by Penny Wynter
"There's a tiny shred of hope in me that you're telling the truth, Amber. We'll figure this out together. And, by the way, this is not our home. The part about the production was true. I'm only here temporarily. Since I didn't know if you had actually lost your memory, I didn't want to lure you to New York in case you suspected it to be a trap."
"I am telling the truth. I don't know anything, so how am I supposed to help you when you're refusing to answer my questions?"
"Eventually, I will answer your questions. We just need more time to get there. You have no idea how much I still have to tell you about my fascinating, enigmatic wife."
I sit down on the sofa, my knees weak, feeling defeated. I find myself utterly boring, and yet, here he is, painting a picture of this wicked seductress and mysterious vixen. That isn't me. It can't be.
"That's not me." I can't even stand to look him in the eyes. Maybe he's lying. Maybe he's just a crazy fan of the podcast and somehow found out about my past. Maybe . . .
The truth is, I don't want to disappoint him. If he really is my husband and knows this exciting woman, then he will have a rude awakening when he realizes that I'm not like that anymore. What if my memory never comes back? I can hardly pick up a life I don't know—with him.
That's just wrong.
Dom closes the distance between us and cups my chin, his thumb stroking over my cheek. "Do you remember your first kill?"
And just like that, my pulse is racing again. "What? No!"
I almost drown in his eyes as he smiles at me. "You don't believe me, Amber? Well, I have proof."
He puts the knife down on the coffee table and turns to me, extending his hand. "In my bedroom."
"Of course. Where else would you keep it? Do you really think I'm that stupid? Do you know what I should do? I should take my phone and google your name along with 'New York' because I wonder what I will find out."
With a shrug, he takes my phone and holds it out to me. "Be my guest, Amber. We were always very private, and you won't find a lot. And what you will find will only corroborate what I already told you."
I can't read him no matter how long I stare into his eyes, searching for signs that he's lying. In the end, I give up. "Fine, show me your bedroom."
He smirks and puts the phone down. "Good choice. Follow me."
He turns and walks toward the door as I get up and reluctantly follow him.
"You wanted to tell me about the night you took my virginity."
"Right." He chuckles. "That night really was something else. You were already 19 when it happened." Dom starts climbing the stairs. "We had just wrapped up filming in Chicago, and everyone was heading out for drinks. I feigned a migraine because I needed time to think. You see, I've always wanted you, but I just wasn't sure how to approach the whole thing with your uncle being one of my biggest investors and my sadistic tendencies. So while you and the rest of the crew went out to a fancy bar, I was meeting an old friend in a rather seedy sex club. My friend had introduced his wife to the lifestyle when she was quite young herself, only that she was the dominant one in their relationship. I wanted to probe him about how he approached her and how they talked about all of this."
Dom stops at the top of the stairs and turns around to me. "But guess who shows up uninvited, tricking the doorman into letting her in and causes a scene in the middle of the club?"
I want to say "me" but it doesn't feel quite right. Dom hovers above me, waiting for my answer as I'm standing two steps below him. I swallow nervously. "Your wife?"
"Damn right." He extends his hand again, and this time I take it. Without switching on the lights in the hallway, he leads me to a door and opens it.
It's his bedroom all right. But to my surprise, he doesn't lock us in as I suspected, and the bed looks normal enough. I can't see a chain coming from the wall with a nice iron collar just for me, so maybe I'll make it out of here alive again.
I expect him to grab me and throw me onto the bed, but he simply kneels down and lifts one of the floorboards, exposing a secret hiding place. He then proceeds to take out another shoebox.
"I don't know why I didn't expect you not to follow me to that club of all places," he says, "but there you were. And you were pissed, thinking I was there to fuck another woman. The situation escalated when you cussed at me before you asked the first best guy lingering at the bar if he wanted to take your virginity. It was unreal, like expecting a drop of blood in the water not to attract sharks." He cocks his head and studies me. "You always were a little crazy."
I'm enthralled and can't look away. "What happened next?"
"I threw you over my shoulder, caveman style, and took you to one of the playrooms. You cried—a lot—while I made you regret what you did, before I fucked you for the first time and laid down the ground rules for how we would proceed after this."
"That sounds . . . intense." Again I envied him for the memory.
"It worked. We married two years later. But I want to show you something else." He takes the lid off the new box and hands me two Polaroids. I can't tell if it's him or me, but one of us clearly loves those things.
But this time, the pictures show strangers. The first is of a man and a woman, both tied up and gagged. I look at the second Polaroid and drop it immediately. I gasp for breath. "That's not true." I close my eyes, rubbing them with the back of my hand. "It's not true."
"But it is." His voice is so terribly calm.
When I open my eyes again, he has an old revolver in one hand and a chain with a locket dangling from the other.
I kneel down to pick up the picture again. It shows an open grave with two bodies in it; both heads adorned with a hole in the front.
"This can't be. It's from one of your movies and staged."
"No, this is our dirty little secret."
