Authors note: Hello all! You guys are the best, your reviews and pm's are such an encouragement and fuel me to keep writing so thank you all, you're each little muses. If you haven't checked out the pinterest page yet, consider it but open it in private, it's not for the work place or children. FSSAS/fifty-shades-slow-and-steady/ If you have a hard time finding it, I'm told the url in my profile works.
APOV
When I wake to use the bathroom at some point in the dead of night I nearly fall out of the bed when I see Christian lying next to me sleeping. When the hell did he get here? I'm a bit drunk still but the emotional inebriation of a few hours ago has been effectively cried out onto the tissues scattered on the pillow and the floor. Once I've picked them up and taken a few Advil's I sit on the bed next to this beautiful man and fight the urge to smack him upside his head.
His clothes are in a pile at my feet where he shed them before getting into bed, the soft glow of his phone alerting him to a new text message and I sit pensively until the light goes dark. What am I doing? What is he doing? It took 12 hours, six vodka tonics and one very persuasive girlfriend to convince me that this man wouldn't use me and I don't think he's still interested in Elena but then, why the secrecy? What is he trying to hide? The light glows again and this time I lift the phone and see her name and the beginning of her message.
Darling, you have far more to lose if anybody finds this out. The price of my silence is yours as well.
I don't know if there's more, if I swipe it he'll know I read it. I hate her. I fucking hate her. Outside of killing her I don't know how to get her out of our lives. For gods sake she molested him and remained friends with his mother. How does one even go up against someone so hideous? I replace his phone, face down on top of his pants and exhale harshly, secretly hoping he'll wake up and explain himself.
Three in the morning. I can't sleep in here anymore, I feel a burgeoning animosity towards this man sharing my bed so I head to the guest room and lay in the dark silence, praying that my heart won't shatter when the inevitable happens. I've tried desperately to hold onto a part of me that he can't take just so that when he tires of me, there's something left for me to build from.
For as much as he knows about me and my daily activities, I feel like he doesn't really know me at all. If he did, he wouldn't have made me feel cheap this afternoon and he certainly wouldn't have waited until the middle of the freaking night to make things right. But then, that tiny little voice in my head, the one that speaks for my heart, it gets louder and louder as it puts his actions in place. Secret meetings, omissions of his activities, his constant 'need' for me. Something is going on and it's stressing him out.
Finally, after I've run around different possible scenarios as to what's going on in his closed off world I drift to sleep.
I'm pulled from my dreams by a violent scream that slams me in the chest and freezes me to the mattress. That's Christian. The incoherent shouts are punctuated by high pitched screams and I race from the bed, untangling myself from the blanket around my feet and run into Elliot as he flings the door open.
Christian is thrashing back and forth on my bed, the blankets are on the floor, the sheets untucked from the mattress. In the middle of my queen sized bed is a billionaire CEO in the middle of a nightmare. The beat of my heart is louder than the screams from his throat and I jump onto the bed only to be pulled away by Elliot.
"Christian! Christian!" Elliot is yelling his name over and over, each time he says it the screams get quieter until they stop along with the frenzied thrashing. This isn't new, he knows exactly what to do. Oh my god.
"Christian, you're ok, you're in Anastasia's room." Elliot is still standing at the edge of the bed and I notice that he's in nothing but his boxers. Kate is crying in the doorway, the visual of a terrorized man unsettling all of us but it's Kate, hard as a rock Kate who cries for him. My feet move of their own accord and I sit on my knees next to him and turn his face towards me. His eyes are vacant and distant, his skin is clammy and cold, his heart beat racing faster than I've ever known it to.
"Baby, it's me. I'm here, you're ok." Little by little the detachment ebbs and slowly I see my Christian return. His hand rises to my fingers as they gently stroke his cheek and he grabs them and hold them against his heart and then pulls me onto his legs so that I'm straddling him.
"You left. You must have left." Guilt washes over me.
"I did, I was just in the other room but I'm here now and I'm not leaving." His gray eyes are searching mine, looking for an answer to a question I don't know so I do the only thing I know to do and I kiss him, softly and lovingly.
"Promise me, Ana. Promise me you won't ever leave me."
