Free My Love Forgive by Anna Antonia

gasped. “Jealousy.”
    “You’re so full of yourself!” I winced in preparation of a brutal squeeze that never came.
    “I’m not. I just know you, Risa. That’s all. I’ve known you since I first saw you.” He nuzzled my cheek so gently. “I knew you were it for me. I knew it and it pissed me off.”
    “Why?”
    “Because I didn’t want to have to hurt Gretchen by never being able to go back to her. And because—”
     

21
     
    I wiggled one of my arms free and slapped Damian. The ugly sound of flesh striking flesh inflamed my misery. I’d never struck him or anyone like that before. I wasn’t a violent person. I really wasn’t, but the rage that boiled inside me had turned me into someone else.
    Someone I didn’t recognize.
    Oh my God!
    Lashing out in guilt, I yelled, “If you loved her so damned much maybe you should’ve just stayed with her instead of wasting your time on me!”
    His cheek flushed with blood. My handprint became a beautifully impermanent tattoo. Damian’s gaze glittered with rage, but his voice remained as soft as it ever was. “I’m letting you get away with that now because you’re proving me right. Don’t do it again.”
    “I shouldn’t have done it. I’m sorry but you have no right to throw that in my face, Damian.”
    “Why did you react so violently when I brought up her name? Are you jealous?”
    “No!”
    He touched his cheek briefly. “Yes, you are. You’re sick with jealousy and always have been. I’m sorry I didn’t do more to address it then, but I’m going to break you of that now.”
    The arrogance of this man! “Don’t bother.”
    “I refuse to spend the rest of our lives with this hanging over our heads.”
    My stomach dropped further. Damian’s imagination was an elegantly brutal landscape. His threat could ensure anything. I smothered my fear with outward contempt.
    “It’s not jealousy. I don’t like you rubbing my face about poor Gretchen. Maybe I don’t like you blaming me for you leaving her. And maybe, just maybe, I don’t like what you’ve done to me!”
    “I didn’t leave her because of you. I’d already left her because our relationship ran its course. You had nothing to do with it at that particular junction.”
    Damian’s cold-bloodedness got under my skin. “I don’t care.”
    “Of course, you do. Would you rather hear me say I left her because of you? That I fell in love with you at first sight? Would that soothe your pride, Risa?”
    I closed my eyes and savored the masochistic rush of Damian rooting inside my secret self. Had I really become this shallow? “Would you have chained Gretchen like this?”
    “No, you vain girl, I wouldn’t have done this to her or anyone I’ve been with. I told you already. I meant it.”
    Something beautiful and dark pushed through the barren ground of normalcy.
    He’s not lying to me.
    I deflated and rested my head against his chest. My heart lightened just enough for me to say, “Captivity makes me special then.”
    “Yes. I’m happy you’ve come to understand that so quickly.” He kissed my cheek. I shuddered from the person I’d become entrapped by.
    “What’s wrong? Are you cold?”
    “You always pay me back for whatever I do against you.”
    “Yes, that’s true.”
    “I slapped you. Hard.”
    “Yes, I know.”
    “You’re going to get me back for hitting you.”
    He squeezed me and laughed. “It wouldn’t be punishment if you knew when and what was going to happen, would it?”
    “No, it wouldn’t.”
    “Don’t pout, Risa. It’s unbecoming of my special girl to do so.” He softened the stern admonishment by bouncing me on his knee. “Will you stop fighting me?”
    Yes. I want things to go back to the way they were.
    It was impossible. Everything had already changed.
    It scared me how I’d fallen so quickly under Damian’s spell. All it took was an easily tossed suggestion of love and affection to have me under his thumb again. I knew what I had to do.
    What