Toxic Read online

  I’d forgotten how fast he moves, and a second later, he’s inches away, so close I can see the pulse beating in his throat. Instinctively, my hands fly up in front of me, and I swear he presses forward so that I’m forced to lay my palms against his chest. He’s so different from Vic it’s a shock to my system to have his body touching mine. I haven’t touched another man, despite Vic’s constant accusations of my infidelity, and to do so makes me yelp and turn my head away. I push against him, but it’s like trying to move a boulder. He doesn’t budge.

  My mouth opens to protest, and then his hands are probing along my ribs. The sharp pain from blows Vic delivered causes me to bite down on my lip. Shame weights my head and brings my gaze down to my feet.

  Only when he drops his hands and gives me some room can I look up. He gives me a long, hard look. “That’s what I thought.”

  “Who are you to judge me?” I ask when I manage to recover my breath. Even then, my voice is little more than a wheezing gasp and lacks my usual bite.

  His voice deepens, and though it seems impossible, he grows even more imposing. “I’m someone who knows better than to hit a woman.”

  My suspicions about why he’s in prison solidify. This is a man who is capable of great harm. It should scare me, but it doesn’t. There is something about the blatant way he displays his dominance that’s almost comforting. He doesn’t try to hide who he is.

  When I dated Vic, he tried to be exactly what I wanted him to be. Caring, subservient, kind. I don’t have those delusions with King. What I see is exactly what I get. I don’t know if it’s a good thing or not.

  I roll my eyes at the thought and gesture with the hand not wrapped around my rib cage. “Do you even know where you are? You’re in prison. That doesn’t say upstanding citizen to me.”

  “I’ve never claimed to be upstanding, little mouse.” Well, if that isn’t confirmation of my assessment, I don’t know what is.

  I glance at the window and see medical is as empty as the infirmary and scowl as I turn back to him. “Why do you even care?”

  He steps closer again, and I stiffen, unsure of how my own body will react to his proximity. “Maybe I know what you’re going through.” I find that statement unfathomable and almost scoff. Almost. There is something about the way in which he said it that gives me pause. The woman inside who’s suffered innumerable assaults recognizes a kindred soul.

  I find myself taking a step forward. “What do you mean?”

  His eyes meet mine, and he lifts a shoulder. If he were a tiger, right now, he’d be wounded and irritable at showing it. I have no doubt if I tried to get close to him that he’d bat me away like an obnoxious fly. “My dad used to hit my mom and me.” He inches a bit closer. His gaze never wavers from mine. “I’m surprised more people haven’t seen it. But maybe you need to go through it to know for sure. I recognize the signs. It may have been a long time ago, but it’s something I’ll never forget. The way you try to make yourself look smaller and how you seem to walk like every bone in your body is broken.”

  I wince, staring at my hands and trying to ignore the prickling of tears and the tickle at the back of my throat. “We shouldn’t be talking about this.” I turn away and look around blindly. “Let’s, uh, we should get back to work.”

  “Don’t make the mistake my mother did,” he says as I pass by him.

  I settle myself behind the desk, and he watches me for a moment more before going about his morning chores. My breath eases, and I use the mind-numbing task of filling out patient forms to keep my hands busy, but I can’t stop thinking about what he said. My awareness of him was already at a fever pitch. Now, I feel every movement he makes with my whole body.

  Once patients begin to arrive, I lose track of him as I tend to their wounds and ailments, but I know he’s never far from me. After lunch, I return to the infirmary with a new sense of eagerness. I’m practically skipping past Annie and Patricia in medical, hoping I might catch him before he leaves for the day. He isn’t there, but there is another drawing on my desk.

  I rub my fingers on my scrubs so I don’t smudge the ink, and they’re anything but steady as I pick up the piece of paper. This time, he’s drawn me looking down at my hands like I’d been doing during our conversation, and wisps of hair fan down, blocking my expression. I’m vulnerable and sad like the last picture he drew, but there’s strength to the firm line of my lips and my squared shoulders.