"Christian" how can I promise that? How can I promise to never leave him when I don't know what our future holds?
"I need you. You can't leave me. Say it, say you'll never leave me."
"I'm not going anywhere, Christian, I'm right here. With you. Come, let's wash this nightmare off of you and then you can tell me what just happened." He swings his legs over the side of the bed and walks to the bathroom, never putting me down. He reaches in and starts the water before setting my feet on the floor and lifting my t-shirt above my head.
"I was going to make you some tea while you showered."
"No. I need you right now." His voice is scratchy from screaming, the raspy sound cutting me up. He shakes his head emphatically so I turn to shut the bathroom door hoping to god that Elliot didn't just see my nakedness but he and Kate are gone and have shut the bedroom door leaving us alone.
In the shower he wets himself, rubbing his face vigorously under the water and then steps back and pulls me under the stream. The nightmare is lingering, I can see the fear fighting its way out by the line of his mouth and the slight tremble of his shoulders. His pupils are tiny as can be, his breathing still choppy. If I had any idea of what I could do, I'd do it but I'm at a loss so I just wait for him to do something, anything to clue me in to how to help him.
"Touch me." What? "Touch me, Ana, I need you to touch me."
My heart is racing with apprehension but I reach out and run my palms over his shoulders and down to his fingertips, lifting them to my lips and intentionally kissing each knuckle. If physical connection is what he needs to pull him from the whispers of this nightmare, then I need to boldly meet him there. The wildness of his eyes disappears and I reach up again to touch his shoulders, again trailing down to hold his hands while he stares at me closely.
"Touch me." His voice croaks and the last vestige of my anger sloughs off and circles the drain, following the water down the drain.
"Are you sure? I don't, I don't want to cause you any more pain."
"I'm sure, Ana. I want this. With you. Please." Each word is a struggle.
I grip his fingers tightly and lean forward to kiss that soft vulnerable hollow at the base of his throat. I've got to stand on my tippy toes and even then he has to lean down a little but I press on and lightly, so lightly I can barely feel him, I move down and kiss his chest, right over where I know his heart is beating. He grips my hands tighter when I pull back and murmurs with his eyes closed.
"Again."
I find one of his scars and look up at him so that he knows what my intentions are and then I kiss it. He gasps and trembles but doesn't pull away so I brush my lips over the smattering of hair that I've fantasized about so many times to the next scar. And the next. And the next until I've kissed all six of the small silvery circles that have done so much damage to him. So tiny and yet, so prodigious.
"Ana" he breathes before he crushes me to his naked chest and lifts me, my legs naturally wrapping around his hips and locking behind him. "I want you." He whispers into my ear and I reach down between us, wrapping my hand around his now hardening cock, stroking it as the water rushes over us until he's hard. "Hold onto the wall behind me."
His hands span the width of my back and glide over the cheeks of my ass, lifting me slightly and then lowering me down onto him with a groan against my cheek. When he's fully sheathed he breathes out and kisses me as he lifts me up only to let me sink back down. "Need you." he says every few thrusts, lifting me and sliding me down onto him over and over and over until I can't feel my legs or my feet and the water begins to get cold.
"I need you, Ana. Never leave me, tell me that you're mine."
"Only yours, Christian. I'm yours, only yours." I breathe back into his mouth, our lips never breaking contact. "Yours." It's the honest truth.
One hand leaves my butt and slides between our slick bodies to press and pinch the pulsating bundle of nerves where the pleasure is coiled tight. "Ah, oh, oh." comes out like a whine but I can't help it and I easily obey when he leans me back so that my back is braced against the cool tiles. His thrusts gain in their ferocity, his dark wet lashes unable to hide the heated stare of his eyes on mine. One hand leaves the wall and grips his lower back and those eyes blink and then roll to the back of his head when he trembles against me and his knees weaken beneath him. As he spills himself deep inside of me he presses his thumb directly onto my clit and pushes up, holding it there until my own orgasm wrings me inside out.
I almost collapse when he puts me down, his arms catch me just in time and we both snigger.
"I'm sorry, I can't feel my legs or my feet at all."
