Page 36 of Anchored

Daniel closed his eyes and tried to will the shakes away, forcing himself not to recoil from the master’s touch. He even faked a quiet moan—no hard feat, since pain and fear and pleasure all sounded alike. But the instant the sound left his lips, the master’s hands left his skin.

They returned a moment later, though, brushing over a long, thin bruise that ran hip to hip below his navel, where the edge of the table had bitten into him over and over with every one of Mr. Foster’s and the supervisors’ thrusts. Daniel dared a glance at the master’s face, all creased eyebrows and pressed lips, but couldn’t read what he saw there.

And then his eyes raced back to the master’s hands when thumbs hooked in the waistband of his pants and underwear and tugged.

Daniel sucked in air like a beached fish, trying and failing to contain his rising panic. It’d be his own damn fault if he couldn’t swallow it down; he knew the master wanted the illusion of a willing partner—an eager one, even—and Daniel was blowing his last chance to give him that.

No, not was blowing, did blow. The master’s hands froze halfway down Daniel’s hips, exposing a wide swath of skin but none of the parts that really mattered. Daniel swallowed back a sudden, vicious nausea, covered his face with shaking hands, and entertained, for a moment, the thought that it’d be okay to cry now.

After all, he had nothing left to lose.

Without a word, the master splayed his fingers across Daniel’s bared hips, lining them up with one of the many sets of finger-shaped bruises that curved around from his ass to his pelvis. Daniel startled at the touch, reaching instinctively to push it away. He curled his hands into fists and forced them behind his back before they could commit such a grievous sin, but it was too late. The master’s narrowed eyes traveled from Daniel’s bared skin to his face and locked there. If before there had been a storm brewing in the man, now it was a tornado, a tsunami.

Daniel trembled in its wake.

Slowly, so slowly, the master’s hands left Daniel’s hips, settled his pants back into place, and then curled around his upper arms, applying pressure so slight that Daniel felt it only because he was exquisitely hyperaware. In this way, the master guided him back to the couch and deposited him there as if he were made of glass.

And then he spun around and kicked the coffee table—which was made of glass—hard enough to crack it.

“Fuck!” the master screamed.

Daniel wondered if it was because the master had just broken his furniture, or maybe his foot, or because he’d realized that Daniel had put out for NewWorld Media but not for him.

“God fucking damn it!” The master grabbed the television remote and hurled it into the wall, where it shattered into a spray of plastic bits and batteries. Another shouted string of profanities, and the master reached for the cushions on the empty couch, flung them toward the hall, the kitchen, the window. Daniel huddled into himself, brought his arms up to his head, yet his gaze remained pinned on the storm raging through the living room.

“Shit!” The master upended the now-cushionless couch, then kicked the underside hard enough to punch his foot through the fabric. He wrenched it out with another furious shout, stomped around the couch, and cleared the nearby kitchen countertop with a long and livid arm swipe. A basket of fruit splotched to the floor, a notepad, a knife block. The master scooped it up, and Daniel whimpered “I’m sorry!” just in case the man planned to start throwing the knives.

God, what had he done to cause this? Such fury over nothing made less sense than the master trashing his apartment instead of his slave.

The master hurled the whole knife block into the fridge hard enough to dent the appliance door, and Daniel cried “I’m sorry!” again.

The master froze. Then his head whipped around, and Daniel reflected for an instant on how absurd this would all seem if he weren’t so goddamn fucking frightened: the master was standing one foot in front of the other, his right arm drawn back behind his ear, his fist clutching a banana so hard the fruit was oozing through the burst seams of its skin. Like a baseball player, or a monkey, winding up for the pitch.

“What?” the master asked, sharp and breathless.

Daniel cringed, but forced his voice steady. Well, steady enough, anyway. “I said I’m sorry, Master. Whatever I did wrong, I’m sorry.”

The master’s face went slack as suddenly as if he’d had a stroke. The oozing banana slipped from his fingers. He crossed the floor in three huge strides, dropped to his knees beside Daniel, and threw strong arms around Daniel’s huddled shoulders. When Daniel stiffened, the master pulled him closer and whispered, “Shhh, no, no, Daniel, it’s not you. Not you, I’m not mad at you, I swear.”

. . . What?

One of the master’s arms unwrapped just far enough to snake up to Daniel’s head, stroke through his hair. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you. I’m so sorry.”

What?

Surely he was imagining the master’s words. Hallucinating, cracking under the stress. But the master kept repeating himself, over and over, interspersing apologies and assurances with stroking hands and a soft press of lips to Daniel’s forehead, cheek, the top of his head, the side of his neck. “It’s not you.” Kiss. “I’m sorry I scared you.” Kiss. “I’m not mad at you, I promise.” Kiss. “You’ve done nothing wrong.” Kiss. And on and on and on.

Gradually, Daniel’s shaking subsided, and he relaxed into the master’s arms as the true import of the man’s words sank in: If the master wasn’t mad at him, then that left only those who had hurt him, only Mr. Foster and the supervisors and NewWorld Media. Which meant the master wasn’t going to punish him, wasn’t going to return him, certainly wasn’t going to tattle to Mr. Foster on him. Hadn’t even meant for any of this to happen.

And as slowly as that realization had dawned upon him, a new one began to take root in the fertile ground his terror had left behind.

Anger.

He was angry. What the fuck had the master meant to happen, if not this? What had he possibly thought could come of telling Mr. Foster he’d been obstinate and useless? The master wasn’t a stupid man; how could he have been so stupid about this? About Daniel’s safety, Daniel’s life?

The master’s arms tightened again, not hurting but clearly not letting go anytime soon. He placed a fluttering kiss on the shell of Daniel’s ear and said, voice tight and shaking, “I had no idea he would hurt you. You just seemed so unhappy, and we never got along like I thought we would and I didn’t want to force you to stay here if you were miserable, and . . . and I’m so sorry, but I swear to you, I will never let anyone hurt you like that again.” Kiss. “I promise, do you understand?” Kiss. “Never.”

Another kiss to his ear, his temple, his cheek, and Daniel couldn’t stand it anymore; if he didn’t get this poison out, it’d kill him, and it’d kill him ugly. Worse even than this afternoon. The master came in for another kiss, and Daniel hunched away from it, threw both hands up and actually kept them there, even as the master’s chest bumped his palms.