Unable to submit, I searched desperately, trying to think of something that could help. But I was in the far corner of a deserted motel in a truck stop well off the highway. I had no practical experience to guide me, only empty words on musty pages. Like Alice, I had stepped through the looking glass into a whole new world, foreign and sinister.
The old rules didn’t apply to this musky hotel room. There was only this man, strong and confident. There was only his mercy, to be gained through pleasing him, not angering him.
“You’re thinking too much,” he said, and I heard the first rise of frustration in his voice. His patience had a limit after all, and it was approaching on the horizon.
“Please, please,” I whispered. “Is there something else I could…anything else…?”
He scoffed. “What else could I want from you?”
Nothing. There was nothing at all, no pride, no hope.
“There now.” His voice softened. Something stirred my hair. His hand stroked down, then toyed with a damp lock. “You’re making this a bigger deal than it needs to be. It doesn’t mean anything, you and I. Just casual sex. Have you had casual sex before?”
No, never. I shook my head.
He seemed amused, a little pleased. “So this will be your first time, in a way. I like that. It’s a turn-on.”
His fingertips drifted over my bare shoulders, leaving a trail of goose bumps in languid circles. I hugged the door, suddenly wishing that I were the kind of woman who had casual sex. That I could turn around and let the towel drop and pretend I wanted this too. It would make this easier. Instead I could only shiver against the door, shudder under his touch.
“Lock the door,” he murmured against my ear. “I don’t want to be interrupted.”
I took a deep breath and tried to calm myself.
There are some men you just don’t say no to. That was what the waitress had said to me, and I understood it now. I wouldn’t say no, and he wouldn’t force me. I would go along with it, and everything would be consensual.
Just like a date. Casual sex.
My hand shook violently as I reached up and turned the lock sideways. It didn’t change our situation at all. I couldn’t leave before it was locked, and I still couldn’t. But it felt different, as if I had exercised my choice. As if I’d consented, and I had. He had my permission, even though he’d proven he didn’t need it.
He trailed his hand down my arm, wrapping his fingers around my wrist. Even though he only touched me in one place, it felt intimate. Though he didn’t squeeze, I felt fragile. Breakable.
Leading me to the bed, he pushed me gently to sit. I tightened the towel around myself, and he let me. I’d expected him to push me down, to tear the towel off and have sex with me. But I always seemed to overestimate his penchant for force. It was something about his presence, brute strength combined with the cunning to use it well. He wasn’t afraid of violence but neither was he overly fond of it. Or maybe that was just wishful thinking.
He sat down beside me, his light caresses still restricted to my arms, my shoulders. Safe places, as if we were still getting acquainted. As if my comfort mattered at all.
“Tell me about your boyfriends,” he said.
“What d-d-do you want to know?”
Oh no. I hadn’t stuttered since I was a kid. My mother had tried to frighten it out of me, but that only made it worse. Eventually I’d grown out of it…right around the time I’d gotten my book on Niagara Falls. Now my dreams deserted me along with my composure.
He raised his eyebrow, a sign he had heard my stutter, but he made no comment on it. Instead he asked, “How many have you had? How far did you let them go with you?”
I thought the phrasing was odd, even if it was technically accurate. How far I let them go, like he recognized my dominion over my body. Maybe he considered this the same thing; maybe it was. I was letting him do it to me. I was letting this happen.
Swallowing, I said, “My first boyfriend was in eighth grade. We only dated for a few months and never really saw each other outside school.”
“Did you fuck him?”
The question was blunt, and I flinched. “No. We d-didn’t do that. We would meet sometimes, outside the school during gym class.”
“You made out.” He smirked.
The arrogant action didn’t subtract from his attractiveness; it enhanced it. Up close, I realized he was one of the most handsome men I’d ever met. I never would have looked at him twice, mostly because of his age. He looked about ten years older than me. I never would have expected him to look twice at me either, but then I had always worn baggy clothes and hung at the edges of a crowd with my mother before we made a quick exit.
“Did you let him touch your tits?
“Yes.”
