by Cee Smith
“Call.”
I groaned at the release of his hands and mouth. This was something else I was becoming used to with Dominic—he liked to tease me to my breaking point.
I picked up the phone and began dialing the numbers that were ingrained in my mind.
“Hello? Hello?” Jessa rushed out, leaving me to wonder if that was what it had been like for these last couple months. Did she think every call could be me? My eyes grew heavy with unshed tears as I replied, “Jessa?” My whisper was loud enough to be heard because she erupted in sobs at the sound of my voice.
“Hailey…Hailey. Where are you? Are you OK? Oh my god, I tho—I thought. And then there was the letter.”
She didn’t need to finish. I knew what she had thought, and it broke my heart—even more so because this call was a lie, one of the biggest I would ever tell her, but I couldn’t reconcile a life that didn’t have Dominic in it. People always talked about Stockholm syndrome, but I knew better. I wanted this. Dominic didn’t break or brainwash me. I had chosen this from the first time I crushed my lips to his until the moment I picked up the phone.
“Shhh. I know. I know. I’m OK now. I’m safe. I got away,” I said looking back at Dominic before continuing, “Someone saved me. I’m still not completely out of the clear yet, but I’m going to be home soon.”
“When? When will you be home? We could come get you. Where are you?”
“In a couple days…I’m in South Dakota. In a cabin. I’m not ready to say, to tell you everything, but I will. I promise. Tell everyone I’m fine, but Jessa, I don’t want anyone else to know yet. Only family.”
Tears trailed down my face, and I felt Dominic’s fingers trace the path of my tears smothering them into my skin like lotion.
“It’ll just be us, Hailey. No one else. I promise. What’s the number where you’re at so I can stay in contact with you?”
“The phone number,” I asked, stalling while I looked at Dominic for the phone number. He picked up a pen and piece of paper, scribbling something down before passing it to me.
“Do you have a pen?”
I rattled off the number, listening to her repeat the numbers back like she was committing them to memory.
“I’ll let you know when I’ve reserved a plane ticket home. I miss you, sister. I never thought I’d be able to tell you just how much.”
“It’s so good to hear your voice! Call me every day so I know you’re OK.”
We said our goodbyes, and when I hung up the phone, I felt like gravity had weighed me down to that spot. Dominic swiveled the chair until I was turned around to face him, the door to the hallway open behind him.
“It wasn’t as easy as you thought it would be, was it?” He dropped down on his haunches, his eyes running across my face, as I sat stock still in the chair reliving the pain in my sister’s voice. I looked over his face, trying to read his mood. His eyebrows were held in their usual queried expression. His mouth was slack, drawing attention to his high cheekbones and razor-sharp jaw.
“No, it wasn’t. I didn’t exactly think it would be easy. I’ve always hated to hear her in pain,” I confessed.
His palms held the side of my face as he leaned in and gave me a chaste kiss.
“I know how much this means to you, but I don’t want you stressed out. Here.” He opened his arms, and I knew what he intended. I climbed atop his legs with my arms looped around his neck and let him carry me back to the bedroom.
One of the other things I realized Dominic and I had in common was how we dealt with emotional pain—both of us resorting to physical acts to express and tamper down feelings that we couldn’t vocalize. I usually swam to release the tension, but if I hadn’t been a virgin, I probably would have been fucking my way through my emotions. This was clearly Dominic’s preferred method of choice.
Sex with Dominic had evolved. We were no longer fighting each other for domination, each of us trying to outdo the other in terms of how far we could push one another. He was less sexually aggressive—part of which I thought came from the fact that I was pregnant; the other part because I was coming to terms with the taboo aspect of my feelings for him. I was also calmer than I had felt in weeks. It was like we knew where we fit in each other’s lives and no longer resisted the pull that we felt.
Dominic held a natural strength that showed in his every touch, every look. Even when he was making love to me gently I could still feel a tinge of pain as his strength vibrated from his fingertips like spears pressing into my skin. I already knew that he got off on my resistance, and sex was just an extension of a persona that I was still becoming acquainted with—one that was still adapting.
Dominic undressed me slowly and laid me out on the bed, while speaking in a soft tone that threatened to lull me to sleep. His words were hypnotic as I closed my eyes and listened. “I don’t want you to think about anything else but me. Focus on how good my hands feel against your skin.” His hands burned a slow path from the bottom of my soles up to my thighs and down. “How good my lips feel to kiss you.” He leaned down onto the bed kissing my stomach from hip to hip. “How our bodies meld together,” he said into the crook of my neck.
He pushed into me gently, in a way I would never expect from Dominic. This was sweet, romantic, no dirty words, or hate-filled passion. This was Dominic making love.
As our bodies rocked together in perfect synchronicity, I let him take my mind off what I knew was to come. The next few months would be harder than anything I’d ever endured, but I felt a little better knowing that Dominic would be there. There was safety in knowing that nothing would ever happen to me so long as he was around.
“What are you thinking?” he asked as he we laid there catching our breath. We weren’t as physically spent as we’d ordinarily be, but it felt like my whole body was still reeling from an orgasm that shook me to the core.