"Well I can't feel my left arm so together we're a good team. Come, let's get you back to bed. With me this time." And just like that, after six minutes of shower sex, he's back.
Once we're toweled off I put on another t-shirt and look for something he can wear.
"If you pull out a pair of men's boxers, you are going to have one pissed off boyfriend on your hands."
"Well," I say as I dig through the bottom drawer where all things go to die, "I don't have boxers but I do have these old soccer shorts. They might fit." I lift them and hold them out to him but he just stands there and shakes his head with a look of disgust.
"They're purple!"
"They are not! They're maroon and they're the only thing I have that will fit you!" He walks over stark naked and takes them from me by two fingers holding them in front of his face.
"Those are purple."
"OK, they were maroon but they've been washed enough times to appear purplish now. You can wear those, your dirty drawers or you can sleep naked." I shrug and climb into bed to wait for his decision and am shocked when he puts on the 'purple' shorts.
"I don't need Elliot coming in and seeing my twig and berries. He's already jealous of me, I'd hate to add insult to injury."
I throw myself back onto the pillow and cover my eyes as I laugh at the ridiculous sight of Christian Grey wearing a pair of women's purple soccer shorts that barely cover his larger than life penis. Twig? Not even close.
"Oh, thanks! You convince me to wear them and then laugh at me." He's grinning from ear to ear but climbs in next to me and motions for me to sit up and turn around. As soon as I do I feel the soothing bristles of my brush as he runs it from scalp to tip, squeezing the water onto the towel he's placed around my shoulders.
"They're cigarette burns." He says faintly as minutes tick by.
My hair has long been tangle free but I let him continue, knowing that he's using the busyness to garner courage before speaking. "My mom had a pimp…he was…less than thrilled that she had a child and he hated me. I tried, I really really tried to be a good kid. I never cried, I never asked for anything, never interrupted her when she was…working. But it didn't matter to him. Just the sight of me would set him off and he'd hit me and push me around, call me names, threaten to kill me, you name it and then one day, when I was about three he put his cigarette out on my back while I was lying on the floor watching TV. No warning, no preamble, no nothing. Just a searing pain that I felt for weeks afterwards." My heart breaks as I picture a small copper haired boy, dirty and hungry, laying on the floor of a squalid apartment while his mother makes money by fucking some random guy in another room.
"I cried and he hit me to shut me up. When my mom came out, she saw what he had done and gave me a bag of frozen peas to put on it and then took him in the bedroom to do god knows what." His voice drops to a whisper and even though I can't see him, I know his head is hanging low. "She never once asked me if it hurt, she never even acknowledged it until she asked for the peas so that she could make me dinner, it was all we had until her food stamps came in."
"After that, anytime I'd hear him coming up the stairs I would hide under the kitchen sink cabinet, sometimes for the entire day. She never even wondered where I had gone, it's almost as if she had forgotten I existed at all. Sometimes he'd be hopped up on some drug or drunk out of his mind and he'd look for me. Banging cabinets and closet doors until he'd find me and then he'd throw me around. My mom tried to stop him once and that was the second time he burned me. This one, right here." He points to the first mark I kissed and I turn to face him, sitting Indian style just like he is.
I reach out and touch it with my fingertip and he reacts by sitting up straighter and closing his eyes only opening them when I've pulled away. I kiss my fingertip and put it back on the perfectly symmetrical scar and watch as his shoulders slump forward with relief. My heart cracks in two and try as I might, I can't not imagine a beautiful little boy so alone like that, unloved and uncared for.
"After that, she just drank when he came around or she'd get so high she didn't know what was going on anyway. I hate her for that. For abandoning me, for leaving me alone with a monster. She was a monster." He shakes his head and runs his hands through his hair. I grab the forgotten brush and brush the hair back from his face, front to back, as tenderly as possible while he watches me. I say nothing, my tears speak for me.
"It was him who found me after she died. I didn't understand what was going on at first, she just laid on the floor in the living room which wasn't unusual. I sat on the couch, I remember it was brown plaid with big yellow flowers on it. After the first night I knew something was wrong but I didn't know what. I threw water on her, she had a friend, Patty and that's what she would do when my mom would pass out. But it didn't work. By the third morning I knew something was really wrong but I barely spoke, and even if I had, the concept of leaving to get help was beyond me." He stops speaking then and I stop brushing. "I was so afraid."
