Page 46 of His to Keep

“I’m about to whip you, and you’re getting jealous over something that meant nothing?”

“I’m just trying to understand.” I sniff back tears. “Was she your first?”

“Yes.”

“Then how can it mean nothing? And why did you never mention it?”

“Because I hated every moment of it, Ava. Even talking about it makes me sick. She was a few years older than me and forced herself on me to prove a point that I was exactly like my father. It was full of anger and hate, neither of us in a good place. We took it out on each other. And I soon learned she was spiteful and wanted her freedom any way necessary. Even if it meant using me to get it.”

“But your father caught you?”

He sighs. “He did. John had been spying and told him out of jealousy. He always thought he was a much better candidate for teaching Orla how to conform than me. But John has sadist tendencies that are boundless. My father knew it’d be too risky to put anyone in with John while he kept up appearances.”

“What happened after that?”

“You know what happened.”

I do. But it still doesn’t make sense. “Was your father not afraid you’d end up repeating history when he locked me in a room with you?”

“Christ, Ava,” he swears. “Do you think so little of me?”

My chest pains. “No. But historyhasbeen repeating itself.”

“No,” he denies. “You’renothinglike her, and I don’t hate you.”

The minutes pass, and we’re running out of time.Just get it over with, I want to say to him. But he’s right. That’s too brave. When on the inside I’m screaming in terror. When nothing happens, I give in and glance over my shoulder, daring to look at him. But when I do, I wish I hadn’t. He’s even whiter than before, eyes fully dilated and boring into me, lips flat but jaw clenched. The top of his black shirt is unbuttoned, and he’s yielding the whip tightly in his fist.

“Turn back around.” Sobbing, I do as I’m told, knowing I won’t be able to get that image of him out of my mind.

Swallowing down a painful lump, my throat scratchy from dryness, all I feel next is horrendous pain as he steps back and crashes the whip down against my spine. The pain is so violent, so stinging, I scream.

“Stop!” He doesn’t. He whips me again.

Drool and tears drip on the table as I lumber forward. My scream breaks my voice. “Oh, God, please. No more! No more!”

He reigns pain down on me once more, this one so cutting, so bad, the lights go out, and I’m slipping to the floor before I even know it.

Chapter Twenty-Six

Iwake up lying on the bed, the room hazy from the film of blurriness in my eyes. Thoughts come back slowly, and when they do, I start crying.Three.Three lashes of the whip were all it took for me to fall headfirst into oblivion. Three to convince Father Aaron that I mean nothing to his son.

And don’t I feel likenothing.

It’s four in the morning—dark and cold. The only light source comes from the candle on the desk. The house is deathly quiet, almost like it knows. Simmering in dark delight, beneath the floorboards and behind the walls, something’s sniggering,sinners, sinners, sinners.

I know, even without having to look, Callum’s sitting at the end of the bed by my feet. I sense him, his presence, knowing that he’s looking ahead at nothing. Eyes transfixed, glazed, and haunted. I know because I’m doing the same, unable to look at him, at anything. Justfeelall these terrible things inside of me.

A strong scent of blood hangs in the air from the whip’s slashes. My dress must be open at the back because a chill licks the wounds. He didn’t go easy on me. It may have been only three, but they go deep. As deep as the mess we’ve created.

The image of Callum’s expression right before he was about to whip me inhabits my thoughts, knowing he had to travel to a dark place to do that to me. To hurt me like how his father makes him himself.

I’m too afraid to look at him now, to see the anger I know he has toward me in his eyes. Though, as it turns out, I don’t have to.

“You turned me into him,” he says, probably sensing I’m awake. “You turned me into the one person I’ve been trying my hardest not to become.” His voice trembles, and it makes my chest hurt. But does he deserve my pain for not telling me about his history with another girl dressed in white? “I hate what I did to you.”

“You had to,” I rasp, tears stinging my cheeks. “Or I would’ve died.”

He shifts at the end of the bed. I still don’t look at him. “That’s if he’s even convinced. You could end up dead anyway.”

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