project

by Torrance, Asa

  Well I don’t give a shit, I decide. He should know better than to think my relationship with permanence is anything but solid.

  I somehow get loose, struggling just wildly enough to wrench my body from the solid grip he has on it. It’s nearly a miracle when I feel the soft touch of sand underneath my feet again, and I don’t hesitate.

  I run like I’m running for my life.

  17

  I get home in a flurry of emotions.

  Amazement that I managed to escape and Damien didn’t instantly come after me. He just let me run, up the beach and further up the dune, out and away from the boardwalk until I found familiar streets to wind through on my way home.

  Embarrassment fills me from reacting the way I did. Did I want the tattoo? Hell no. But still, there’s nothing more fucking square than kicking and screaming at the thought of two dots inked into my skin. Apparently, I’ll never outgrow the mantle of bookworm and weirdo.

  I’m a loner for a reason, and maybe it’s more than losing my best friend.

  The other emotion is anger, of course. Anger that Damien thought he could do whatever he intended to do to me. I’m well aware that I’ve been holding him in an elevated status in my head, but that doesn’t mean I’ll let him run all over me.

  Not without one hell of a fight, anyway.

  It takes me just over an hour to make the journey back home. It has to be at least a few miles, but I never slow my pace.

  Slow walker my ass.

  To my surprise, my mother’s car isn’t parked in the driveway on my arrival, and I grab for the phone in my jacket pocket, checking for an update from her.

  Mom: Staying late with George. Call if you have an emergency. Xoxo

  I sigh and slide the phone back into my pocket, unlocking the front door and walking into the deathly silent and dark house. The environment feels somber and ominous, but it could just be my mood.

  I shouldn’t feel this way about my mom getting out and dating, let alone finding a guy she feels good enough about to find herself ‘staying late’ with. Dad has been gone for over three years now. Life is constantly changing and evolving.

  But a part of me wishes she could have chosen any other night than this, because it feels dangerous to be alone.

  Especially when I know I won’t be alone for long.

  ***

  My eyes snap open to darkness as the door downstairs opens and closes. It feels like the middle of the night, and I lift myself from bed to creep over to my window and peer down at the driveway.

  Damien’s car is the only one parked outside, which can only mean that was him coming through the door, and that it’s his soft, stalking footsteps heading up the stairs.

  Down the hall.

  Towards my room.

  I hold my breath and wait. I know he must know we’re the only ones here, leaving him free to do whatever he wants to me. The house is so empty we wouldn’t even need the guise of silence, or the shroud of darkness.

  It’s just me and him, alone.

  But to my surprise, the door next to mine ticks open, the soft whoosh of it opening barely audible above the heartbeat that throbs in my ears.

  I’ve spent this whole time wishing and hoping he would leave me alone once he got home, and now that that’s what’s happening, I don’t know what to think. It doesn’t seem real.

  What’s more, I don’t fucking trust it.

  Still, instead of confronting him, I slide back into bed, feeling it shift silently under my weight, knowing every spring that creaks in the slightest and avoiding it. A part of me thinks that despite my closed door, I can convince him I’m not here. Instead, a text message pings loudly on my phone next to me, giving my entire dubiously held cover away.

  DAMIEN: Get undressed

  I stare down at my phone in disbelief. He cannot be serious.

  But I know he is, and as usual, he’s expecting me to do exactly as he says.

  Instinctively, a part of me wants to take the path of least resistance. I reach up, pulling the strap of my dress from one of my shoulders and pausing before I go any further. I could stop and make a whole lot of noise as I tried to push my heavy dresser in front of my door to keep him out. I could bail out the window. I could text him back my patent refusal to play any of his little games, including whatever this is about to become, any longer.

  Instead, I reach up and pull my other strap down, shifting my dress off my body and dropping it onto the floor at my feet. I strip my underwear off, because I can’t afford to have another pair torn and tattered, especially when the rest of my underwear drawer is still MIA. Then I slide into bed and wait.

  The darkness and silence is nearly suffocating, the only sound my hammering pulse, quick and annoying, betraying the anxieties I’m trying so hard to convince myself I don’t have. My heart actually sounds like it slows down as I hear movement out in the hallway outside my bedroom, but that could just be me trying desperately to listen, and anticipate what’s coming next.

  The door opens, and I can make out his form in the darkness. He enters my room without a word, trailing over the floor with slow, silent steps like a dark apparition. A shiver runs down my spine but I force myself to stay still, a part of me craving the evil incubus that’s appeared to pillage my innocence, and my soul.

  Damien pauses at my bedside before I feel his knee shift onto the mattress beside me. He reaches out and pulls the covers from my body. If there’s one thing I’ve noticed from both times he’s invited himself to my bedroom now, it’s that he always likes me completely bare and exposed to the elements around us, giving me nowhere to hide, and no reprieve from the things he does to me.

  A swallow goes down hard in my throat, and I nearly gasp when I feel his hands on me. His touch slides down my arms and only my arms, feeling sinfully modest with how naked I am. His hand lifts one of my arms, fingers pressing against my beating pulse points before his touch is replaced with something else, the feeling of slick fabric, twisting and wrapping around my wrist.