"Christian, you don't have to say anything more if you don't want to." My hands are on his where they're resting on his knees and they twitch underneath my palms.
"I want to tell you, Ana. I want to tell you everything." He pauses and settles his gaze on me. "I don't know why, I just do." I lift his hand and kiss it and he continues.
"He walked in on the fourth day, it smelled terrible in that apartment by then and he knew, he fucking knew right away what had happened. I watched him walk over to her and then he went into the coffee can she kept the money in. Once he cleaned it out he pointed at me and said, 'This is your fault you little piece of shit'. Then he left. He fucking left me with her by myself until the cops showed up an hour or so later."
I crawl onto his lap and wrap my arms around his neck tightly at the same time his arms wrap securely around my back. It's all so clear now, his obsession about me leaving, his inability to believe he's good, why he believes he's unworthy of love, his self loathing and the unfair blame he pins on himself for things beyond his control. He was made to feel less than human. He didn't know anything else, his formative years had been spent isolating himself to avoid being hurt and that's how he had survived.
In my heart I know he's never told anyone the extent of those years and specifically those days. Exhaustion, emotional exhaustion hits us both, the silence lingering as his words swirl around us like smoke. I lay him down and kiss his face until his hands fall to his sides and he exhales a long shaky breath, the fight leaving him as he falls asleep in my arms. I will protect this man and love this man and fight for this man until his demons can't find him anymore.
A precious few hours later both of us sit straight up when there is a sharp knock on the door.
"Ana! Christian! You up? You dressed? I'm coming in." Elliot opens the door and even though I'm in a t-shirt and the comforter is over my legs Christian shields me with his body.
"What the fuck, Elliot? Get the fuck out!"
"Calm down, I already saw Ana's underwear when she sat on your lap last night." He winks at me and shoots me a grin. "Cute polka dots."
"Oh my god. You're like the brother I never had."
"Or wanted, now get out." Christian throws the covers back and walks to the door, slamming it in his face before turning back to see just how much of my body Elliot may have seen. Through the door we hear a muffled laugh.
"Are you wearing purple girl shorts?" Christian bangs once on the door and begins to laugh.
"I will never hear the end of this. Never. Come on, I asked him to wake us up if we slept past nine." He's pulling off the purple shorts, oh yes, bring that right over to me please, and stepping into his jeans, sans underwear. Hot.
"Why? I'm tired, you're tired, we've got nothing going on today, let's go back to sleep."
"Nope, we do have things today. Two things actually. You, my sweet girlfriend are seeing Dr. Laura Fischer today at 10 and then we are going on a little trip."
My face falls and my chest tightens when I remember.
"I don't want to go."
"Nobody wants to go to a therapist, Ana. But you need to go and you need to be honest with her. Seeing you sad and upset, it kills me. You deserve so much more." He's sitting on the bed, so close, and I reach out but he grabs my hands and kisses my palms before he rips the blanket off and slaps the outside of my thigh. "Come on, I can't wait to see what Kate and Elliot whipped up for breakfast! It's like having Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum in the kitchen."
"Wait!" he turns and looks at me expectantly.
"Where are we going after my appointment, I need to know how to dress." He purses his lips, crosses his arms and runs a finger over his chin in thought.
"Well, it'll be just you and me for the day and overnight, so panties are not necessary. Actually, neither is a bra. Or clothes at all really. Well, that was easy!"
"Christian!" He chuckles and begins to text something on his phone.
"OK, bring a bathing suit, something casual for tomorrow and something casual beachy for today. I want to take you to a really great restaurant near the shore line but that's all I'm telling you!" His finger points to me, teasing as he flings the door open. "Cover up, I don't need my brother to see what's mine."
"OK, you have breakfast, I'll get dressed and packed up for the day. Do we need to stop at your place to get clothes?"
"Nope. Mrs. Jones has sent over a bag with Taylor who's on his way." My face must fall because he reaches out and pulls me from the bed against his body.
"He's just dropping off the car and the bag and following us until about noon or so. Then it's just me and you for the entire day."
