STRIPPED 2 (A Ferro Family Novel) (6 page)

I
wait
in the dressing room until everyone else is long gone. I wipe the makeup off my face and reapply with a lighter hand. I want the ugly red mark on my cheek gone. I want him gone.

I hate what I’ve become. I can’t find my spine when that man is around. I cower, imagining what he’ll do to me. The cat claws were the worst. Most women with scars like mine get them during childbirth. I did not. I managed to heal. He did it twice more after that. Blood, sex, and semen are three things Mark likes to do to me.

He was my first. I thought it would be slow and loving, passion and pleasure mixing within us. I had high hopes, none of which turned out to be true. From day one, he hurt. I don’t know why, it just did. He got increasingly impatient until sex turned to rape. I was too stupid to know what to do, too scared to ask for help. He was a good man having a bad day. I’d convince myself that it wouldn’t happen again.

But it did.

He latched onto the pain and perverted it. He’d tie me down and then jam things inside me—sex toys, bottles, glass—until I passed out. I’d wake up covered in cum and dried blood. Sometimes, toward the end, he’d leave me tied in the basement with no water, nothing to eat for days. I’d scream, but no one ever heard me. When we first moved into that house, he told all the neighbors how amorous I was. ‘Insatiable,’ he’d say. I thought it was a strange pride at the time, but it wasn’t. It gave the neighbors a reason to look the other way when he locked me outside with no clothes, leaving me to freeze on the back porch.

‘Sex games,’ he’d tell them, ‘of course we enjoyed playing and teasing each other.’ The way the men looked at me made me afraid to go outside. They thought I’d do anything with anyone. It was so far from where I started, and I felt so incredibly forsaken that I ran away.

The first time I did it wrong. I took things with me and didn’t go far enough. He found me, beat me, dragged me home, and we resumed the daily terror that put a grin on his face. He had an iron mask fitted to my head and left me wearing it while he was at work. He used everything from hot wax, to metal claws, to electrified barbs on me. It was a dungeon made for fucking, and he wouldn’t let me out.

It never felt good. I never wanted any of it. The thought of going back there terrifies me day and night.

I'm lost in the possible horrors awaiting me and don’t see Jon standing in the doorway. His hip rests against the frame, arms folded across his muscular chest. Those blue eyes are dark as the night sky and filled with worry.

He clears his throat and steps into the room. “Are you ready?”

I nod and don’t trust myself to talk. What would I say to him? I can’t tell him all that. I don’t want to relive it. I want it to go away.

He sighs deeply and presses his lips together before finding a seat down the bench. He probably hates me right now. Tonight could have gone a lot worse, and I’m sure he knows it. He rubs his hands on his jeans and glances at me from the corner of his eyes. “I’m sorry.”

I can’t hide my shock. “For what?”

“For not keeping you safe. For letting that asshole inside. For not stopping him fast enough. For not realizing the extent of what he did to you.” His eyes are wide, earnest. He blinks, looks away, and runs his hand over his head and down his neck. “I almost lost you tonight, Cassie, and I was too pissed off about stupid shit.”

I look away. I shouldn’t have gone nuts on him. He’s been so sweet to me, so patient. “It’s not stupid to want to do her.” I sneer without meaning to when I think about Gretchen.

“Cassie—”

“No, I mean it. I’m sure you’re lonely. I would have flipped out less if it had been someone else. Gretchen isn’t my favorite person.”

Jon loved me that way once, but now he’s distant. I feel more like a sister than anything else. It makes me sick inside because I don’t feel that way about him. Even conflicted and batshit crazy, I know I want to be with him. I just don’t know how. One second it seems like I can handle it and the next it’s all I can do to escape.

Jon’s voice is deep, soft. “I didn’t want to, but I need certain things, Cass, things I can’t ask you for.”

Oh, God. It feels like he’s going to rip my heart out. I can’t take it tonight. I can’t hear him say those words. I need to make him stall, but there’s only one thing that comes to mind. Can I do it? Will he let me? “I understand. You don’t have to ask, Jon.”

His face scrunches together in confusion. “I don’t?”