  My brain is sluggish to compute what’s happening, because it’s something only out of my wildest dreams, and before I realize it, my arm is pulled above my head. The back of my hand thuds against one of the four posts of my bed as the fabric wrapped around my wrist is laced around it. Damien takes my other hand, joining it to the opposite post to form two loose binds that give just enough to let me struggle.

  A second later, another piece of fabric finds my eyes, looping around my head to cover my already darkened vision.

  He reaches down, grabbing me by my hips and flipping me onto my stomach. I gasp in protest, even as the binds around my wrists move with me, but because they’re twisted, they become even tighter. I become anchored in place with my knees pressed into the bed below me.

  Twin rushes of heat simultaneously flood into my face and between my legs, and I pray to stay in the dark, but I know almost as soon as I think it that’s a wish entirely too good to be true.

  Everything Damien does is about making me uncomfortable, pushing me to my limits, leaving me no place to hide.

  Despite the blindfold, I both see and hear the light next to my bed flick on, illuminating the room in soft yellow light. I bite my lip to keep a whimper of protest from escaping, staying perfectly still, even as I feel his eyes move over my body like branders.

  “Sorry, I couldn’t resist,” his voice echoes through the room, and he doesn’t sound sorry at all. “I knew you would look too good like this to stay in the dark. Besides,” he continues, and it sounds like he’s moving around the room. “I’m going to need to see what I’m doing.”

  I hear something hit the surface of my desk, not a palm, not something soft. An object, just hard enough to make a noise. My mind spins at the possibilities. Despite running from him earlier, I know I’ve let him literally trap me now, and not just that. Every part of my body is exposed to him for the taking.

  The claiming.

  The marking.r />
  My ears pick up the sounds of clicking and clattering, and in my mind’s eye, I see him assembling some sort of crude tattoo gun. The needle at the end gleams, sharpened and ready to pierce into my skin.

  The blindfold lets in just enough light to follow shadows, and I’m able to make out Damien’s form approach the bed again a second before his weight shifts onto the mattress again. A second later, a buzzing sound fills the room, and I let out a plaintive whimper. “Look,” I say. “I’m sorry I ran. I was just freaked out.”

  I don’t want to have to beg him like this, but then again, I knew I set myself up for failure almost as soon as I decided to comply with his demands. His shadow passes above me, and I can feel the heat from his body, emanating onto mine to warm me despite the fickle coverage I have. Until he decided to hover over me, the most I had on was the fabric wrapped around my wrists.

  The buzzing gets louder, hideously close, and I find myself wriggling to get away, only there’s no place for me to go. Not only am I tied to the bed, but Damien has trapped me with his body, my shifting hips brunting up against his when I struggle.

  His hand shifts onto my arm, fingers pressing into my skin. “Damien,” I utter. “If you do this, I’ll never forgive you.”

  I cry out as something presses into my arm, a sensation spreading across my skin like the smallest earthquake. I wait for the pain, but it never comes.

  Is my adrenaline really that high?

  “Shut the fuck up,” his voice emanates in a low treble against my ear. It’s not a threat, but a promise to give me something I won’t forget if I’ll only be good.

  I hold my breath.

  My vibrator. That’s the buzzing sound. The rumble against my skin.

  I grit my teeth, already anticipating too much to keep still. I’m not sure if I can keep my end of the bargain, but I don’t have a choice.

  There’s too big a part of me that doesn’t want him to stop.

  My heart is still beating hard in my chest from the tiny panic I had gone into from thinking I was about to be tattooed, but I feel myself relax as Damien’s hand passes over my arm, lifting the vibrator from my skin and lowering it again to a place I wasn’t expecting.

  A sound escapes the back of my throat as the sensitive skin of my nipple rumbles, sending tiny shockwaves up and down the curves of my shaking breasts. With my arms strung to the bed posts, I know they’re hanging down, jiggling like Jell-o molds every time I move, which frankly I can’t stop. Even when I try, the ambient tickling of the vibrator causes an unconscious response if only on the surface of my skin. Goosebumps spread across my body.

  I know what this is going to end with, and I know exactly how it’s going to feel when the vibrator reaches my clit.

  It feels fucking glorious, and by now I’m so turned on that the thought of it leaves me restless and needy.

  A sigh escapes my chest as the vibrator trails down the hollow curve of my ribcage and along my stomach, touching my belly button for the briefest moment and making me gasp in anticipation.

  Behind me, I can just hear him laugh.

  “I’m glad my suffering gets you off,” I breathe.

  “More than you know,” he tells me.

  His hand finds the inside of one of my knees, spreading my legs wider against the bed and bringing the vibrator flush against my clit. The assault is almost instant, and I’m so sensitive it’s nearly painful. But it feels good, too, the familiar sensation, one I already equate with pleasure, humming between my legs in a familiar way.

  I take in a breath, wanting to relax into it, but it catches in my chest as Damien moves the vibrator away.

  “What’s the matter?” I hear him ask me. I may be blindfolded and turned around, but I can see the cocky smirk spreading across his face in my mind.

  “Nothing,” I respond. “I do that all the time.”

  “Oh really?”

