I was sent to my last foster family at sixteen, and that is where I met her.
Elsa.
She was part of the family I lived with, not my designated foster mother, but her younger sister. So, in a way, she was like another aunt to me. She was just a few years older than me, in her mid-twenties when I first met her. There was an instant attraction between us, an attraction that shouldn't exist between a foster boy and a woman who was supposed to take care of him. She also saw something in my eyes, but it wasn't the devil. Not until later.
She was an attractive woman with a lush body that she regularly flaunted in front of my horny teenage eyes. It was great and tormenting at the same time. I laid awake all night, thinking about all the things I wanted to do to that incredible body of hers, agonizing over my strong yearning while she made it worse every single day. She seduced me, using all the little tactics available to a woman in her situation, leaving her blouse unbuttoned, using the summer months to run around wearing as little as possible while getting as close to me as she could, randomly touching me when no one would see.
Of course, I never acted on it. Like I said, I wasn't a bad kid. I thought I knew what was good and what was bad.
Until I turned eighteen. I was getting ready to move out for college, and it's probably a good thing that most of my bags were already packed by the time our affair was discovered. It only went on for a few weeks, and it started one fateful afternoon when we were alone in the house and she showed up in my room wearing nothing but a tiny bikini that barely hid her assets. I was sitting at my desk, working on an app that would later become my first step to success and wealth. She asked me to join her at the pool, seductively leaning against my desk and pushing her round tits into my face.
That's when I snapped. I jumped up from my seat and I took her. I fucked her like a wild animal, exploding like a savage and devouring her lush body as if there was no tomorrow. But I did more than that. I soon realized that simply fucking her wasn't enough, for neither of us. She needed the pain, I needed the dominance, the power, to leave the marks on her body. I needed her cries and her tears, and I reveled in the knowledge that she could no longer run around in her naughty nothings because it would reveal the marks my brute hands left on her.
It was all good. It was fun. It was the release I needed, an awakening that had been long in the making.
But it wasn't more than that, not for her, at least. I was young and naive enough to lose my heart to her. As my time to move out for college neared, I began to dread the day that forced me to move away from her. I was obsessed with her, and I was dumb enough to think this was love.
When my foster family found out about us, I didn't think much of it. I was in love, I was ready to ask her to come with me. That's what I told them, my heart bursting with excitement and hope.
And she stood there and laughed. She denied everything, said that I was the one who initiated it, that I raped her, that I beat her up... She even showed them her bruises, claiming that I gave them to her when I assaulted her.
Needless to say, I was thrown out of the house immediately. After all, she was blood, I was just a dependent they took in for a few years, not family. I moved on to college and buried myself in work, trying to forget about her. It would have worked if Elsa hadn't been the witch she was. About a year later, when things were finally looking up for me, she showed back up in my life. At that point, I was still hung up on her, but I was in a much better place overall. The app I had been working on was bought by a bigger company. It was completely undersold, but I didn't know that back then. For me, the amount I had received was gigantic. I was rich. And when she found out about it, she wanted a part of it.
I was young, I was dumb, and I was still in love with her, desperate to have her back in my life. She made me believe that she was filled with remorse over what she'd done to me, that she missed me and couldn't stop thinking about me.
I fell for it. I didn't see it coming at all. We fucked, we played, I was back in my element. I did things to her that measured up to nothing I'd ever done with anyone else before. In fact, I had only touched two other girls in the meantime, two drunken one-night stands that left no impact on me.
But with her, everything was different. It was more of everything. More intensity, more passion, more pain, more power.
I'd used my money to start my own company in the meantime, vowing to myself that I wouldn't just sell my next idea, but make it grow myself. I was still in college, but I was growing into someone. I made important friends, valuable connections, deals.
All of that was ruined when she began blackmailing me. She'd just waited for the right moment to do it. She threatened to spread rumors about me hitting her again. She took pictures of herself every time after we played, staging her bruises and tears as if they were involuntary leftovers from my brutal attacks on her.
I didn't believe her. I didn't think she'd go through with it because I still thought she must feel something for me. Still, I gave her money, hoping that she would let it go. But she asked for more. And more. And more.
And when I finally refused to give in to her demands, she went ahead and destroyed my reputation. It killed my first attempt at growing my own business, it cost me a lot of money, a lot of friends, a lot of opportunities. Because even when there's no clear evidence, even when there was valid doubt about her story, something always stuck.
It was years ago, and it taught me a valuable lesson. I recovered from it, but I also learned from it.
That's why I am who I am today.
Chapter Thirty-Four
Ann
"That's why you are who you are," I repeat his last words.
We're sitting on the couch together, each of us holding a drink, a Scotch for him and a glass of white wine for me. I'm curled up next to him, my legs tucked under my body while I randomly seek his touch.
I was leaning against his chest at first, listening to his heart racing as he went through the memories, but he squirmed, letting me know that he'd rather not have me this close for the moment. I know this wasn't easy for him to share, so I avoided direct eye contact, but I let him know that I was with him by touching him throughout his story, even though he didn't always seem to want it.
"So who is that person?" I probe. "What kind of person did that Elsa woman create?"
He sighs.
"First of all, she gave me the push I needed to become a real success. I moved away, across the country. Putting physical distance between me and the dirt she created was a necessary first step," he says. "I never had a real home, so it was easy to leave everything behind. I didn't have much left, but I still had some financial assets, a functioning brain, and a college degree that made me look good on paper. It was all I needed to start anew. But there's one thing I made sure to never let happen again."
"What's that?"
He looks at me, an unmistakable shadow cast over his eyes.
"Falling in love," he says. "I never dated, but I still craved sex and the kind of play I enjoyed with Elsa before she turned on me."
I nod. "That's why you buy women for pleasure."
"That's why I bought women for pleasure," he repeats my words, adding a small but substantial difference. "It kept me sane. I needed the release. I still do. After what happened with Elsa, I thought that it would be better for anyone involved anyway."