Tears of Tess (44 page)

I
couldn’t stop the shiver as Brute shot into my mind. Forcing it away, I added,
“He helped me heal, then let me go.” Those two paragraphs would be all I
uttered on the matter. It was my life, tied with a pretty pink bow.

Brax
screwed up his face. “You’re saying he just let you go? The police never showed
up?”

I
smiled. “The police arrived, and thank you for helping them find me. But Q was
going to give me up all along.” My heart twisted, wishing it wasn’t true. “You
see, he rehabilitates women who are broken and sold. He buys them, but once
they’re healed, he sends them home.” I couldn't stop the swell of pride in my chest.
Q wasn’t a monster. He may think he was, but a monster would never do that. A
monster would torture and rape and kill. Not offer freedom after a life of
misery.

Brax relaxed
a little. “So, he never touched you? You were kept safe and protected this
entire time?” Eyes dropped to the sheet I pressed against my throat. “What
about the marks on your body?”

I sat
straighter, hoping like hell I hid the truth. “I got those when I ran away. I
lived in luxury, and made friends with his maid, Suzette.” I beamed brighter,
fighting watery grief threatening to crush. “I’m fine. Honestly. Together, we
can get our lives back on track.”

He cocked
his head, and, for a moment, I wondered if he didn’t buy my lie, but then he
reached for me. I climbed into his arms.

Brax
kissed the top of my head, murmuring, “It’s all going to be better now. You’re
home. I’m never letting you out of my sight again.”

I
snuggled closer and didn’t say a word.

*Woodpecker*

A
human is adaptable. A human heart is not.

A
month trickled past, and I resumed my old life as if I’d never gone. Two weeks
after returning, I called my parents.

Brax
told them what happened in Mexico, and they cremated an old stuffed unicorn of
mine, then scattered it in the back garden, believing I was dead. In their old,
foggy minds, my reincarnation was a messy ordeal, not a happy second chance.
The conversation was stilted and hard.

I
never called again.

I
became addicted to raging songs, just like Q. The lyrics shared my pain,
letting it unleash from festering inside.

Your
memory won’t leave my head

haunting
me, hunting me, driving me crazy, I wish I were dead

every
time I close my eyes, you’re there, ready to suck me into dark desires

reality
is where I no longer want to be, my dreams are my salvation

I
will cut you out, chop you up, break every bone in my body

if
only it meant peace from your dark melody

I never played
the songs when Brax was home, but when it was just me and loneliness, words
rained with heartache and need.

In
my dreams, Q visited, and I woke to shooting stars and orgasms. By day, I forced
myself to act and lie and be Tessie. The truth and Q blistered my heart; I
became as successful in hiding my feelings as he was.

My
secrets stayed locked behind a fortress of blue-eyed innocence. My body healed
and the whiplashes no longer showed. But they blazed bright and red on my soul.

Some
nights, I twisted my nipples so hard, just to try and recreate mind-tripping
lust like Q, but it never worked.

The
vibrancy and encompassing life he’d given became a distant, dark paradise.
Reality took over. I sat my final exams for uni. They let me take my tests late,
due to circumstances, and I passed with flying colours. Brax took me out for
dinner to celebrate, but I fumbled through the evening, aware I’d snipped
another anchor keeping me here. I had an education now. The only thing tethering
me was Brax. And day after day proved it wasn’t enough.

I
tried to recapture Q’s mansion on my tatty sketchpad, but no matter how hard I
tried, I couldn't get it right.

I
reconnected with Stacey, and friends from uni, and started looking for work in
the property industry. I coasted through life in a semi-aware state. Smiling,
laughing even, but everything was muted—covered by a filmy screen, never letting
me see bright colours, or smell rich scents, or enjoy exquisite pleasure.

Thirty-six
days after Q abandoned me, two things happened that rocked my bland world.  

Brax
subtly changed. I noticed he spent a lot of time putting out the garbage. I didn’t
care, and only curiosity made me follow one night.

Sneaking
outside our apartment block, I found him talking to our neighbour across the
hall. She had her face in Blizzard’s fur and a look of adoration in her eyes
for Brax.  

My
fingers convulsed as my heart raced faster—the first spike of emotion in a
month.

I
never stopped to consider the life Brax led while I played kinky slave with Q.
He cared for her—the tentative sweetness he’d shown me when we first met—glowed
in his eyes.

Oh,
my God, did he resent me for coming back into his life when he thought I was
dead?

I
was so selfish to never consider it. After the first morning, we pretended as
though nothing happened. We never discussed it, and I never complained when we
didn’t have sex again. I didn’t want to admit it, but living with Brax,
accepting his kisses and hand-holding, felt like I cheated on Q, which was
idiotic and frustrating as hell. But my body hated me for betraying my master.
Subsidizing real Q for dream Q, I grew wet while I slept, and trembled for
release.  