I’d been staring at the ceiling for a few minutes, which probably prompted his question. I began tracing circles, watching his chest hair swirl as my finger parted his hairs.
“I was just thinking about what our future could look like.”
“And what’s that, matakia mou?” he asked with a smile. I always liked it when he called me “my little eyes.” It was a term of endearment that I knew he would never call anyone else. It said more about our relationship than he knew. My eyes were the tools used to translate Dominic when words got in the way. There were things that I learned exclusively from watching him, things that contradicted the things he said. Maybe that was how I fell for him. I saw him. The real him.
“I don’t know,” I said shrugging, “me and you somewhere warm, vacationing someplace I can swim with the sun on my face and the wind in my hair. It’s a nice thought.”
“It doesn’t have to be just a thought. When things have settled, I can take you anywhere you want to go. I have a lifetime of making it up to you. Just say the word.”
I didn’t spend too much time thinking about how he talked about our future. He talked as if everything was set in stone—that we would spend the rest of our lives together. He never mentioned that he loved me or planned to marry me, or even how we planned to raise a child or where for that matter. There were a lot of questions that still needed answers, but maybe we didn’t need to have all the answers figured out right then. When I thought of the future, I got dizzy from the myriad of questions that tumbled through my head like a hurricane. It was still too soon. We were balancing on a tight rope that seemed long and drawn out with too many opportunities for everything to unravel.
***
We left on a Tuesday. I knew it was Tuesday because it was the first time that days or dates meant anything to me since the day I was taken. Eleven weeks—that was how long it had been since the day he took me.
Everything about the plane ride was the same as the last time we traveled—same plane, same couch, nearly the same destination. I tried not to think about what happened the last time we flew. I was nervous enough and didn’t need the
reminder that so much could change in an instant; if anything, that was the one lesson that Dominic had taught me, repeatedly. I wanted this one thing to be predictable though. My family was expecting me when this plane landed, and I didn’t want to do anything to delay or jeopardize our reunion.
Dominic and I were both quiet as we sat stiffly on the leather couch. I stared out the windows, watching clouds part around the metal wings of the plane. Our departure marked the first day it didn’t snow that winter, and it almost felt like fate wanted everything to run smoothly for us.
We spent the last couple days going over our plan and working through the details that would surely come up. We agreed that Dominic would be the one to describe how he came to “save” me, seeing as how that would be the biggest farce, and I didn’t know how I would be able to go through with a lie that big. At least not to my sister.
I reached out my hand, and his hand reached out to meet mine. Dominic was staring down at the carpet as I looked up. My nerves had been on edge for the last couple days, my fingers jittery with anticipation, but I was thrown off by Dominic’s sudden withdrawal.
“Are you nervous?” I asked, my voice sounding brittle as I croaked past a whisper.
“I’d be an idiot if I said this was going to be easy. I know the risk, Hailey.” The words hit me like a slap. He doubted me. He doubted that I wouldn’t turn him in at the first opportunity. Truth be told, if we had made the trip a few weeks prior, I would have shouted his name from the rooftops if it meant I would have no longer been his prisoner. Things were different though. We were different. Didn’t he see that?
“Do you doubt me?”
“Doubt you? No, but there are a lot of ways this can go wrong. We’re both risking a lot by doing this.”
I didn’t respond. There was nothing I could say to either alleviate the tension or change our circumstances. We planned as much as we could, and the rest was up to fate.
After the plane descended, I waited behind Scout for the door, signaling my freedom, to open. I was sandwiched between Scout at my front and Dominic at my back, but when the door opened, all I could see or feel were the warm sunrays that spun around me like gold threads.
The air was pressed from my lungs as I reached the bottom stairs where Jessa nearly knocked me down like a linebacker. Thick, hot tears poured from her eyes and dripped down my face as her cheek met mine. It was hard to decipher her sobs and laughter from my own. We stayed standing like that, clutching each other at the bottom of the stairs while propping each other up. I could have held onto her forever, but when I heard the soft sob behind Jessa, I knew there were others who needed this as much as we did.
When I stepped to the side, I watched as four sets of eyes landed on Dominic. They looked a bit weary, but were too swept up in our reunion to question his presence.
“We missed you so much, dear. We’re so glad you’re home and safe,” Mrs. Bartholomew said as she and Mr. Bartholomew swept me up in a hug.
Between the bodies that encircled me I watched as Dominic shook hands with my sister, and when Adam stepped forward, I eased over to his side. Dominic had never outright said he didn’t like Adam, but I could tell he didn’t like the relationship that we had. He knew Adam held a torch for me, and I wasn’t sure how he would react when face to face with him. Dominic was still a few feet away when he reached out his left arm and pulled me into his side in an Alpha-male show of ownership. Adam looked befuddled as his eyes swept over to me. I met his gaze before dropping my eyes and felt his sight drift back to Dominic.
“Thanks for bringing her home,” Adam said with a stiff voice and his hand outstretched.
“I would never let anything happen to Hailey.”
They shook hands, but the tension that bristled the air was thick, and finally Mr. and Mrs. Bartholomew interrupted to shake hands with “my hero, the man that had saved me.”