"Anastasia, it's so nice to meet you. Mr. Grey, a pleasure." Dr. Fischer is a tiny older woman with short gray hair and deep chocolate skin. Her eyes are shrewd but kind and wordlessly convey the strength behind them. I like her immediately. Christian shakes her hand and stands, waiting for me to tell him what to do but Dr. Fischer takes care of it for me.
"Mr. Grey, we'll be just about an hour so if you'll wait in the waiting room, we can call for you should we need you." He looks a bit dejected but I'm not bringing him into my therapist appointment so that I can lay bare to him all of my insecurities and show him just how crazy he is for being with me.
After taking my family history and laser focusing on my mother immediately, Dr. Fischer goes in for the kill.
"So, tell me about the abuse you suffered at the hands of your step-father." My belly flips despite knowing that we'd be talking about this. The coffee has gone cold but I sip it anyway to stall and take a moment to gather my thoughts.
"I don't call him my step-father. He's just Stephen." I take a big breath and press on with a shrug before I lose my nerve. "He hated me. I'm not sure why, I was a pretty good kid. A few small issues but nothing he should have hated me over." The silence stretches on for a few minutes. I hate this part of therapy, the part where they let the silence prod you to keep talking when you so obviously don't want to. 43 minutes left.
"Anyway, it started out small, a hit here, a push there, bed without dinner. It escalated as I got older. Sometimes he was really great, he'd take me to amusement parks or go to the schools 'Dads and Donuts' events with me. He even bought an above ground pool for me for my 13th birthday."
"When did he start to assault you?" Assault? That word makes it sound so much worse than abuse.
"Um, the first time was about six months after my mom and he got married. I forget what it was about but he slapped me, hard, across the face and told me how annoying I was. It shocked me, I remember not being able to cry even though it stung and embarrassed me. I was used to Ray and he never hit me and never made me feel that way."
She lays her pen down and takes off her glasses to look at me. "And what did your mother do?"
"She was as stunned as I was. We were having dinner, lasagna, I still can't eat it to this day. Everyone, including Stephen was still and then he stood to get a drink and my mom looked down, cut a piece of her dinner and ate it. Like nothing had just happened. I remember they were talking about getting the oil changed in the car."
"And how did that make you feel? Not the hit, the silence that followed?"
"At fault. Alone, rejected, annoying, unwanted, sad. Very, very sad." It still makes me feel those things.
"Being physically assaulted on a regular basis, or at all really, is a terrible thing for any human to endure. To inflict that sort of abuse on a child is especially damaging and we will talk about the physical nature of his abuse but for today, I want to focus on what he said to you." She puts her glasses back on and looks at her notes. "Would you agree that his verbal abuse was the most damaging?" She's good, I'll give her that.
My hands are twisting furiously in my lap, my lip is almost bleeding between my teeth and my left calf is cramping from the constant tapping of my foot on the floor.
"Yes. The rest of it, the hitting and the neglect, it just reinforced what he was saying."
"And your mother doing nothing? Where does that fit in?"
"It proved to me that he was right. Look, I've had years of therapy to talk all of this through, I know that the root of my issue with my own self-image is her neglect and the way I interpreted it. But here's the reality; when your own mother doesn't see you as somebody worth fighting for, worth keeping around, how can anybody else?"
"Anastasia, did you ever think that maybe your mother has a mental health issue?"
"I have and I've come to my own conclusion. I think she really just didn't give a shit." I will not cry.
"I want to focus on the things Stephen said to you and tie what he said to the struggles you have today. One by one we're going to cut those ties. Talking through something as a teen is wonderful and you've given yourself a really great head start. But once you reach an age of reasoning, usually around 18 or so, the realities of the things that have been done to us become that much more painful because now you're the adult. Our coping mechanisms change, we have a greater understanding of emotions which makes it that much harder to understand why someone would want to hurt us."
She's right. I thought I was past this shit, I thought the three years of therapy had fixed whatever damage had been done but as I've gotten older and have entered into a different type of relationship with Christian, there are other issues that have popped up.
