“You know how much I love your hair. How dare you cut it without my permission.”

“But, Sir, I only had her take off three inches.”

“Three or thirty … It doesn’t matter. You defied my wishes.”

Charlie had fought back tears and she knew Sir knew she was fighting them back. Her hair had been part of who she was since she was just a little girl, and he was going to remove it, painfully shedding her from how she saw herself, who she was.

The snapping of the scissors had echoed through her ears. The chill upon her bare neck had evoked a near crippling sense of loss. She had known it pleased him. Still, cutting it short was not enough. Not for him.

“You know I am not finished just yet. No, I am going to shave you. I am going to expose your scalp. I want my toy bald. I want your head to be as naked as the rest of you.”

She had cried immediately when he pressed the steel against her head. Charlie had fought the emotional submission, but the vibrations, the desecration of her last mask broke the dam, leaving her a sobbing, uncontrolled mess.

“Shh. I know it hurts, but it’s a gift to you really. In time you will see this punishment as freeing, and you’ll thank me for it.”

***

Charlie woke to a sadness so full and terrible and pressing she could hardly breathe. She found everything polluted with the specters of the past. It was a weight on her chest, suffocating her tightly in its grip.

“What is it, Charlotte? What’s the matter?” Declan bolted up from sleeping as if the nightmare had reached inside his mind from hers.

“A dream,” she managed. “A dream about the past.” It was not until she heard herself speak the words that she started to cry.

Charlie tried to gain control of herself, to rein in the terror, to push it back to the place she kept it locked away, hidden. But the dream stayed, the past no longer far enough away. She grasped her hair still woven in a braid. Just a dream, she thought. Nothing more.

There was no hiding from Declan. He saw everything. Declan knew her thoughts, her fantasies and apparently even what terrified her.

“Charlotte, you need to let me in.” He shifted so he sat in front of her on the bed.

Charlie wondered if he would punish her for not being forthcoming with all the details of her past. Of course, it didn’t matter before. Before Griffin had existed only in the recesses of her mind. But now, now that she’d seen him again, it mattered more than she wanted it to.

Declan’s gaze narrowed as he continued to study her. “What the hell is going through your head right now? Whatever it is, I don’t like it.”

Charlie pursed her lips, doing her best to keep the word “nothing” prisoner. It would be futile to deny that things weren’t bothering her. It would be pointless to deny him. When he wanted something, he got it. She was proof of that, and this quest would be no different. He’d given her time. And now she had to give him what he wanted, full access to everything about her, including her demons.

Declan remained silent, waiting for her to continue.

“It was the fall semester of my second year. He was a teaching assistant in the history course I was taking. He was intelligent, handsome, and intense. Every girl in that section wanted to go out with him. When he asked me out, I could hardly believe he was serious. I was a mousy, shy, Catholic school girl who’d never been kissed let alone tied to a bedpost and whipped.”

How can I tell him how stupid and naïve I’d been? I didn’t know the first thing about dating or BDSM for that matter.

“He opened a whole new world up to me. It was intoxicating and hypnotic. I was under his spell and willing to do anything he asked. Until the lines blurred and the domination turned into disturbing, abusive behavior. I was his prisoner trapped in a world I didn’t want to be in.” This time Charlie couldn’t swallow the tears. They fell freely down her face. “I tried to break free. So many times.”

Declan dropped her hand and sat back. His jaw clenched as he raked his fingers through his hair. The separation from his touch pained Charlotte. Her body ached for the physical contact he now withheld. She craved his touch, somehow believing it was an affirmation that his feelings for her wouldn’t change.

A sickness twisted inside her as she choked down her worst fears, continuing her confession. “I was finally able to get away.” She blew out a breath, swallowing hard before spurting out the horror of that night. “Everything had happened so fast. One minute I was fast asleep and the next screaming against the unforgiving tape forced over my lips. He covered my head, obliterating my ability to see anything. I knew he placed me inside some sort of a cargo van because I had a great deal of room to be tossed around as the vehicle turned through the streets. Eventually the noises of living in town gave way to the quiet silence of somewhere rural.

“I figured he was simply pushing my buttons, invoking an element of fear in our play. He wanted me scared, confused, and aroused. I was calm at first.” Charlie wrung her hands as she relayed the events of that night. “My captor hadn’t spoken a word of instruction nor allowed his body to touch mine. Even when he tore the pajama top from my body, cut my bra, and used it to bind my wrists against the rough bark of a tree, could I feel his skin. The heavy sack covering my head eliminated any scent of the cologne he usually wore, so I couldn’t tell if it was him or some stranger. There was nothing, no indication that the man who pulled me from my bed and plunged me into darkness was someone I knew.

“And suddenly nothing was okay. I heard several different male voices. I knew one of them was Griffin’s. Panic bloomed in me. We had an audience. At first I thought there was no way he would let them touch what was his, but then I became unsure. It didn’t matter. I’d learned well at his hands. My will was his will. I had no say, no voice, in what was to be done. I was to sit back and take it, be grateful to be driven to the heights of ecstasy no matter how objectionable the means.”

If only she had paid better attention. If only she had known the tears had just begun. If she knew that by the time the moon had given way to dawn she would be a crumpled, bloodied, and bruised mess, and still unaware of where she was or what would happen next. It had been such a long day for her, such an evil day.

Charlie bristled at the memory. “It ended when they dropped me on the doorstep of the campus clinic the morning of my birthday. It was his present to me.”

There was a spark of rage in Declan’s eyes that made Charlotte wary. Darkness tracked over his face, and her heart filled with regret for telling him everything. She sobbed uncontrollably. She wished Griffin had remained a painful scar instead of the disease that was now infecting her relationship with Declan.

He moved closer, wrapping his arms around her, and she looked up at him. He didn’t seem angry with her, and relief washed over her. It was hard enough navigating their relationship before. It was so new. She didn’t want to screw it up. She was already in love with Declan.

Declan’s hands slid over her body and back up her arms, before giving her another gentle squeeze. “Is this why you are always running from me? Are you afraid things will take a turn for the worse like they did with him?” Declan traced a finger down her cheek, stroking gently. “Charlotte, I’m not going to punish you like that. That would require a level of assholery that I’m not even bastard enough to pull off. I don’t want to be that guy with you. Ever. Because it would make me no better than that sick son of a bitch.”

Charlie nodded, some of the tension dissipating.