My heel hits something solid—a wall, maybe—and I freeze.
Trapped between stone and whatever he is.
The warmth intensifies. He’s right in front of me now. I know it even though I can’t see. I can’t hear footsteps or breathing or anything that would prove he’s real.
But he is.
He’s real, and he’s close, and I can’t move.
“They made you small.” His voice wraps around me now, coming from everywhere and nowhere. “Treated you like you were less. They taught you to shrink. To apologize for existing.”
Something brushes my jaw.
I flinch—but I don’t pull away. Can’t. My body won’t obey.
The touch is light. Barely there. Could be fingers. Could be shadow.
I don’t know anymore.
“They are afraid,” he murmurs, and I feel breath against my ear. Warm. Real. “Afraid of what you’d become if they let you grow.”
His words dig in like hooks.
Because he’s right.
My father made me feel like I was something to be used. Kevin made me feel like a burden, an inconvenience. Even the guys—they want me, but they’re scared too. Scared of what I can do. What I might become.
Scared of me.
“But I see you whole.”
Something trails down my arm—so light I almost think I imagined it. My skin warms where it passes.
I hate that it feels good.
“I see what they were too afraid to look at.”
Another touch. The curve of my shoulder. My collarbone.
Each one measured. Deliberate. Like he’s mapping me in the dark.
I should be terrified.
Iamterrified.
But underneath the fear is something worse: I want to hear more.
Want him to keep talking. Keep telling me I’m not broken. That I’m strong instead of damaged.
“They fear you,” he says, and the voice is velvet now, soft and suffocating. “I will worship you.”
My breath catches.
That’s—
Yes.
What I deserve.