After another half an hour of hyper focusing on my feelings of being 'annoying' she wraps up our meeting and opens the door for Christian who practically falls in. He looks like he's on edge, his hair wild from his constant tugging but when he takes my hand and searches my face, his palm brushing over my cheek and jaw, I feel safe again.
"Hi. I'm fine. Really. I just want to start our weekend." He smiles and kisses my temple, focusing his attention on Dr. Fischer who just sits back down and looks at him expectantly. Eventually she looks at me and smiles sweetly.
"Ana, I'll see you again on Thursday morning, 8am. That will be your time slot going forward, we thought it prudent to have a session immediately after your self defense lessons since those seem to expose you the most. If you need me before then, here's my card." We all stand and walk to the door, Christians hand a comfort on the small of my back as we make our way to the waiting car outside.
Once inside Christian holds my face and kisses me gently.
"How are you? Did you like her? We can go anywhere you want if she's not a good fit."
"I liked her, it just sucks to verbalize certain things, ya know?" He rolls his eyes and runs his hands through his hair, leaning back onto the headrest.
"Yeah, I know." He leans over and opens the glove box pulling out a package of Reeces cups. "I thought you might want these after." I plant an appreciative kiss to his cheek and rip into the best coping mechanism known to man.
"Thank you, Christian. Where to now?"
The car roars to life as he grins and winks.
"The farmers market!"
CPOV
Sitting in this waiting room, helpless to the emotions I'm sure are battering Anastasia, I can't help but reflect on my own hell from last night. We have yet to address what made her leave the bed in the first place or what made her so angry with me yesterday but we need to. I'm still shocked and embarrassed by being caught in the middle of a nightmare. Kate looked at me a little funny this morning and got my coffee for me, her way of caring I guess. Elliot's been privy to the nightmares since I was four but he hasn't seen or heard my outbursts since he left for college 14 years ago. He knew enough to not question me in front of Kate but I know my brother and he won't let this go.
And then there's Ana. Pure, sweet, soft Ana. I told her almost everything last night and I wanted to. If I'm going to force her to work through her issues, then I can only be expected to do the same but opening up to her was more than that. I want a life with this woman that doesn't include the darkness and secrecy of my past. I finally have the motivation to put it behind me and to move on.
Once the session is over I wait for a rundown from Dr. Fischer but she just stares at me like I'm an idiot. Ray chose her based on a recommendation from Ana's therapist in Monsanto and clearly, there's no way I'm going to get inside information from this tiny woman.
"OK, so what do we need to get?" She looks unbelievably sexy in her black ankle length sun dress. The thigh high slit and low cut center offer glimpses of just enough of her skin to make me crazy. She's opted to not talk about the appointment so I leave it be and walk hand in hand with her, just happy to have her with me. Out of nowhere some schmuck walks right up to us while we're picking out olives and from less than two feet away snaps a picture.
"Ms. Steele, are you cheating on Mr. Grey with Jared Mastellano?" Asshole. She looks surprised but responds on instinct by grabbing my hand tighter and positioning her body behind my arm. She expects me to protect her and I will.
"Ignore it, baby or they just get more rabid." I whisper in her ear, kissing it quickly and she nods as he continues to take pictures. Taylor walks up behind him, removes the camera strap from his neck before he knows what's going on and walks away with it. His timing is, as usual, is perfect. I was half a second away from knotting the strap around his skinny neck and hanging him from the nearest lamp post.
"I thought you said it was just us." I can see she's not mad, just surprised.
"It will be but not until we're finished here and at the restaurant. As you just witnessed, there's still a need for him right now. But I promise, it'll be just us until tomorrow morning." I can't resist that pout so I don't and instead indulge myself in a kiss that sets my blood to boil. "Come on, we've still got to get dinner for tonight."
She stops and turns to me, still holding my hand.
"Dinner? We're making it?" I nod. "So there's a kitchen?" I nod. "Escala?"
"No." Her eyebrows knit together forming that cute as fuck V while she tries to figure it out but when she bites that bottom lip, cute is not the adjective on my mind. Sexy, fuckable and hot are more accurate.
"How about we make scallop and mushroom risotto then? Oh! And can we put asparagus in it?"
I laugh as I answer her, her enthusiasm thrilling me.