“No.” I’m off the bench and pad to the spot where he sits. I place my hands on his knees and sit between them, facing him. My hands are shaking slightly thinking about it, feeling torn. Before I can change my mind, I reach for the waist of his jeans and undo the button.

“Cass? What are you doing?” He watches me but doesn’t stop me.

I don’t answer. Instead, I put my fingers on the zipper and pull. His snug black boxers hold his package close to his body. I trace the tip of my finger over the bulge on top of the fabric. Jon closes his eyes, tips back his head, and moans. His breathing seems louder, less controlled. I reach for the elastic band on his shorts to free him, while considering putting him in my mouth. I can do it. I have before. I don’t like it, but he needs it. I’m willing to do it for him, regardless.

That’s when he grabs my hand and stops me. “Cassie, don’t.” His voice is so soft, so incredibly careful.

I try to pull my hands back, but he holds on. “I thought you’d like it.”

“I don’t know what to say.” The way he looks at me destroys me. It’s like he has no interest in me that way, no matter what the bulge in his pants proclaims.

“Don’t say anything. Let me do it.” I chance looking up at him and instantly wish I hadn’t.

He lifts both my hands to his lips and kisses my fingertips. “I can’t. Not tonight.” He drops my hands, stands, and kisses the top of my head. As he walks away, he zips up. “Come on. I’ll take you home.”

I
keep dreaming
about that night, with Cassie on her knees at my feet, her small body between my legs and that sinful mouth offering to suck me off. I groan and roll over. I’ve been sleeping on her floor for the past few weeks. Cassie comes to work smiling, does her job—which I can’t stand—then goes home with Beth. I follow shortly after.

I can’t get her to move to my apartment or quit. I don’t want to pressure her because of her relationship with the asshole, but I’m going to lose it soon. I need her. I need to feel her naked body pressed against mine. I want to feel the heat from her inner thighs as she straddles my face and I slide my tongue deep inside her. I want to drink her in, and hold her hips down as she rocks against my face.

I need her. I don’t know how else to say it. It’s not about fucking or getting off. This is about me and Cassie and our two bodies tangled together into one.

I rub my eyes with the back of my hand and pad out of the tiny room. Beth sleeps in the other closet of a bedroom, leaving the combined living room and kitchen area open at night. There’s no TV, just an old couch that smells like cats and mildew. There’s a print on the wall, stuck there with tape. It’s a riverbank in Paris, the yellow lights glowing softly along the Seine. I’ve been there. This image is a romanticized version of it, the trees dripping with rich autumn golds.

“That painting makes her so happy. You’d think she won the lotto the day she brought it home.” Beth is there, standing behind me in thick oversized socks that go halfway up her calves and a long t-shirt that drowns her. It must have been white at one point, but now it’s dingy gray like her socks. The cast on her wrist is covered in glittering pink Duct Tape. She would never have bought it—Beth doesn’t spend a dime unless it’s absolutely vital—so I bought her four rolls. I think she’s taped everything. Her door is pink, her chair is pink, and the old coffee table they found on the side of the highway is also covered with pink tape. I’ve never seen someone so grateful for something in my life.

My last name affords me everything I want, whenever I want it. I've never had to save and always have more than I could use. Fuck, I have more than I could spend in my lifetime. The concept of being excited about tape eludes me. I wish I could find that much happiness in something so simple.

“She never talks about it.” I tip my head toward the painting and follow her to the cockeyed kitchenette table.

Beth grabs the milk and two cups, pouring one for me without asking. “To you.”

“Why not?”

“She figures you’ve been there and doesn’t want to sound like a peasant.” She grins and hands me the glass.

“Do I sound like that?”

“I don’t think so," she says, shaking her head. "You’ve been sleeping on the floor for weeks without trying to get in that girl’s pants. You know what that means.” She puts the glass to her lips and chugs the rest of the white liquid.

“No clue.”

Slamming the glass on the table, she smiles and sighs like milk is liquid sex. “You’re either gay, hard up—since you're a Ferro, I ruled that option out—or the L-bomb is floating around in your head.”

“I already told her I love her. She wasn’t interested.”

Beth’s face scrunches making her mousy features pointier. “You said what?”