  I’ve never considered myself to be a strong person. If I were, I wouldn’t have fallen victim to Vic’s machinations in the first place. I would have seen them for the empty promises they were. As I study the drawing of myself, I start to think maybe I can be the woman he sees in me, like how a broken bone grows stronger once it heals.

  I carefully fold the drawing and place it in my pocket. As I do, something much more powerful takes root inside me, and as I continue my work, that something pulses just underneath the surface, a bubbling darkness much like the man who inspired it.

  The connection, the temptation, I feel whenever King is around only continues to grow the longer we work together. My collection of sketches grows from two to three and is inching toward ten. He draws seemingly mundane scenes, moments I don’t even realize have passed and turns them into magic. Turns me into magic.

  They have secretly become the single most anticipated moment of my day. I’m slowly becoming addicted to them, and to him.

  If I thought I was in a bad situation before, it’s nothing compared to the tumult of emotions I navigate now.

  I pour myself a cup of coffee, careful not to reach too far or move too fast so I don’t irritate my ribs. Vic hasn’t been up to sex in a few weeks, which at first was fine, but now his temper is shorter and his fists swing harder. I’ve barely healed from the last time. When he enters the kitchen behind me, I set my coffee cup carefully on the counter. I’d gotten up before him because I can’t stop imagining what I’d do to him if I had the balls. The fantasies have grown so vivid they’ve begun penetrating my dreams. I woke from one with my skin crawling, and I’d shot from the bed like it was full of bugs.

  His arms come around my waist, and I swallow hard, trying not to flinch away. “Good morning,” he says, his mouth on the skin at the back of my neck.

  “Good morning,” I mimic, devoid of any inflection or emotion.

  “Missed you when I woke up.” I take a strategic sip of coffee instead of a response, and his hands clamp down on the kitchen counter on either side of me. “Come to bed with me,” he says, and this time I can’t stop the cringe. I close my eyes and will my heart to calm as I wait for the blow to my ribs or his fist in my hair, yanking me back.

  When he steps away, expecting me to follow, I can’t make myself do the same. I think of the woman in the drawings I have stored inside a box of tampons under the bathroom sink. That woman can’t continue this way. If this relationship doesn’t cost me my life, it’ll at least be the death of what’s left of my spirit.

  Instead of following him, I turn around with a brittle, forced smile. “I would, but if we go to bed, we both know we’ll be there for a while, and I wouldn’t want you to be late for work.”

  He moves into me. Unlike King, when Vic gets close, all I want is to get as far away from him as possible. He pulls me into an embrace and drops his mouth to the soft curve of my neck.

  “Come on, we can be quick,” he says. There isn’t any fooling me with his cajoling tone. I know if I continue to refuse it could get ugly, but I can’t make myself submit.

  I swallow the sour taste of my disgust, so my response is seductive. “You don’t want to rush it after all this time. When we get back home from work, we can make it last. Whatever you want,” I add, my toes curling in my shoes at the thought.

  There’s a lengthy pause while he considers my request before easing back. My hip resting against the counter is the only thing keeping me from completely sagging in relief. As he watches, I get my cup of coffee and take a sip to cover my nerves.
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  “I thought we could have—”

  His fist catches me in the stomach, and my coffee cup falls from my hand and shatters right before I fall to the floor, cutting my knees on the shards. My chest burns from the lack of oxygen, and I hold a hand in front of my face, which he slaps away. I hear the metallic clatter of his buckle coming undone, and shame and anger and hate war for dominance inside me.

  “Vic, please.” My voice wobbles around my wheezing. I taste salt on my lips. I never even realized I was crying.

  Then his dick is out, its musk filling my nose and causing me to gag. “Shut the fuck up and suck me.”

  It isn’t a request, and he doesn’t allow even the barest second for me to object. The next breath I take has the head of his dick pushing past my lips and bathing my tongue with his salty pre-cum. There’s no chance to fight back, not when my focus is on breathing and trying not to panic. I make terrified sounds around his heavy, thrusting weight, but it only seems to excite him more. More tears leak from the corner of my eyes as he presses impossibly deep.