"Ana, when I say 'we're' making it, I mean you're making it. I'll help but I have no idea how to cook so you can make anything your little heart desires." She stands on her tippy toes and pulls me down by my hair, placing her hand gently on my chest as if to test my reaction and whispers into my mouth.
"My heart desires you, Mr. Grey."
I'd like to say that our the hour long ride to the shore line was pleasant but it wasn't. Welch has been working double time to find out who the kid in the picture is and while he hasn't made any headway with the picture, he has with the bank.
"She's fucking the manager." No surprise there. "And the assistant manager." Now that's interesting.
"How do you know?" I shoot Ana a smile while she flips through my iTunes library on the dash board finally settling on the Indigo Girls.
"You have some serious crap on here." She whispers when she knows I'm watching her but I have to concentrate on what Welch is telling me no matter how much I want to watch her sing along to 'Prince of Darkness'.
"Well, tellers are mostly women, women notice shit that no one else does and they talk. I had a few guys up there for a few days this week to get as much intel as they could. Basically either she or a tall red headed woman shows up every two weeks or so to make the deposits, always in cash and almost always in hundreds. Their arrival is always known about beforehand and once the transactions are complete, they leave with both men for the rest of the afternoon. Every few months both Elena and this red head come together."
"How does that boil down to fucking?" Ana's head shoots back, her brow furrowing as she tries to figure out what we're talking about.
"That in and of itself doesn't. But one of the tellers said that every time either of them shows up she brings at least one other girl with her, usually a blonde who waits in the car. This particular teller said that her cousin is a maid at the hotel they go to when they leave the bank."
"Fucking get to it!"
"Walla Walla isn't a huge place, people talk, news gets around. Whenever these four individuals show up at the Marcus Whitman Hotel people take notice. They always want the same room, fourth floor, furthest from the elevator."
"And the proof of their activities is…?"
"The condoms and stripped bed that are always left behind with a $20 tip." None of this is surprising but I need more than this.
"We need photos, tangible evidence that she's paying them off to not report the cash."
"Working on it. According to my source she's not been there in over two weeks so I expect she'll show up soon. I've got two people watching the bank and I'm working on someone I can…use at the hotel to get us in the room."
"Nothing illegal. This shit needs to stick. Good work, now let's get the kid identified."
When I hang up I attempt to skirt the questions I know have formulated in Ana's head.
"Crap?"
"Uh, yea. Brittney Spears? Beyonce?"
"You don't like Beyonce?"
"She's got talent, I just can't figure out why you'd have her 'Crazy in Love' song on here. And Brittney? What's your excuse for that?" I love this, this goading on her part, this intimacy that she wraps me in without even realizing it.
"Someone else put those on there." Shit, I had forgotten about this. Her head tilts towards me as realization hits her.
"An ex?"
"Yes. An ex-sub. Not an ex-girlfriend. I don't have one of those, never will." I hope she gets my meaning and squeeze her knee but even that doesn't illicit a smile from her and I ready myself for the questions.
"What was her name?"
"Leila. She was with me last year."
"And where is she now? Why did it end with her? Clearly if you let her play around in your car you took her places so she had to be a bit more than just a sub."
"No, she wasn't and that's why it ended. She wanted…more and I didn't. I have never wanted more with anyone until you, Anastasia." I see the corners of her mouth lift so I continue. "And she didn't go anywhere with me, she accessed the account in Escala at some point and added a few things. I have the Apple iCloud so any changes that are made are made everywhere so that my efiles are in synch. As to where she is now, I've no idea. Taylor keeps tabs on them to ensure that they're not violating their NDA's but I have no interest in what they're doing."
"So you have no contact once they leave?"
"None. I hardly had contact with them when they were under contract with me unless they were in the apartment." Suddenly it's hot in this car, this conversation can only go from bad to worse.
"What did you guys talk about over the weekends?"
Deep breath, push on. "Movies, books, politics, the universe. I don't know, Ana, none of it really mattered to me enough to file it away."
"But you did interact outside of the playroom?"
"Yes and no. If we weren't…in the playroom I was usually working or out of the apartment."