I tap my fingers on the side of the glass, feeling the cold condensation under my fingertips. “I professed my undying love, and she said she loved me, too.”

“And you’re sleeping on the floor?”

“Correct.”

She studies me for a moment, the corner of her mouth pulling up into a crooked grin. “God! You mean it, don’t you?”

I don’t reply.

“She’s been through a lot of shit. She doesn’t talk about it, but I know she’s not dead inside.” Beth pulls her feet up onto the chair and wraps her arms around her ankles. She watches me, her dark eyes studying my face, then dropping to my hands on the glass. “So, you’re just going to sleep on the floor forever?”

“I don’t know.”

“Have you talked to her?”

“No, and I’m not going to either.”

“Why not?”

“Because of the way we met, okay. I was all about fucking, and she wasn’t interested. I charmed her every day and tried to get into her pants every night. It was a game. I don’t want her to think I’m playing around. I’m not. I’m worried I lost her, that Mark showed up and, although Cassie stayed with me, he stole what remained of her." I glance up at Beth. "If you tell her any of this, I’ll deny it.”

She frowns and exhales slowly. Her gaze cuts to the side and then at my glass of milk. “Fine, I won’t say anything. Are you going to drink that?” I push the glass toward her. Beth lifts it and guzzles.

“I’ve never seen someone like milk that much who wasn’t, you know, five.”

She leans forward and presses her palms to the table. “Ooh! You know what’s even better? Chocolate milk! I’m getting me some of that tomorrow.”

“I wish I had your zeal.”

“No one matches my passion for dairy products.”

The corner of my mouth lifts slightly. “Or tape.”

She lifts a finger, pauses, and nods. “Glitter tape. If it were invisible tape, it wouldn’t matter so much. You'd have more gusto about something you truly want but have to earn.”

“You didn’t earn the tape.”

She smiles at me softly. “Yeah, but I know what it's worth and that it was something I’d never have. You made that possible, Jonny boy.” She ruffles my hair as she walks back to her bedroom. She stops in the doorway and looks back at me. “She’s lucky to have you.”

“That’s the first time anyone said that.”

“It won’t be the last.”

T
he next morning
Beth heads out to run, and I’m alone with Cassie. I spent the night on the couch, screwing around on Reddit. I started out laughing at posts about crazy horse girls, then moved to something that hits a little closer to home—dating someone who has been sexually abused. From what I read, it sounds like I’m handling things right. It also sounds like I’m fighting for something that might not be possible. At some point, people become too wounded. They wither and die. What’s left is a shell of the person who used to be there going through the motions of life. They slip into a place where no one can hurt them again, but that place prevents them from feeling anything at all. Numbness swallows them whole, and it sounds like a lonely life.

The guys who love women like that sound like martyrs. They give up all physical contact, sleeping in different beds, even different rooms. They live next to her never touching her. Some of their stories get better. Over time, some couples build healthy physical relationships. I find comfort in those endings. But there’s something worse. Depression can take over and walk her off a bridge.

It kills me, but I keep reading. It's the same story over and over again. An asshole mistreats a woman for so long she stops fighting. Even if she wants to break free of him, he won't let her go. She accepts her fate. His abuse never ends, until one day she has an opportunity to leave. She takes it, manages to find real love, but she can't forget the abuse, can't believe she didn't deserve it. Suicide pops up over and over again. In the end, the good guy, the guy fighting daily to prove his love earns nothing but gut-wrenching loss.

All his sacrifice is pointless.

Nothing can heal her.

I don’t know how far gone Cassie is. I don’t know what he did to her, if every aspect of physical contact is ruined, or if it’s only sex. I think I could live without it, pretend it isn't important. Dozens of other men said the same thing online. They gave up everything, and a lucky few got the girl back. There are always demons in tow, but everyone has baggage.

My past also lingers in the shadows, tainting my present.

I glance at the picture on the wall. If she bought that, there’s got to be some hope floating around inside of her. That picture is Cassie’s glitter tape, her milk. She pads out every morning and sits on the couch, staring at it while she drinks her coffee. It’s a small thing, but I’ll take any flicker of hope that I can get.