  Maybe not all the time. My privacy may have been respected in this house before Damien moved in, but usually I’m trying to make myself come as quickly as possible. One orgasm can make a relaxing segway into hours of studying.

  I give a nod anyway. He doesn’t need to know everything, and what he hasn’t already taken, I don’t have to give.

  “I guess you’re experienced then,” he murmurs, pressing the vibrator against me again, and I sink into the feeling of it before it’s lifted away again all too soon.

  “Fuck,” I utter. I bite my lip to keep any more involuntary words from spilling out of me, but it’s all too late.

  “Don’t worry,” he murmurs, his breath warm against the back of my shoulder. “I just wanted to get you good and wet. But it seems like we’re pretty much almost there.”

  A blush tints my cheeks.

  He switches the vibrator off and passes it through my slickened folds with ease, easing up towards my anxious clit to give it a curious swirl. It’s enough to make me whimper, but part of me wants him to know I need it. I want him to keep going if only because he’s enticed by the thought of still being able to torture me.

  Because this torture is too good.

  There’s something primal about being trapped, so vulnerable with someone that anything is possible. Instead of it being something bad, at the center of it is pleasure, slick and sweet and hot, and completely freeing.

  The vibrator switches on in an instant, and I moan into the open silence of the room, the sound I make the only other noise beside the humming between my legs. He pulses it against me, alternating the pressure, keeping it close or just out of range. All of it is rage inducing, insanity bringing, mindless pleasure.

  I fight it, because the tension feels good. A quiver starts at the center of my pussy, emanating down the insides of my thighs and through my legs. Soon, I feel myself begin to head over the horizon of a giant release.

  Damien lifts the vibrator from my clit at just the right time, crushing my dreams of the perfect orgasm I had been anticipating.

  I let out a groan.

  I should have known.

  “I was about to come,” I say miserably, but I know he already knows that. It was obviously the exact reason he stopped.

  “I know,” he confirms, and I feel him shift away. “So I think my job here is done.”

  He lifts away from the bed, leaving me alone on the bed. My knees are still pinned against the mattress, legs spread wide, my weeping pleasure center open and waiting for more.

  I struggle against the bonds at my wrists and toss my head back in frustration. “You can’t just leave me here like this.”

  “I can’t?” I hear him say, and this time his voice sounds further away, maybe even near my door.

  “You won’t,” I challenge him. “That’s not what you came for.”

  I hear him scoff, but he doesn’t say anything. I wait, the tension nearly thick enough to distract me from the tension still wound tight between my legs. The fabric at my wrists feels frustrating and luxurious at the same time, holding me in a place where I can do nothing but wait and hope the dice roll my way.

  “How do you know the whole point in doing this wasn’t just to get me off?” he asks, his voice thick with amusement, and tinged with lust. “Seeing you spread out and humiliated is exactly what I wanted.”

  My cheeks feel like they heat with fire, but I forge ahead. “Really? Exactly what you wanted?”

  He’s quiet for a moment, quiet enough for me to hear his footsteps move across the floor. “What are you getting at?” he asks me, standing at the foot of the bed. His palm sweeps across the back of one of my knees, ensuring I stay spread wide and at his mercy. “You want me to fuck you, is that it?”

  This time, I’m the one that stays silent.

  “If you want it, you have to say it,” he tells me, his voice rough but soft enough that I can tell he wants it, too.

  He’s fallen into my web, now it’s just about whether or not I can wrap him up.

  “I want to come,” I tel
l him. It may just be the most honest thing I’ve ever said. Right now, it feels like it. It’s become my entire world.

  I know it’s not the orgasm that matters. It’s the experience, and doing it with Damien, and the fact that I’ve given away too much ground not to forge ahead now. He may be in my web, but I’ve always been in the palm of his hand.

  Even when I realized he hated me. Even after. Even now.

  “Remember what you told me when you came to stay here?” I taunt him.

  “Yeah, I said I’d make you beg to come,” he replies.

  “No. I want what you promised. I want you to pump your dick in and out of me. While you hold my vibrator against my clit, remember?”

  Damien laughs. “Why the fuck would I give you what you want?”

  “Because you want it, too.” I narrow my eyes behind the blindfold, spitting a lust bound venom of my own. “Leaving me like this may be fun, but fucking me like this is what you really want.”

  “What kind of virgin are you?” I hear him say skeptically.

  I shake my head. “One that’s ready.”

  His shadow moves towards me again, and I feel his fingers reach for my face, pulling the blindfold from my eyes. I squint against the light, but his face is in front of mine in an instant, shieling my eyes, blocking anything I might be able to see but him.

  I feel patently vulnerable, yet somehow in control. He may think he’s staring into my eyes, but I’m staring into his, too. I can see the way he wants me, and it feels good.

  “I’m ready,” I tell him, in a soft voice like the one he uses on me when he wants me to pay attention. “Are you?”

  His eyes narrow at my challenge, but he can’t hide the way he sucks his full bottom lip between white teeth, a look of pure lust, the official moment he’s really fallen under my spell. He lifts away from me, but I don’t panic the way I did the first time he left me.

  This time, I know he’ll be back.