Page 27 of A Smile Full of Lies
She didn’t type anything back… didn’t have to. The way her thighs pressed together said enough.
The way she whispered, “Jesus fucking Christ,” into her palm before slamming her laptop shut said even more.
The connection to her laptop cam and mic dropped.
I leaned back in my office chair and smiled to myself.
She didn’t say no.
She didn’t sayno.
Chapter
Eight
ROS
I hadn’t stopped shakingsince I shut my laptop.
My heart was still skipping every third beat. My thighs wouldn’t stop clenching. And my head was a fucking mess.
I hadn’t even meant to open the damn anonymous forum this morning. I just… couldn’t help myself. After last night, after everything I’d typed, everything I’d confessed, I thought maybe it would help to see it again. Like rereading a journal. Like poking at the bruise to make sure it still hurt.
But it wasn’t just last night. This morning had been worse. That message. That fucking message. It was burned into my brain now.
If I were someone you knew…
…if I had a familiar body, hands you’ve seen before, and a voice you know… if I were there… would you let me chase you?
I couldn’t stop hearing it in my head. Worse than that, I couldn’t stop imagining the voice that might’ve said it if itweresaid aloud instead of just words typed out on a screen — low, smooth,dark with intent. The kind that didn’t ask to borrow. The kind thattook.
I dragged a pillow into my lap and pressed my forehead into it, groaning as if I could smother the mortifying heat in my cheeks that way.
It didn’t work. Nothing did. Not the cold shower I got up and took. Not the banana I forced myself to eat afterward. Not the double-strength coffee I brewed and left untouched on the counter while I paced the living room like a restless ghost.
I didn’t even remember sitting back down, but here I was, cross-legged on the couch, laptop open again, glaring at the login screen for the same forum that had just unraveled me.
I hadn’t been this curious about something in years. I typed in my info, hit enter, and held my breath. Then I stared at the empty search bar like it was a landmine.
MaskTok. That’s what StrayDog777 had called it. A specific corner of the internet. Primal. Safe. Controlled.
“Some people say it makes them feel scared and safe at the same time,” he — or maybe she, for all I fucking knew — had said.
That was the part that had stuck with me. The contradiction.
Scared and safe.Pinned and wanted.Chased and chosen.
I couldn’t tell if it was healthy or if it meant I was deeply, fundamentally fucked up. I took a long breath.
Then typed it into the search bar in that same anonymous forum, just to see what would come up. MaskTok.
The search results populated instantly. Content began to load. The forum was full of threads about it, including links toa certain social media site filled with the kind of videos StrayDog777 had told me about. Men in black masks. Tactical gear. Voice distorters. Ring lights. Night vision overlays. Grainy filters and whispers in the dark.
Some were silly. Some were… not.
I watched one where the man in the mask just stared down the camera, breathing slow and deep as if he could smell whoever was watching. I watched another where the creator stalked the frame with a knife in hand, blood dripping from his fingers in slow, deliberate loops. Both were tagged with words likefearplay,consentkink,chaseher, andmaskeddominance.
It made my throat go dry. It made my thighs twitch.