I’m not the knight in shining armor. I’m not the hero who saves the girl. I’m the asshole who rips bodices and ravages wanton women. Sometimes I think fate played a cruel trick on me, putting us together. We don’t fit and never have. I thrive on sex, and she doesn’t want anything to do with it.

Cassie yawns and walks out of the bedroom behind me. She wakes at the same time every day, no matter what. She clings to that schedule of hers like a life raft. In many ways, I guess it is. I feel like a dick for not seeing it sooner, how hard she clings to her life, trying to pull herself back up over the cliff. When you're hanging on by your fingernails, it’s not easy.

She’s wearing a pajama set I gave her. I was going nuts sleeping near her in those threadbare shirts with nothing between me and her panties. This set is pink stripes with a pink patch on the boob. Her hair is tied into a ponytail on top of her head. She looks perfectly sleepy, still peaceful. Nightmares didn’t wake her today.

Previously, she tried to hide them—and I let her. Then Mark stopped by the club and provided a face to the monsters again. It's easier to imagine what she sees while she's dreaming. I finally admitted I have dreams, too. I wasn’t lying. I don’t have to make shit up around her. I've kept that part of my life hidden from her, and mine was a different experience, but years later the ripples look the same. Nightmares, sweats, aversions to certain things…

I hold a mug of black coffee up over my head so she can take it as she passes. She removes it from my hand, and I drop my arm as she sits next to me on the couch. Her bare knee is close enough to touch, but I don’t. She has to come to me—and it can’t be with a can-I-give-you-head request. It’s like starting over with a twitchy virgin, which is pretty much how she was when I met her. If we start over, it’ll be at the beginning.

“Thank you.” Her voice is smooth, thick from slumber. She has a serene look on her face as she stares at the picture. It’s too small, too far away, but that doesn’t seem to bother her. As she sips her coffee, her eyes cut to the side, and she blinks at me. Sheepishly, she lowers the cup and points at the picture. “TV is pretty good this morning.”

“Yes, it is. I love this show.”

“You would.” She giggles. The sound fills me, and I’m greedy for more.

“Why is that?”

She gestures toward the picture. “It’s The Sweater Slut in Paris—sexy news at sexy times.” She says the last part in a deep, manly voice.

“I didn’t realize the sweater slut was a hermaphrodite.”

She laughs and nearly spews her drink. She slaps my arm with the back of her hand. “You know you like her.”

I’m quiet for a moment, watching the smile fade from her face. I want to ask her, but I can't hear the answer be no. I have no idea what she thinks of me, even after offering me a blowjob. How fucked up is that?

I decide against it. I don’t want to know.

“Hey, Cass, come out with me today. Skip work.”

“I can’t. I need to pay rent.”

“You already cleared it. Come on. You haven’t had a day off in forever, besides, being your boss has got to have some perks.”

She smiles suspiciously. “You don’t have to hang out with me, Jon. I know you have other things to do.”

“Nope. I really don’t. You’re the only thing I want to do today.” I grin brightly at her and stand, offering her my hand.

“I’m a thing?” She sounds offended.

“The prettiest thing in pink pajamas.” She swats at me again. I take her hand, intertwine our fingers and hold her for a second. “Come on. Say yes.”

No stripping. No strutting. No naked Cassie with plastic smiles and dead eyes. I want to make her laugh. I want to see the girl I once knew come to the surface again. I’m not an idiot, I know I can’t hold her there, but I have to try.

She looks at my hand holding hers and flexes her fingers, tapping the back of my hand one finger at a time. I wish I knew what she was thinking about. Cassie glances up at me with those dark eyes and nods. “I’d like that. Are you sure someone can cover for me?”

“It’s already done. There’s a line of girls waiting to take your spot.” Over the past few weeks, I’ve turned away more strippers than I could shake a really big stick at—my reputation is spreading. Club Ferro is a safe place to work with no bullshit and good pay. It made me wonder what else I could manage.

She frowns lightly. “Are you going to give my job away?”

I kiss the top of her knuckles. She doesn’t flinch, but she doesn’t act like she felt it either. “No. I promised it’s yours as long as you want it.” I watch her, wishing to God she’d say she doesn't want to do it anymore. For no reason I can fathom, she stays. She keeps working, and won’t leave. Beth doesn’t know why either.

