I reach my hand under her and, sure enough, she’s a sopping mess. Poor, neglected pussy. I find her clit and grind the heel of my palm against it, making her cry out. My free hand grabs a handful of her hair, drawing her head back as I pummel her bottom. I want to hurt, to destroy her. Break her down until she’s in pieces. Then rebuild. She’ll be reborn. I’ll make her new. Make her mine.
A roar builds in my throat. Daphne cums with a howl, my hand at her clit and cock in her ass. She shudders hard, her back bowing until I’m afraid she’ll break in two. Her ass clenches around me, ripping out my cum. I fill her to the brim with my creamy offering, then pull out and coat her perfect ass.
Then I lean on the table, trembling, weak from my orgasm. The mask glimmers in the corner, empty eyes pointed in our direction, a judgmental voyeur. My clothes are crumpled on the floor. I left pieces of me all over the room.
Because, this night and always, Daphne’s the one who broke me apart.
She’s destroyed me. And I’m the one reborn.
Daphne
I thought it might mean something: giving myself over completely. But when I go to turn around and hug my Master, he stops me. A dark cloth drops over my face. He blindfolds me carefully, and leads me from the dungeon. Rose petals whisper at my feet.
Logan is gentle as he guides me to the bathroom, to a shower first for a rinse and then a tub full of fragrant water. Judging from the soft fluttering against my bare skin, he’s added rose petals. He eases me back and washes me gently, taking care not to disturb or submerge my newly pierced nipples.
But he won’t let me touch him. When I reach for him, he captures my wrists.
“No,” he rasps.
“But…” I bite my lip. We just shared a moment, I know we did, but he’s holding back. Retreating behind his stone walls. I opened myself completely, but it wasn’t enough to earn his trust.
I fight back tears as he takes me from the tub and dries me off. He removes my blindfold so I can take out my contacts. But his mask is back, firmly in place. I finish my business in the bathroom and head to bed where he waits for me in the darkness.
“I want to see you,” I whisper as he draws up the covers, tucking me in.
“I know.” His lips are on my forehead. The mask is cool on my skin. And I hate it. I hate how he hides. Not because he’s holding back from me, but because he thinks he’s ugly. The mask is a shield, but it hasn’t stopped me from hurting him.
He retreats to the door, pausing when I call his name.
“How, Logan? How can I earn you?”
He pauses and my silly heart fills to the brim with hope.
“You can’t.”
And when he leaves, I feel nothing but despair.
Eighteen
7 Years Ago
Daphne
My whole life has been spent towards one goal: saving my mother from death by this horrific disease.
And I failed.
I didn’t grow up fast enough, finish my degree quick enough, spend enough time with her while I had her on this earth.
And now she’s gone.
Gone.
It’s not fair. I believed so hard we would save her. That if I just did everything I was supposed to and worked hard enough…
But I’ve been a little naïve fool, imagining there’s any order or balance or fairness to things in the universe at all.
I’ve been a child still believing in fairy tales.
It rains while they lower my mother into the ground beneath an angelic statue at Thornhill. The heavens weep along with me and my father.
The entire community would have been here, but my father refused anyone beyond the priest, Logan and Adam, a few others from the research lab, and me.
I don’t have any friends here, other than Logan, but he’s standing under an umbrella beside my father, though his eyes keep coming to me.
I don’t care. I don’t deserve to be comforted. I failed her. I deserve every ounce of chill and cold and hurt and—
I hiccup as a fresh round of tears hits me.
A woman I barely know from Dad’s lab comes over and tries to put an arm around my shoulder but I pull away.
They’ve finished putting Mom in the ground and I rush forward and throw a single bright red rose on top of the casket. Her favorite.
And then I turn and flee back towards Thornhill, abandoning the umbrella about halfway there and letting the rain lash my face the rest of the way.
I’m cold to the bone as soon as I yank open the heavy wooden front door and I’m breathing hard as I slam it shut again. I flee upstairs to my bedroom.
I slam that door, too, and shove rain-soaked hair out of my face as I start to yank at the collar of the stifling black dress, when I see it—on my white, virginal bedspread—a single red rose.
Just like the one I put on Mama’s casket. A crimson Heathcliff. Her favorite.
I slink out of the heavy, soaked dress so that I’m just in my silk camisole and slip and curl onto the bed, clutching the rose and fingering the delicate petals.
Who put it here?
It feels like a sign from my mother. A reminder of beauty and goodness when all I feel is pain.
There’s a knock at the door and I sit up. Did Dad actually come after me? Did he put the rose here? He’s barely tried to comfort me since she died. Hasn’t even tried to hug me. Is this his way of reaching out?
“Come in.”
But it’s not Dad who pushes open the door.
It’s Logan.
The disappointment at it not being Dad is only momentary because I immediately feel a rush of gratitude that Logan did come. Of course he noticed me leaving the funeral. Of course he came. He’s Logan.
He only proves the point when he nods towards the rose. “Looks like someone remembered the birthday girl.”
I look down at the rose in surprise. Oh my— He’s right. It’s my birthday. I’m nineteen now. On the day I buried my mother.
I double over as fresh rounds of sobs rack my body.
“Oh, hey, hey,” he says, immediately coming over and wrapping his big, warm arms around me. “Shhh, it’s going to be okay.”
But I shake my head. “No, no it’s not. That’s just something people say. But it’s a lie. Nothing’s ever going to be okay again. Not when—” I hiccup. “Not without Mom.”
He holds me tighter and I twist in his arms, burying my head in his warm chest.
And he holds me as I sob out my pain.
“Ouch,” I yelp as I shift several minutes later.
“What?” Logan pulls back, immediately alarmed.
I hold up a finger, pricked by one of the rose’s thorns, welling with bright red blood.
Logan grabs my hand and immediately brings it to his mouth, sucking on the finger. I don’t think he quite realized what he was doing, it was just an instinctual reaction.
But then, as if it hits him that he’s sitting on my bed with my finger in his mouth, suddenly his eyes darken as they lock on to mine.
And suddenly all I can think of is Mom making me swear that I’d live my life. Live the life that she couldn’t.
And all reason and sanity take a flying leap out the window.
I pull my finger from Logan’s mouth and pounce on him, wrapping my arms around his neck and trying to land my mouth on his.