I force myself to look at him, and for the first time, I'm kind of able to read him. He's telling the truth. The locket reflects the light as it still sways through the air, and in the back of my head, I hear myself screaming and a man laughing. Instinct says it's not Dom, but a stranger.
My heart starts beating faster, and I squint my eyes to take a closer look at the picture.
"What is it? Did you remember something?" Dom puts his hand on my shoulder and squeezes, the locket dangling from his fingers.
"I don't know. The locket . . . I heard myself screaming." Shaking, I find myself reaching for the chain. I need two tries to pry the damn thing open. Inside are pictures of Dom.
"Her name was Patricia, and she started stalking me shortly after the release of one of my most successful movies. As you can imagine, my possessive wife didn't like that one bit. The thing is, the kind of work we both do attracts a lot of weirdos who have no concept of privacy and art versus reality. So, one day Patricia decided to send her brother for you. I have no idea what she told him, but he was to get you out of the way."
I stare at the locket and the Polaroids, feeling like I'm caged inside a horror movie playing myself. "What happened?"
"Like I said, you're a bit crazy, and your instincts are pretty good. However you did it, you knew something was wrong when you came home that night. You can't see it in the picture, but you shot Luke in the thigh when he tried attacking you in our bedroom. You tied him up and waited until I was home. He broke down and told us everything. So you made him call his sister. She came over, and we decided to shoot them both."
"That's absurd." My voice trembles, and yet I feel some kind of familiarity looking at that locket. "Why didn't we call the police?"
"We discussed it briefly but came to the conclusion that neither of us wanted the publicity and you were too interested in how it would be to take a life. This still might come as a surprise to you, darling, but we're not good people."
As I glance at the second Polaroid with the grave again, a memory flashes right before my eyes. A highway exit sign during a rainy night. My throat constricts and I have to force the words out while rubbing my hurting forehead. "Exit 16N,
Taconic State Parkway."
Dom seems surprised. "That's where we took the bodies. So, you do remember."
"No, I don't. I just saw that when I looked at the picture again. It's like a word that you can't grasp although it's on the tip of your tongue. There was a sign. It was during the night and it was raining."
"Yes, it was raining. We searched for hours for the perfect spot, buried the bodies, and then went back to the car. You were incredibly horny, and when we fucked in the car, a park ranger knocked on our window. You couldn't stop laughing, and he thought it was because he caught us in the act. Only it was the wrong act."
I sound like a crazy bitch in his retelling. "Please keep talking. This is the first time since I woke up that I feel like I have a chance of remembering anything."
Wondering what else might be in the shoebox, I kneel down and start shuffling through the papers and pictures. Something else catches my attention, though. Dom tries to grab my wrist, but I'm quicker this time and manage to pull a big black bag from its hiding place underneath the floorboards. "What's in there?"
Dom sighs. "Toys."
I look up at him. "Can I open it?"
He nods his head while I'm already pulling back the zipper. At first glance, I see leather cuffs and a riding crop. My fingers caress the smooth leather, and another memory plays out before my eyes. Dom whipping me because he was angry with me for getting a tattoo without asking for his permission. I also remember specifically not asking him beforehand since I wanted him to be angry.
That means at least the part of him being my Dominant must be true. Maybe everything else is true as well.
"You didn't like the skull tattoo, so I had to go back and get the moth attached to it to make it at least look a bit more feminine."
He nods slowly, curiosity on his face. "Yes."
I start digging through the bag until he puts his hand around my upper arm and yanks me back to my feet.
"So, do you remember or not?"
"Bits and pieces. It's slowly coming back. Help me."
He stares into my eyes. "How?"
"Fuck me."
"What?"
Pressing my thighs together, I shift my weight. "Whenever you touch me and—I guess, I'm no expert—recreate another sensation, I seem to remember a bit more. Help me remember, Dominico."
"By fucking you?" He sounds incredulous, and at the same time, his voice is deliciously low.
"Maybe if you occupy my mind, my subconscious has more time to work."
"What kind of game are you playing?"
I shake my head. "I'm not playing any games. You're the first person to touch me without me reacting negatively. I wasn't even able to have sex in the last six years. I puked during my last attempt. But with you . . ."
His fingers dig into my arm, making me wince, as he stares at me, looking all strict and dominant as hell. "You're still as crazy as you used to be."
8
For a moment, I hope that he's going to kiss me. But instead, he lets go of my arm and takes a step back.
"No. We should talk a bit more first. Let's have a cup of coffee and then we'll see."
I'm about to stomp my foot. I want his dick and not coffee. Yet I know that he makes the rules and he won't give me what I want when I want it. No, he enjoys tormenting me too much for this.
At least now I know why I have this huge ass death's-head hawkmoth tattoo on my back. It started out as a skull between my shoulder blades, and Dom didn't like it. He didn't want me to get a tattoo in the first place, but I guess I enjoy provoking him too much.
Having memories again feels weird and not as good as I thought. I'm hesitant to believe the images coming out of my brain. What if I fabricated them myself—involuntarily? Just to have something to cling to?
Dom puts his hand on my back and basically shoves me out of the room.
"I don't want coffee." There. I said it.