“Under your shirt or just over?”
“Over at f-first. And then he started—” I broke off as he touched my breasts through the towel, just two fingers on the top slope, then around the underside.
“He started what?” he prompted, still stroking, soft caresses on the rough fabric.
I swallowed, willing myself not to tremble. “Then he started reaching under my clothes.”
He tugged the towel down. I loosened my hold, letting the cloth slide down my breasts. The hem of the towel caught on my nipples, baring the slope of my breasts but no more. It was almost more obscene this way than if I’d been naked, but I couldn’t bring myself to pull the towel down.
Instead I stared into the darkness at the shadowy curtains that I hadn’t drawn closed while the weight of the wet towel tugged at the tender skin of my nipples. He drew his finger over the tops of my breasts.
I sucked in deep breaths, more panicked now, everything more sensitive, so acute—like pain. He touched me so lightly, and it hurt. How would it feel when he was rough? Because surely he would be. There was only one reason I could think of why a man who looked as good as he did would force a woman—because he preferred it that way.
“Why did you let him, your boyfriend? Surely you worried about being caught? I bet he didn’t even give you an orgasm out back behind the school. Were you that desperate for a skinny eighth-grader?”
His words knocked the breath from me. “No, I just… He wanted to, that’s all. I figured it didn’t hurt anything just to let him.”
“That’s right,” he said approvingly, soothingly. “It doesn’t hurt anything to just let him.”
With a flick of his fingers, the towel slipped off my nipples, gaping open around my waist. I sucked in a breath and shut my eyes.
“Just let it happen,” he murmured. “I want to do this. You let that little kid paw at you, so why not me?”
His warm hand closed around one breast. It was lifted, hefted into his palm before he rolled the nipple between callused fingers. It didn’t hurt anymore. He was right about that. It felt good, the slight abrasiveness, the pressure.
Sparks set off low in my belly. He played with my breasts with a proficiency that made my breath catch. Clearly he was experienced. He knew just where to touch me and how to do it. But he seemed to be learning me as well, exploring every dip, every milky expanse of skin and the pink tips that pebbled under his manipulation. My hands were tense by my sides, my eyes shut tightly until he pinched my nipple. I gasped.
“Did he do that?”
“No, I—”
“What else did you let him do? Where else did you let him put his skinny little fingers?”
He made it sound so dirty, when it had just been innocent exploration between two teenage kids, hadn’t it? That was normal. This was the fucked-up thing.
He twisted my nipple when I didn’t answer.
I sucked in a breath at the pain. “I don’t know—oh God.”
“Your cunt? Did he touch you there?”
His coarse words made my face heat. I couldn’t remember ever hearing that word aloud but I knew what it meant. Maybe it was just a universal sound or the tone he used, derisive and eager in one note.
“He touched your ass. That’s it? That’s all he got to do to you?”
Cheeks burning, I nodded.
“No wonder that didn’t last. What about the next boyfriend? Did you put out for him?”
My voice fell to a whisper. “There wasn’t…He wasn’t…”
“Tell me about the big day. Were there rose petals and candles?”
The pain washed over me afresh. Romance? Not likely. I cursed my mother all over again for not seeing through him, for not seeing how much I was hurting in those weeks before she discovered us.
“He wasn’t my boyfriend.”
“Ah, now that is interesting. Where were you the first time, in his car?”
“In my room.”
“What did he have you do?”
“He said to… I was on my hands and knees.”
He whistled. “He came at you from behind for your first time. That’s harsh. I don’t think I would’ve even done it that way. Did you come like that, with your face hugging the sheets?”
I shook my head quickly.
It had hurt so bad. He’d stabbed deep inside, and I hadn’t known how to control the depth at all, had been too afraid and cowed to fight back. I hadn’t been able to, with his hands on my hips, holding me steady for his thrusts. The floral fabric of the comforter turned damp beneath my cheeks as I cried in pain, but he told me to quiet down.
The first always hurts, he’d whispered.