  “Take it,” he says as his head drops back.

  My hands dig into his thighs as the force of his thrusts threatens to knock me back into the cabinets. I try to push him away when my vision darkens, but he only knots his fingers in my hair to hold me still and thrusts harder, the head of his dick bumping into the back of my throat and triggering my gag reflex. I choke around him, which only causes him to hiss, “Yesss,” above me, excited by my struggling. I give a brief thought to biting him, but I’m scared it will only enrage him more.

  He doesn’t even care when I gag and bile and saliva leak out of the available corners of my mouth. My nose burns, and my throat and lungs are screaming for relief, but there is none to be found. In the end, all I can do is hold on and hope for him to finish as quickly as possible. He doesn’t last long, and when I feel his thrusts shorten and hear his groans increase, I take advantage of his loosening grip and pull away before he can come in my mouth.

  Semen spurts onto the floor with sickly wet plops. It displeases him. No doubt the less-than-stellar ending sucked whatever pleasure he took from forcing me to bend to his will. As he struggles between disappointment and frustration, I get to my feet and turn away, trying so hard to catch my breath. It’s all I can do to keep from throwing up into the sink. My entire body is shaking so badly I nearly do despite my efforts to hold it back.

  Behind me, I can hear Vic getting dressed, and each whisper of movement sends a pang of fear, anxiety, and anger throughout my system. I don’t know whether I want to fall to the floor and sob, run and hide, or claw his eyes out with my bare hands. I compromise and do nothing, even as my mind races with variations of all three. When he’s dressed, he palms my hip, pointedly ignores my flinch, and kisses my still damp cheek. He admires the devastation on my expression for a moment before he smiles and leaves, humming to himself.

  When I look up again, I realize I’m late for work. Very late. I squawk, and in my hurry, I slip on the remains of the fallen coffee cup. Cursing, I get down on all fours and gather the pieces with a kitchen rag. Tears drip from my cheeks and mix with the spilled coffee. I toss the shards from the cup in the trash, rag and all, and set about getting ready for work.

  For the first time since King and I had the frank conversation about his father’s abuse, I don’t want to work with him. I can’t stand the thought of him seeing the remnants of my ravaged emotions from Vic’s early morning “attention” on my face. I don’t want to hear him say I told you so.

  I catch him looking at me often, trying to figure me out. He hasn’t even been covert about it. Each time he finishes a task and strolls over for another assignment, I can feel his gaze like a heavy weight, except it has the opposite effect, buoying my spirits from whatever dreadful misery awaits me at home. No amount of heated looks or flirtatious gestures will pull me from the pit of despair threatening to devour me.

  Despite my resolution to keep away from him, it’s become the highlight of my days, working with him. It energizes me the way a bolt of lightning does. A shot of light in the darkness. Electrifying in a dangerous way that I know that if I get too close I’m going to get myself burned. The fact is, he’s the only person in my miserable life who’s ever asked about the bruises on my arms or face.

  I don’t have any family—that I talk to anyway. Vic doesn’t allow me to have any friends, and the people at work are too wrapped up in themselves to pay attention. I’ve been completely isolated.

  Probably exactly how Vic wants me.

  After two years under his totalitarian rule, the concern from someone else—even someone like King—is like a welcome ray of sunshine in the middle of a barren winter. I’m a flower turning in his direction for one more drop of light, blooming at each sliver of attention he allows me. It’s pathetic, and I hate myself for every quiver in my stomach and each trip of my heart when I catch his presence from the corner of my eye.

  But today, after what Vic subjected me to, I don’t want his attention. I want to go back to hiding like I used to. Invisibility helped mask me with numbness and King makes me feel too much. He gives me hope and sometimes hope makes a despondent situation seem even more so.

  Ernie leers at me as I hand over my badge. “Someone’s running very late.”

  When I don’t answer, his smile falters, and he stutters, bobbling my ID as he hands it back. Without saying a word, I gun the engine and fly through the gate, unable to repeat our daily interactions one more time without falling apart.

