I need to get out of here.
Now.
My eyes sting, but I refuse to cry. Crying is weakness, and weakness in this particular room feels dangerous, even if Nico is asleep. Even if he did… take care of me after.
It was nice in a weird way.
The thought makes my face burn all over again, because it drags a whole other set of memories behind it—food, water, warmth, his hands moving along my skin as he washed me, as he applied lotion to my body and massaged my sore muscles.
My face burns even more when I remember the way he brought me an ice pack in the middle of the night and made me place it between my legs. Then on my ass.
Where he spanked me.
I stifle a groan. It just keeps getting worse.
My stomach rolls again, and I press my fingertips to the sheet like I can ground myself through the fabric.
What would Dad think?
If he knew.
If he ever found out where the money came from.
I can already hear his voice—quiet, genuinely disappointed in a way that would crush me.
He’d blame himself.
He’d think he forced me into it, even if I never told him the details. He’d look at me like he didn’t know me anymore, and I wouldn’t survive that.
I can’t tell him.
I can never tell him.
The shame would kill me.
It was bad enough that I stood on that stage and let strangers bid on me like I was a thing. It was bad enough that I walked naively into a situation I knew nothing about.
But last night… last night wasn’t normal.
No.
It wasn’t natural.
Something got into me. Something that didn’t belong there.
That’s the only explanation my brain will accept, because the alternative is that it was me.
That I wanted it.
That I liked parts of it.
That I—
I squeeze my eyes shut hard enough to hurt.
No.
I can’t think about that.
