Page 44 of Filled

“And earlier, you looked pissed when you found out about him and me. Were you jealous?”

“Of which one of you?”

“Both,” I whisper.

“Then yeah.” His tongue runs over his bottom lip. “Both.”

The room shrinks again. I can hear my own pulse now, loud in my ears, drowning out the distant bass.

“How long?” he asks.

“How long what?”

“Since anyone touched you. Really touched you. Not Cruz in the locker room. Not Eli pinning you to a cage. Touched you like you were worth more than five minutes.”

I open my mouth, and nothing comes out. He waits. Dante’s good at waiting.

“Years,” I say finally. My voice sounds like it’s coming from somewhere else. “Gerald, my stepfather, he made sure I didn’t have anyone. Made sure boys knew not to come around. Said it was protection.” A bitter laugh scrapes out of me. “He wanted me isolated. Wanted me dependent. Every time I started seeing someone, he’d find a way to wreck it. Show up. Make threats. Tell them stories. He’d hover. He’d touch my hair when they could see, to send a message.”

Dante goes very, very still.

“By the time I was twenty, I’d stopped trying,” I keep going, because once the wall cracks I can’t seem to plug it. “By the time Mom died, I’d been celibate for years and I didn’t even know what I missed anymore. I just knew I was so fucking tired of him deciding what I could have and who I could be and?—”

“Dakota.”

“I’m so tired of being controlled, Dante. I’m so fucking tired.”

His chest rises and falls slowly. When he speaks, his voice has dropped an octave. “Nobody controls you here, baby. You hear me? Nobody. You want something, it’s yours. You don’t want something, it’s gone. That’s the only rule that matters in this room.”

My eyes burn. I turn back to the cross before he can see, and my fingers find the cuff again, and the words come out of me before I can stop them.

“I want you to tie me up.”

The quiet behind me is so complete, I think for a second he’s left.

Then his footsteps. Soft, unhurried, until he’s right at my shoulder and I can feel the heat of him along the length of my back.

“Say it again.”

“I want you to tie me up.” My voice steadies the second time. “On this. Hands and feet. I want to know I can be held down and it doesn’t. It doesn’t have to hurt. I want to know I can give it up and still be safe.”

“Dakota.” He turns me, gentle hands on my upper arms. His face is close, and his eyes are searching mine. “You sure?”

“I’ve never been more sure of anything.”

“This isn’t a way to prove something. Not to me. Not to Cruz. Not to your ghost.”

A tear slips down my cheek before I can stop it, and his thumb catches it without his expression changing.

“It’s for me,” I whisper. “It’s the only thing that’s been for me in years.”

He nods, once. “Okay, baby.”

“Okay?”

“Okay.” His hand cups my jaw, thumb stroking under my cheekbone. “We do this my way, though. You hear?”

“Yeah.”