That was in the past. The horrible memory wasn’t relevant to me anymore. Except this man pulled me down to the fraying floral bedspread. The towel remained in a limp heap where I had sat, leaving my body completely exposed. I shut my eyes tightly, but I could see the scene as clearly as if we were in broad daylight. My body awkwardly splayed across the bed, tense and vulnerable. He still fully clothed, wearing jeans and a blue button-down.
I felt my hands pulled above my head.
“I wouldn’t treat you that way,” he said. “The first time is something special.”
The sleek sound of leather whipped through the air. I cringed, anticipating the blow.
He soothed me with a stroke of my thigh, as if I were an animal. Gentle hands wrapped the smooth leather around my wrists and secured them to the headboard with an ease that scared me.
“You can get out of that,” he said, nodding toward my tethered hands. “If something were to happen, you could wriggle and yank them out. It’s safe.”
Safe? Was that really a consideration here? This whole thing was unsafe. That was too mild a word. It was devastating.
A tear slipped down my cheek. “Why?”
His face darkened. “We aren’t back to that again, are we?”
“Please,” I babbled. “I won’t tell anyone. Just don’t hurt me, please.”
He pulled a knife from his pocket. My eyes widened and I squirmed. Instead of using it on me, he cut a strip of the damp towel and slanted it over my mouth, tying it behind my head.
At my pleading look, he shook his head sadly. “We had an agreement. You can’t just change your mind. There’s a word for girls who do that.”
A low, mournful sound left my throat.
“Is that really what you want, girl? To make me angry? To leave me with this?” He gestured jerkily to his crotch, at the bulge in the denim.
I shook my head—no, no. I didn’t want him to be angry.
“That’s right. It will be okay. You let boyfriend number one touch your tits. You let non-boyfriend number two fuck your cunt. Now you’re going to let the dangerous stranger you met on a road trip tie you up and fuck you. It’s a fantasy, sunshine. Just a dream.”
Though it seemed very real when he stood and took off his clothes. I couldn’t see very clearly in the dark, just angled shadows and sleek lines. A light dusting of hair on dusky skin. My vision was blurry, but I felt his presence, touched by the hawk-like gaze on my body and battered by his arousal pulsing in the air.
I couldn’t move my hands. I couldn’t talk. So I tried not to think either. I wanted to become a purely physical being, one who could feel and be felt but didn’t have to analyze any of it. Why had I ever agreed to this? How much of this was my fault and how much his? But if I were just a body, then it didn’t matter. If I were just a warm tumble of limbs and curves tacked against the bed, an unholy amenity in this godforsaken motel, then it couldn’t be my fault. I could just let it happen.
He touched his palm to the inside of my thigh, and I let it fall open. The idea of refusal was ludicrous now, with all of my power taken from me, all willingly forfeited in a game I’d been destined to lose. But he didn’t enter me with that dark, thick erection that jutted from between his legs. He leaned down and breathed in deep. A soft tingle ran up my core. He lapped at me with a tenderness that hurt worse than violence. The first time a man had ever done this to me, and it was against my will. But how could this be against my will, when I wanted it so very badly? It felt so good, so right, like huddling up to a campfire on a winter’s night.
I panted into the towel cutting across my mouth. My breasts heaved obscenely, the small twin mounds obscuring the sight of him below, leaving only a half-circle of dark hair between my thighs. He pushed a finger inside me, the intrusion so stark that I grunted.
“Ah fuck,” he said. “I meant to make you come this way, but you’re so tight. I need to be inside you.”
He reached for his pants and grabbed a small packet—a condom, something I felt thankful for at least. I was aroused from the illicitness of the situation and from his tongue on my cunt, but not so far gone that I lost my sense of self. I wanted to get out of this safely. That had to be my goal.
When he leaned back over me, his cock sheathed and breathing labored, I cringed back.
“No, pretty girl.” He rained kisses over my forehead, on my nose. “You want this, don’t you? You want this cock inside you. You’re all the same.”
I bit down on the towel, unable to answer. I was almost thankful for the gag in that moment, because what could I say? I may have gone along with this, but I hadn’t really wanted it. This wasn’t something I had chosen.
