Page 44 of Say It Slowly

Does he really believe he’s just like his dad? So much of what Roman says is a game, but the level of violence he’s describing from his childhood is heartbreaking, and as cruel as Roman can be, I could never imagine him harming a child.

I pull my knees up to my chest, and rest my head on them. “I don’t believe you.”

He lifts a brow in question.

“How are you like your dad?” I clarify. “Tell me. I’m dying to know.”

He just laughs and shakes his head, like my naivety is amusing to him. “When I see something I want, I’m relentless. I crave control at all times…”

I’ve been in enough therapy to recognize trauma when I see it. “All of that is understandable for a kid who had absolutely no control growing up. Makes sense.”

Of course he would want to control anything and everything around him. It’s so much safer that way. My therapist would say it’s his way of trying to protect himself in an uncertain world.

He looks away again. “But more than that, I crave—” He cuts himself off, and just stares out into the distance. Whatever else he craves, it obviously distresses him, or worries him.

“Pain?” I ask, the memory of how he curled his hand around my throat, and the glint in his eyes when he did it. And when he whipped me with that belt…

He twists his head to look at me, and what I see in his eyes guts me.Shame.It’s the first time I’ve ever seen Roman truly vulnerable. He’s usually filled with confidence, commanding whatever room he happens to be in at the time. He practically owns the entire-fucking-universe. And yet, here he is beside me, open and vulnerable. It’s a side of himself that I’m sure he doesn’t show many people, if anyone.

The pain in his eyes is too much, though, and I decide to make light of it, if only to prove to him that his confession isn’t going to send me running for the hills. I will run, eventually, but not because of this.

I grab his throat, right below his jaw, and bring my face close to his, nose to nose. I squeeze his throat a little. “If it’s pain you want, I’m happy to deliver.”

I have to admit, I love having this strong, muscular guy at my mercy. It’s pretty empowering, actually. I never thought I’d be that kind of girl, but Roman is awakening things inside me, twisted things.

In one fluid motion, he grabs me by the waist and flips me onto my back on the sand. In less time than it takes to suck in a breath, his wet body is curved over me,hishand onmythroat. “It’s your pain I crave, Little Rabbit”

I suck in a breath and fight off the panic of being pinned down, unable to get up. Pain is one thing, but entrapment is something else completely. At least, in my own twisted brain.

My first instinct is to fight him, and I do for a second, pushing at his chest, and trying to twist out from under him. But the harder I fight, the tighter his hand grips my throat, and I freeze.

Old traumas come raging to the surface, and I can actually feel my physical self, and my mental self separating. I think I’m trembling, but I don’t really know. Everything is numb. I can’t even scream. My eyes flutter closed, and I can feel tears streaming down my face, but I’m not controlling any of that. It’s like my spirit and my physical body are on two completely different planes of existence.

Seconds, or minutes, or hours later, I don’t even know, I feel fingers stroking my face. I guess I came back into my body at some point, because I command my eyelids to open, and they actually do. Roman is crouched over me, but no longer pinning me down.

It takes me a second to completely come-to, and I expect to hear either anger or pity from him, but again, he surprises me. He’s always surprising me.

His face is dead serious, but devoid of judgment. “Are you going to tell me what the fuck that was?”

I blink and sit up, rubbing my temples. I have a pulsing headache all of the sudden. “Nothing.”

He’s still crouching in front of me, studying my face, like he can figure out what’s going on by looking into my pupils. “Okay, what we're not going to do is pretendthatdidn’t just happen. You went fucking catatonic, Lux.”

How do I explain something I don’t even understand myself? He’s pinned me down before, and I haven’t reacted that strongly. I’m guessing it’s because we were in the midst of sex, and I wasdistracted? I don’t know. There’s so much of my own brain I still don’t understand completely.

All I know for sure is that trauma is complicated.

I struggle to put what just happened into words, but I come up empty. He just shared a piece of himself with me, and I appreciate that, but I’m not ready to recount the toughest moment of my life. I haven’t even told Bree all of it.

Shaking my head, I glance down at the sand, anything to avoid his questioning gaze. “Sorry,” I whisper. “Just forget about it.”

I don’t know why I’m so afraid to talk about it. Nothing about what happened was my fault. Dr. Cunningham has made that clear. But I don’t know, maybe I’m afraid Roman will look at me differently. Like I’m damaged and broken. Like I’m a victim.

“That’s not how this works,” he says. “You’re going to tell me what caused that reaction.”

I swallow, and my eyes flick up to meet his. If there’s one thing I know about Roman, it’s that he’s not going to let this go. I might as well tell him, and get it over with.

“Okay,” I say on a breath.

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