  “You doing okay?” Annie asks. I look around, expecting someone else to be around me, but there’s no one.

  I clear my throat and smile hesitantly. “Fine. I’m fine. Just running a little behind.”

  “Heck of a day for a late start,” Annie says with a smile.

  Alarm spears through me, but its progress is sluggish. “Why? What happened?”

  “You know how it is. Someone decided to start a riot in the cafeteria during breakfast. There’s already one waiting for you to get patched up in the infirmary. Good luck!” Annie calls out as I hurry to the door.

  “I’m sorry I’m late—”My apology dies in my throat.

  Just like the first time I saw him, King is sitting on the bed covered in blood. Only this time, he’s shirtless, and there are rust-brown smears along his chest. Dark purple shadows line his jaw and ribs. Even though I haven’t examined him, I can tell by the way he’s breathing that he’s in pain. Thoughts of my recent traumas fade behind my concern.

  I don’t want to feel anything—in my life, it’s always easier to maintain a strict sense of apathy about everything—but when he looks up, his face as broken and bruised as my insides feel, and the thread of kinship strengthens. We are two sides of the same fucked-up coin, whether I like it or not.

  “Good morning, Tessa,” he says as he spots me in the doorway. The use of my name almost distracts me from his injuries. Almost.

  “What the hell did you do to yourself?” I ask as I move closer to the bed he’s sitting on.

  He chuckles, and it ends in a hiss. I was right. He is in pain. “Would you believe me if I said it wasn’t my fault?”

  I cross to him. “Not a chance.”

  He spits out blood, but I’m too concerned for his ribs to recoil as it splatters on the tile floor. My eyes narrow on the spot of blood, and I flash back to that night a few weeks ago. It had taken me a long time to get the blood out of the grout in my kitchen. Someone is going to have a bitch of a job once I get him patched up.

  “Well, I’d be lying anyway.” This time when he laughs, it’s humorless. “The real question here is what happened to you?”

  A little sigh escapes me, like pressure building just beneath the surface of all the secrets and lies. “Let’s worry about you first.”

  He submits to my poking and prodding, but I can feel him do an evaluation of his own. It’s pointless to try to school my expression. I already know he can somehow understand everything I’m th
inking. “Looks like you took one heck of a beating.”

  “You should see the other guy.”

  My gloved hands tilt his head to examine a gash along his temple. “I’m sure he’ll be here eventually.”

  His hands cover mine, and I go still. “Are you going to dodge the question forever? I thought we moved past all that.”

  I try to pull my hands away, but he keeps them cradling his face. His eyes close momentarily, and he strokes his skin with my hands. The way we’re positioned, I’m nearly between his spread legs. If anyone were to look in all they’d see is me examining a patient, but he and I both know it’s so much more.

  “I don’t want to talk about it,” I say softly.

  “I think you need to.” A tear crests my cheek, and one of his hands leaves mine to wipe it away. “Tell me.” When I don’t answer, he says, “Why don’t I guess, then?”

  I press my lips together and nod, sniffling.

  “He hit you?” he asks, and I lift a shoulder. His hand drops to my shoulder before sliding down my arm to rest on my waist where it tightens. “He hurt you again?”

  Unable to look at him any longer, I pull my hands from his face and take antibacterial wipes from my kit to disinfect the cut on his temple as he talks.

  He tips my chin up and repeats the question.

  “What do you think?” There’s no way in hell I’ll submit myself to the humiliation of recounting this morning to anyone, let alone him. Distracted, I press too hard with the antibacterial wipe, which makes him grunt.

  “Sorry,” I say absentmindedly.

  “You didn’t tell me he was the warden, little mouse.”

  “You seem to think everything about me is your business,” I comment instead of answering. “I thought you would have known already.”

  I gather more antibacterial wipes and begin mopping the blood away from his skin. There are thin, vicious cuts along his chest and abdomen. Nothing serious, but they’re making a god-awful mess and must hurt like a bitch. The bruising on his ribs is going to make breathing difficult for the next few days, but I don’t see anything life-threatening. I tell him as much as I finish inspecting his wounds.