The limo that my family arrived in whisked us back to the house that Dominic had rented. It was only a couple miles from the house I grew up in with the Bartholomews and was just as cozy as the home in South Dakota.
Thankfully Jessa listened when I told her I wanted only family there to greet us. Dominic and I didn’t need the added pressure of returning to a circus of news reporters all vying to get the story. I could tell the whole ride over that everyone was brimming with questions about my capture and rescue. They wanted to know what had happened and where I had gone. When Jessa opened her mouth with what I presumed would be the first question of many, I cut her off, letting them all know that I had been through a lot and wasn’t ready to answer questions yet. I just wanted to be home and with the people that I loved and missed.
Dominic rubbed my back soothingly—a display of affection that everyone in the car seemed to notice through sideways glances. Mrs. Bartholomew spoke up, “We’re just happy you’re home. You tell us whenever you’re ready.” I was able to breathe a sigh of relief after that, happy that I wouldn’t have to supply answers immediately as if I were being interrogated.
It was weird having Dominic there. I was sure that he would feel awkward and out of place, but what I had forgotten and he quickly reminded me of, was that Dominic was a businessman first. He knew what it took to convince people that he was an honorable, respectable man. Instead of hounding me for answers, they turned to him.
Adam sat sulking in the corner while the rest of my family peppered Dominic with questions of who he was and what he did. Jessa asked questions about where we’d been in South Dakota, seeing as how she was the one most familiar with my rescue. It wasn’t long before Dominic was introducing the story of us meeting outside of a ball he was going to in L.A. He skipped over the parts of how I’d gotten away long enough to slip him a note, and the rest of the story continued on, painting him like the white knight who swooped in and saved me from an evil king bent on keeping me locked away in his tower forever.
My family, not including Jessa, didn’t stay long that night, vowing to come back the next day to check on how I was doing. Adam remained quiet when we said our goodbyes, and I wondered if my disappearance had changed him. He was no longer the fun-loving jokester that I was used to. I knew coming back home that our relationship would change since Dominic was in the picture, but after seeing him that way, I questioned whether he even wanted me around.
Jessa didn’t plan on leaving my side, which I expected. It would be a lot harder for her to let me out of her sight, especially in light of how I was taken. It surprised me when Dominic guided us to the spare bedroom of the house and said Jessa and I could sleep in that room for the night. Jessa walked through the door first and I excused myself, leading Dominic back down the hall where we had a bit more privacy.
“Are you sure you’re OK with this?” I asked, trying to read his expression.
“You’re not planning on killing me in my sleep, are you?” His question came out light, and he smiled with amusement.
“I’ve had my share of opportunities. If I wanted to kill you, I wouldn’t have waited until now.”
“You know, I love it when you’re feisty. You really shouldn’t tease me like that. I’d be tempted to steal you from your bed tonight, drag you into my room, chain you up, and teach that mouth a lesson with my cock.”
“Are you trying to scare me?”
“Are you scared?”
I thought about his words and the throbbing I felt down low as I looked across his darkening eyes and pinched mouth. He looked like he was restraining himself from doing just what he had threatened.
“No,” I replied straight-faced. “Because I may just sneak into your bedroom and say thank you in all the ways my body knows how. You would like that, wouldn’t you? For me to come to you and pull pleasure from your body? To be sopping wet and needy for you to—”
“Say it,” he interjected. Dominic liked to talk dirty while fucking, and I was a firm believer in reciprocation, but outside of the bedroom, I never said anything crude. I may have said the word “fuck” but it was never use
d as a verb, and aside from a few kisses here and there and the time on the plane, I never initiated anything sexual with Dominic. I never needed to.
“…fuck me.” I finished my sentence just before his mouth crashed against mine. His fingers found refuge in my hair and across my back as he pulled me so close I could feel his shaft pressing into my stomach. I kissed him back lifting on my tippy toes as his length pulsed against my belly.
“Not yet,” I breathed through our kiss. He let his hands fall to my hips and groaned, rolling his hips before finally pulling away.
I returned to the room to find Jessa sitting on the edge of the bed with hands folded neatly in her lap. Her face was stoic as she continued looking at her hands. That was the first time since my return that her eyes weren’t awash in tears.
“You’re in love.” It wasn’t a question, and there was nothing to say besides the truth.
“Yes. Is it so obvious?” I took a seat on the bed next to her. She unfolded her hands and wrapped her arms around my shoulders as if she needed to physically touch me to know that I was there, that I was real.
“I don’t care what happened to you out there or how you met. If you say that he’s good enough for you, then that’s all that matters.” I stiffened at her words, and if she felt it, she didn’t let on. It wasn’t what I had expected to hear from her, and it was as if she knew the truth—that Dominic wasn’t the hero that we portrayed him to be. There wouldn’t be any reason for her to think otherwise, so I ignored her words.
“Were you hurt?” She asked looking over my face and neck to my hands, any skin that was available to show her whether I’d been marked in any way. “Did the person who took you…”
“No,” I shook my head, reaffirming my words, “I just think the man who took me was lonely.”