I
lingered like a voyeur as Brax helped the girl stand, holding her for a moment
longer than necessary. The look of implicit excitement in her eyes made me
yearn. Yearn for another.

I
waited for green jealousy. I waited for rage. I waited for anything…
something
to show I cared.

Nothing.

Brax
laughed at something she said, ruffling Blizzard’s head. A smile slowly bloomed
on my lips.

Brax
liked another. He no longer used me as his crutch, and I no longer needed him
as mine. Realization thundered with a hundred drums and lightning bolts.

Happiness.
Freedom.

Brax
didn’t need me.

I’m
free!

Emotions
frothed and stirred. The leash tying me to Brax—the one woven and threaded with
obligation and friendship—snipped, leaving me unbelonging.

For
the first time in my life, I was mine. Completely alone. No one had a right to
me. No one owned or claimed me. Blazing joy blew away my mediocrity, my need
for people to care.

I
cared for me.
Je suis à moi.
I am mine. The French affirmation was ridiculously
perfect.

I
whispered it, tingling with possibility.
“Je suis à moi.”

*
* * * *

The next night,
I said goodbye to Brax.

While he went to
put the rubbish out and flirt with the neighbour, I pulled an old backpack from
under the bed and packed. Turning on the radio, I bobbed to pop music,
welcoming a new beginning.

Clothes I didn’t
like, accessories I no longer cared for, I stuffed in the bottom. For the first
time in my life, I was going out on my own. No back-up plan, no safety net. No
one to rely on but me.

I didn’t have a
destination in mind. But I knew I wanted to make good on my promise. The
promise I gave to the woman who tattooed me in Mexico. I told her Karma would
bite her ass. I wanted to be that Karma. I wanted to hunt and hurt every person
involved, and stand up for all the women who didn’t have a happy ending like me.

I was done being
weak and passive.
I’m done being Tessie
.

Looking at my
newly plastic-wrapped wrist, I smiled. Over the past month, I’d had the middle
of the barcode lazered off. I embraced the pain; after all, Q taught me pain
was pleasure.

He roared into
my head.

“Only think of
me and what I’m doing. There is intimacy in pain, esclave. Let me make your
pain my pleasure.”

I
shook the memory away, ignoring the clenching between my legs. God, I missed
him. Missed his egotistical coolness, his super-hot violence.

But
I thanked him, too. Without his cruelty, I would never have found the core of
iron deep inside.

Smiling,
I traced the small bird in flight trapped between the two ends of the barcode.
Beneath the sparrow were the numbers: 58.

It
was morbid. Wrong on so many levels to brand myself as slave fifty-eight, but Q
was the highlight of my life. The poignant centrepiece who would never come
again.

When
I was old, married, bored, and drained, I wanted something to remember him by.
The tattoo of bird and number would always hold those memories. A lock box of
sadistic pleasure available to relive in the privacy of my mind, whenever I
needed a shot of fire.

Sighing,
I grabbed the last thing in my wardrobe.

The
grey dress I’d left Q’s home in. A song switched on the radio.

Your
touch consumes me, frightens me, beguiles me

you
want to capture me

I
want to be your victim

you
want to ruin me

I
want to be your broken

you
show me your darkness

and
I’ll give you my light

The
lyrics slapped me around the head, and I stared at the dress for ages. My heart
didn’t know if it wanted to beat or die. In a horrible moment of disgrace, I
sniffed the material. Soft lingers of citrus and sandalwood gripped my stomach with
love and hate. Two equal feelings, so different, yet not different at all. They
were both one thing: passion.

Screwing
the dress into a little ball, something crinkled.

Frowning,
I pulled the envelope free that Franco gave me. I’d been too chicken to read
it. Instead, I hid it in the dress, hoping I would forget.

I
never forgot.

But
now, I had strength. I was in control of my destiny. Sitting on the bed, I
slipped a finger under the tacky glue to open.

Heartbeats
jangled as I tipped the envelope upside down. Brax’s silver bracelet fell out.

It
landed in my lap and I could only gawk. Q returned my bracelet.  

“Merde!”
he swore. Standing, he scooped the bracelet from the carpet and dangled it
above. “This is mine. You are mine. Get that through your head if you ever want
it back.”

That
was a lie. All of it. He relinquished the bracelet so easily—like I was never
his. If he made the commitment to fully own me, I wouldn’t have spent the last
month in purgatory.

I
flung the bracelet away; it landed on Brax’s pillow. I didn’t want it anymore.
It belonged to two identities, who I no longer bowed to.

I
will move on, so help me.
I would find and
rescue women who suffered abuse and hardship. I would become a trafficker’s
worst nightmare.
Even though you deny him, you’re becoming him.

My
eyes widened.

Q
saved women, same as I was about to do.

He
might save them, but he never brought the bastards who did it to justice. I
wanted to go after the monsters, not just the offerings.

I
looked into the envelope before tossing it away, and pulled out a small piece
of paper. Air refused to enter my lungs.

Esclave,