Cassie bobs her head up and down. “You think I’m weird, right? Not wanting sex, but working a job like mine?”

She asked me this once before, then changed the topic, killing the conversation before it started. “Yeah, I think you’re weird. I’ve always thought that. You were the proudest virgin I’d ever met. Life got in the way, but you kicked ass. Now you do what you want.”

She watches me from beneath those dark lashes, perched on the couch next to me, clasping the coffee between her hands. “What about you?”

“What about me?”

“Do you know what you want?” her eyes drop to her coffee. “I know you, Jon. You weren’t meant to be alone so often. You weren’t meant to be the kind of guy who sleeps on the floor. I feel really bad about it, but you won’t leave, and I can’t throw you out.”

“Why not?”

“Beth would kill me. Glitter tape and milk? She’d marry you today if you asked her.”

I laugh lightly, smiling. “I’ve got my eye on someone else.”

“Who?” She watches me too long, too intensely. Her lashes flutter, and I think she’s watching my mouth between glances at her cup.

Every fucking thing I read said not to tell her. It’ll add pressure and that’s bad. Be her friend, no strings. No sex. Nothing. She has to come to me.

So I lie. “You don’t know her.”

“Jon, you’re sleeping here. She’s going to flip out. I would. Maybe you should spend the day with her instead.”

“Cassie.”

“I mean it. You’re too nice to me. I don’t want to screw things up for you. Go on. Go home.” She leans closer to push me, but our fingers are tangled.

Her eyes look glassy, and when she gets this close to me, I can’t help it. My head sways toward her, inching closer to her mouth. The pull to her is stronger than it ever was before. My gaze remains locked on her lips, wishing I could taste her, to slowly suck on that bottom lip, pulling it into my mouth and nipping it with my teeth.

It turns out I can protect Cassie from everything except me. I exhale loudly and laugh. It’s completely inappropriate, and makes her frown. When I start to pull away, she tugs me back, pulling my hand.

Nose to nose, she says, “I shouldn’t want you sleeping so close to me, but I do. I shouldn’t want to touch you, but I do. You shouldn’t be here with me. I don’t want to make you lose a girl you obviously care about very much.” Her eyes are full of tears. A big one rolls down her cheek, and she smiles, looking away from me.

Fuck it. I can’t do this to her either. Navigating all this shit is a nightmare. I’m tired of lingering and waiting. I want to help her, and this feels passive, like it’s not doing anything.

I touch the side of her face lightly, turning her back to me. “I do care about her. I love her. I told her, and she said she loved me too, but nothing ever came of it.”

Her bottom lip juts out and quivers. “Oh?” Her nose scrunches and her face wrinkles like she’s going to start crying.

“Cass, it’s you. I love you.” I rub my thumbs over her cheeks, pushing the tears away.

“I thought you wanted Gretchen?”

“What? Why would you think that?”

“She said you'd been together, that she did things to you—things that sound like you—so I thought…” She shrugs and watches me carefully with tears building up to replace the old ones.

“I wasn’t with her. In any sense. Ever. She tried to get into my pants, but I said no.”

She recoils. “You said no?”

“Is that so hard to believe?”

“Yes. What happened to the more sex, the merrier? Where’d that guy go?”

“He grew up, Cass. He regrets not keeping the virgin by his side. He regrets everything.”

“So do I.”

I lean in closer to wrap my arms around her, and hug her, but Cassie lifts her chin and presses her mouth to mine. The kiss feels so heated, so charged that it’s hard to keep calm. I have no clue what just happened, but Cassie is kissing me, and that’s all that matters.

She starts laughing and buries her face in my shoulder. “I thought you guys were together.”

“Why would I be sleeping here, then?”

She shrugs. “I don’t know. Because you’re Jon Ferro? No one knows what you’re doing.”

“I only want you, Cass. I’ve wanted you from the moment we met and never stopped.” She smiles at me so brightly it's contagious. She throws her arms around me and presses her body against mine, hugging me hard. Nothing ever felt so fucking good.

Cassie’s my glitter tape, the thing that makes me happy, the thing so far out of reach I thought I’d never have her.