“Please,” he said.
It was a role reversal, him begging instead of me. He wanted me to do more than allow his use of me, he wanted me to want this too. I couldn’t though, and it wouldn’t matter anyway. If I said no, what then? He was unpredictable even when I cooperated. I didn’t want to make him angry.
I nodded quickly.
Unappeased, he pulled the towel down from my mouth. “Say it.”
“I want your cock inside me,” I said in a deadened voice. It didn’t even sound like me. I had gotten my wish. I was purely physical—a machine with no emotions. Skin with no heart.
His face twisted into a sneer. “I don’t believe you.”
“Please put your cock inside me. I want you to fuck me.”
He sat back on his heels, his cock rising between us. “Fuck. You’re not even a good liar.”
Letting my eyes fall shut, I finally spoke the truth. “Make me come. Please. Show me what it could be like if a man could make me come.”
The bed rocked gently as he leaned back over me, though I couldn’t look at him. I couldn’t see the smugness again, the triumph. A blunt head fitted to my opening. I gasped and writhed on the bed. It felt too large. It had been so long.
In a sudden stroke, he entered me, stretching my walls wide and far. I cried out, helpless to quiet the pain that wrenched me in half. He didn’t give me time to adjust, just pulled out and slammed back in. Tears ran in rivulets down my face. Stunned, I realized it wasn’t the pain that made me cry, or the violation, but the betrayal. He’d said he wouldn’t be like before, but this was the same. It was hard and painful and fast.
“So fucking tight,” he said, panting. “You’re going to come for me.”
I shook my head. Just another betrayal, that empty promise. I wou
ld spread my legs for him, but I wouldn’t fake it.
He wouldn’t even notice if I did. Despite his words, he was far away, his gaze focused on the horizon of his own pleasure. The look on his face was pure ecstasy, his movement jerky and desperate. It stirred me, his need, enough that I felt myself twinge around his cock.
At the contraction, his breath caught. There was a pause, a heartbeat of tortured stillness. Like a dammed force unleashed, he sped up, thrusting wildly. A long, pained sound escaped him, punctuated by his grunts as he forced himself deeper and faster.
His mouth sought out my skin as if it were sustenance, as if it were air. He drew open-mouthed kisses along my collarbone, my neck, breathing me in. I could feel the secret muscles tightening and convulsing. In a sort of feedback loop, his harsh plunder forced them to quiver. The vibrations sent him even higher, spurred him ever faster. It turned the tables too. I was bound and spread open but he was helpless to the squeeze of my sex, to the lure of my skin.
He rammed into me, pulling me down onto his body as if I were a toy, a tool, something to be used well and then put away.
His eyes glazed over. “Oh God.”
He reared up over me, so that all I saw was a blur of hard-packed shoulders. His whole body was racked by the force of each entry, as if he were a ship battered up against rocks. I feared for him then, maybe more than myself. It was almost inhuman, the rage with which he fucked me, the tempest of his lust, and yet wholly vulnerable. Fierce and thick and uncontrollable—neither of us were master now.
My pain became his, twisting his face into a mask of helpless agony. Every jolt of my inner muscles, every slap of flesh against flesh was reflected in his eyes. He stared at me, some of the intensity slipping, reflecting back fear. What was he afraid of?
Tears streamed down my face. Didn’t he like it? Wasn’t this what he wanted?
“It’s okay,” I whispered.
He spoke with grunts. “Shut up.”
“Let it happen.” The words were a mockery, but they were the truth.
He barely paused in his wild thrusts, as he reached up to slap my face. I blinked against the sting. My head jerked against the pillow, and he held it there, stretching away from my body as if he could separate it, as if he could split my mind from my body, and God, if he could have, it would have been a mercy. I didn’t want to think or feel—but I did. It was inevitable, and I knew what he needed with the bone-deep certainty. There were so few things we knew for sure, and mercy was one of them.
Make Me: Twelve Tales of Dark Desire Page 56