"I don't care, darling. We're going to sit down and talk about it."
A minute later, we're back in the living room, and I'm sitting in the armchair while Dom walks toward the door. "Last chance. Are you sure you don't want anything?"
"Oh, I want a lot of things, but I still don't want coffee."
Dom laughs, he comes back to me and leans in to finally give me the kiss that I wanted all along. "I've really fucking missed you."
"What's my name, please?"
He straightens his back, a mean look in his eyes. "I think I'm going to believe your story, when you're able to tell me your name on your own. Either because you remember or because you stop lying to me. But I have no doubt we'll get there."
I cuss him in my mind as he leaves the living room to get his stupid coffee. I'm still not over it when he comes back and sits down with the cup in his hands.
The asshole laughs at my frown. "You're still the same. Are you going through all the cuss words you know in your head? Dying to call me all kinds of things because I was mean?"
His teasing makes me horny, so I clamp my mouth shut and lift my chin defiantly.
After another chuckle, he takes a sip of coffee, before putting the cup down. "You should be glad that my assistant told me about your podcast, or you wouldn't even be here. She's an avid listener and basically forced me to listen along while she played it out loud in the office. I recognized your voice immediately."
"She?" I can't stop myself from blurting out the word. "A female assistant?"
"Jealous, darling? Don't forget, you've been gone for a long time, and I still haven't figured out if you gave me that scar or not."
"So you've passed the time by banging your assistant? How professional of you." My voice is so bitter it's almost embarrassing.
"Maybe I did. Maybe I didn't. Sarah's quite attractive, to be honest. Pretty face, nice tits." He shrugs.
I try telling myself that this is just another move to torment me. He's a sadist. He wants to see me squirm and suffer. I don't even know why I care since I'm still not entirely sure what is true and what isn't.
All of a sudden, I feel restless, like I can't for the life of me sit still any longer. So I get up and start pacing around the room. Dom doesn't seem surprised though. He sits there, drinking his coffee, seemingly enjoying watching me.
"What?" I snap at him.
"The longer you're here, the more you behave like yourself again. You were never good at sitting still. You need something to do with your hands at least. The only thing that keeps your attention for hours on end is your special effects makeup. Otherwise, you barely make it through a whole movie. I used to tie you up and gag you when I wanted to watch something in peace and quiet. Every now and then, I would tease you, of course. Fingerfuck you a little, pinch your nipples, but other than that, I would make you wait. You hated it."
"I'm quite sure I still do." I narrow my eyes at him.
"Want me to test that theory?" He pats the sofa next to him. "There's this three-hour movie I haven't gotten around to watching yet."
"No, thanks. I just want answers."
"Too bad since you're only going to get what I give you, darling. Sit down and be still."
Anger pulses through my veins. This is all so unfair. I can't stand this power play. What I need is distance between us so that I can think clearly again.
I turn towards the door.
"Don't even think about it. You're not going anywhere, Amber."
I have no idea which suicidal demon inside of me takes the reins at this moment, but I turn around and flip off Dominico Fanucci, my self-proclaimed husband and dominant, before I stomp into the hallway.
I'm almost at the door where my coat is hanging on a hook when Dom catches me, putting his arm around my waist and pulling me back against him.
His scruff feels delicious on my cheek as he lowers his head. "You're going nowhere, darling. When you were knocking at Mrs. Cassidy's door, I cut your ignition cable. That car isn't starting anytime soon."
"You bastard!" I start struggling, fighting for him to let me
go.
He just tightens his grip and drags me backward.
"Stop it!" Hands flailing and feet kicking, I snarl at him, scratching the back of his hand and contorting my body in an attempt to break free.
Dom shakes me off and puts his hand around my throat, not minding the blood. He squeezes tight. "Behave, or I have to punish you."
Something in the way he says it makes another memory pop up in my brain about how I picked out my wedding dress with my aunt because my mother died when I was a kid. This is amazing. Kind of at least.
So, he probably really is my husband.
He forces me up the stairs, and I cling to the frame of his bedroom door.
"I've changed my mind. I don't want to have sex with you. Why don't you go and fuck your assistant?"
Dom laughs, takes both my wrists in one hand and pulls me with him.
Face first, I land on the bed. I don't even have the time to get up before he is on me. He pins me down and starts wrapping rope around my arms. God knows where he had it stashed.
As he ties my hands to the big bed, I continue to struggle, turning around to glare at him. Dom slaps my face to get my attention, and it brings back a flood of images. The gates have opened.
"Anchovies!"
He remains perfectly still above me, his weight pressing me in the mattress. "What?"
"I just remembered. It's our safe word because you hate them so much. Anchovies. We picked it during our wedding night. Before we used the ample, red, yellow, and green, but I wanted something more personal."
I watch his Adam's apple move as he swallows. He licks his lower lip, nodding. "That's true. Do you want me to stop?"
"God, no! Continue. Make me remember. Hurt me, Dom."
He puts his hand around my throat and cuts my air supply off until I panic. His smile is every bit as sinister and vicious as I remember it to be.