just like this one. Of course Matthew won’t have one, because he’s not a foster kid. He’s one of the actual kids who live at that house.

  “There won’t be a trial.” I don’t say it like a question. I may be young, but I know that much. I’m just a stupid little girl from the wrong side of the tracks. A girl whose daddy ended up in jail. A girl whose mother took too many pills and never woke up.

  Girls like us, we don’t get trials.

  The judge looks down at his papers. He shuffles them around. He doesn’t want to tell me the truth, but he doesn’t want to lie. I appreciate that, at least.

  His voice is severe when he repeats, “Hannah, we need to know who hurt you.”

  “It was Blue,” I whisper. “Eugene Blue.”

  If I say it was Matthew, they’ll remove me from the home. And Blue too. But they won’t be able to prosecute Matthew. He won’t go to jail. He won’t be punished in any way—except by Blue.

  He’ll go back and finish the job. It took two of the older boys at the home plus Matthew’s drunk-ass dad to pull Blue off him. And I’m grateful. They’re the only reason Blue isn’t standing trial for murder.

  It doesn’t matter that he’s a minor. There’s no way they’d let him off a second time. And if they let us out, Blue will finish the job. He’ll get himself in prison—I know it.

  If I say it was Blue, if I say he hurt me, they’ll send him away. Far away. Exactly where he wanted to go.

  He won’t be able to come back.

  I already know he doesn’t want to.

  * * *

  The whistle of a belt coming off follows me into Blue’s bedroom. My breath stutters in my chest. I hear the threat of the movement, the speed and power behind it. It’s more than a man getting undressed.

  There’s a hundred ways a belt can be used to hurt me. I know them well.

  I turn my head to the side, addressing him but showing deference too. It’s an instinct now. It’s survival. “What are you going to do with that?”

  “I’d rather show you,” he says, approaching me, prowling around me.

  I don’t want him to hit me with that belt. Not because I can’t take the pain. I know I can, because I’ve done it before. I don’t want him to hit me because I might start hating him.

  “Wait,” I say.

  He doesn’t wait. One hand takes my wrist. Standing behind me, he leans close. “What do you think I’ll do with this? Make your pretty skin all red? Make you cry?”

  I tense, twisting my arm. It only hurts me, and I’m still held tight. “Don’t.”

  “I’m going to do both of those things before we’re done here, Lola.” He pauses, loosening his grip slightly. “But I’m not going to whip you with this.”

  There’s only a second where I can feel relieved before I feel him drawing my other hand behind me. It’s a mistake to relax around him. Whatever I’m thinking, he’s doing something different. However much I brace myself, it’s still going to hurt.

  He wraps the soft leather around my wrists, binding them together behind my back. It pushes my breasts out in front of me. Cool air brushes over my skin, tightening my nipples.

  There’s weakness in this pose, being held, being open.

  And there’s strength too, the pride of being wanted, the power of desire.

  “On your knees,” he says so softly I almost don’t hear him.

  I don’t know what he’s thinking. Whether he sees me as an object he can use or as an enemy he can conquer. I’m a little off balance, lilting to the side as I sink to the carpet. His hands cup my arms, helping me down, guiding my gently. It feels more like worship than anger, more like kindness than cruelty.

  At least until the sharp sound of his zipper rips through the air.

  His voice follows. “Candy doesn’t think I’ll hurt you.”

  I shiver at the foreboding underneath the words. “Yes.”

  He undresses slowly, methodically, exposing rough skin and dark hair and a thick, jutting cock.

  I have seen his cock before, but only in the dark, holding it in my fist while I jerked him off, shadows and motion. Now I see the skin like the dark side of a peach, almost the color of a bruise. I see the curve of a vein underneath. I see the head of his cock, fat and proud and already glistening at the tip.

  I see everything clearly because the saturated late-afternoon light still streams through his window. Our hours are all backward and twisted. Where another woman would do this at midnight, would expose her shame to the moon, mine comes open at five o’clock.

  “She thinks you’re safe with me because I protect the other girls.” He approaches me, his cock near my face, his eyes looking down on me. “I even protect you.”

  I choke out the words. “Because only you get to touch me.”

  He nods approvingly. Candy doesn’t understand, he means. I understand. He’s showing me that we’re together on this, like some perverted joint mission where I agree to be hurt. And haven’t I? I showed up here of my own free will. Maybe I do want what’s coming to me.

  And still, there’s a part of me—a weak, scared little girl curled up on a flea-infested bed from the past—who wants it to stop. Who digs her heels into the train tracks as if that might fortify her, as if that might stop the train that’s speeding closer.

  “I never meant to hurt you,” I say because it is the awful, painful truth. Because I failed.

  Because I’m weak and scared, and if he knows I never meant to hurt him, maybe he won’t hurt me.

  He tastes the words, letting them roll on his tongue. “You never meant to hurt me.”

  I’m already on my knees, hands bound behind me. Naked. All I have to protect me is his mercy, but I’m afraid he doesn’t have any where I’m concerned.

  I am sure of it when his hand lands in my hair, squeezing tight, pushing my head back. His eyes meet mine, and I see there a dark promise. A quick shake and I’m backed up against the side of the bed, fallen against it and unable to right myself.

  “I’m just wondering when exactly that was.” He brushes the head of his cock against my lips. “When you told me you’d be my girl, when you held my hand and smiled at me, was that when you didn’t mean to hurt me?”


  It’s a trick question; I know that. It’s designed to tear me apart. I know that too. And still I answer, “Yes.”

  When my mouth opens on the word, when my lips are parted, that’s when he shoves his cock inside.

  “When you decided to fuck another one of your foster brothers, was that when you thought to yourself, I don’t want to hurt Blue?”

  My head shakes no—and I’m not sure what it even means. I wasn’t thinking about him in that moment. I was trying to protect myself, and maybe that’s worse, the selfishness of fighting for me instead of us. Maybe that split second was why I lost him after all.

  He pushes his hips forward, and his cock slides over my tongue. It leaves a trail of salt and musk, something to follow him down my throat. He’s full and large. My head jerks back, but he’s got me in his grip. The sharp pain on my scalp brings tears to my eyes. Then I’m being choked, throat fucked, by the man—the boy—I once loved.

  “I guess it was later,” he says conversationally, as if his cock isn’t down my throat, as if the flat plane of his abs isn’t bumping my nose with every deep thrust. “When I walked in and found you with your panties down, bent over the bed. That was when you decided you didn’t want to hurt me.”

  He’s moving faster now, and it’s affecting his speech, words coming on a punch of breath. It’s a sharp contrast to me, those rapid breaths, because I can’t breathe at all. My arms are aching, twisted back and wrapped in leather and pressed against the wall of metal and mattress. My jaw burns from being stretched open. My throat feels bruised from the invasion, and he only digs deeper.

  “And I was worried. That’s the worst part, that I thought he might be hurting you, might be forcing you, because it looked that way. And because I believed you wouldn’t cheat on me.”

  He presses in deep, stealing all my air. I can only open my eyes wide and look up at him.

  “But it turns out you just like it rough, isn’t that right?”