"How did you find them? Is there like, a rent a sub somewhere that I've never heard about?" she giggles nervously and I wipe the sweat from my palms onto my shorts. I hate that she even has to ask these questions, I hate that I can't just be normal.
"Are you sure you want to hear all of this? Haven't we had enough emotional digging for a few days?" My joke falls flat and I suck in a lungful of air and grip the steering wheel.
"Elena Lincoln. She knew my…tastes and would find women who had similar tastes and she'd match us up." She sucks in a harsh breath. I don't need to look at her to know her eyes are wide and filled with disgust. "We'd meet at a neutral location for an interview, usually Elena's office at Esclava and if it appeared that it would work out I'd have Andrea send over an NDA, Welch would pull a background check and once that all cleared we'd go over the contract and begin to meet."
Her voice cracks when she asks, "Contract?"
"Our limits, what we were willing to do."
"The hard limits you told me about?" I nod.
"So, Elena got the girls for you?" I nod again, afraid to speak about that bitch right now. Her voice drops, her arms crossing defiantly across her chest. "That's what she meant about taking money out of her pocket. You paid her." My stomach roils, I wipe my palms again. How much more of my depravity can she be exposed to before she cuts and runs? "But you haven't slept with her in eight years?"
"We never 'slept' together. I've only ever done that with you. But yes, it's been eight years."
"Is she still trying to find you subs now? Is that why she's calling you still?" Oh fuck. She's on a fact finding mission and I just walked right into it. I should hire her myself to figure this shit out.
"She doesn't understand how I could walk away from the lifestyle so easily so yes, she has told me a few times that she's found a girl for me." I rush on as her eyes widen. "But I've told her, repeatedly that I'm not interested, that I'll never want that from her again. That part of my life is over, Ana." I grab for her hand and she lets me hold it but it's limp on her knee.
"Wow, Christian. The layers of her debasement of you is like an onion. I'm speechless that someone as smart as you, as brilliant and sharp as yourself is so easily manipulated by someone as perverse as her." She scoffs and looks out her window. "Turns out I'm not speechless."
Thankfully we pull into the small beachside seafood restaurant a few minutes later but before I can get out she's opened her door and grabs her bag, slamming the door shut.
"Ana." I start but she holds her hand up and signals that she needs a minute.
"I want a glass of wine first." Ooookay.
Once we're seated and I've ordered our lunch she takes her wine and drinks it all at once. I hesitate to pour her more but she eyes me and frankly, she's a bit scary right now.
"So, the woman who molested you, who preyed upon your weakness, your innocence, your age, your insecurities…the same woman who has betrayed the friendship with your mother for over 13 years, is your pimp?" Well, when you put it that way...
"Look, Ana. We can do this all day or we can get past it and have a really great weekend." She snorts and sips but her eyes don't leave mine.
"Oh, we're doing this. Tell me how you justify having any interaction with her at all? How the fuck can you not see how fucked up this is?" I'm beginning to get pissed and without my normal outlets to deal with it my only real option is to draw on the lessons Flynn has taught me over the years. Counting back from 20 is a good place to start but what I really want is the smooth handle of a flogger in my palm. She snorts. "I mean, I get it when you're a kid, maybe even up to 21 or so but after that, you're a fucking adult, wisen up for Christ's sake." A flogger and a paddle. And a gag.
"I do see how fucked up it was, that's why I'm not doing it anymore! As to my 'interaction' with her, you don't know what the fuck you're talking about so leave it alone." I see the look before I have time to register it and I know, I know I've just fucked myself.
"Actually, Christian, I do know a bit about your interaction. I know you went to see her at Esclava on Monday and I know you had lunch with her yesterday. I'm sure there's more 'interactions' that I don't know about." Her voice breaks as tears fill her eyes and it all becomes clear to me. This is why she was so angry.
"Ana," I reach for her hand and am so thankful that she lets me take it that my own voice catches. "I'm in the process of finding a way to put her in jail without exposing myself. On Monday I cut all business ties to her, she tried to blackmail me by using my parents and I confronted her about it face to face." I scoff. "Trust me, she did not want to see me."
"Then why lunch? If you've told her no to the subs, if you've told her you're with me, if you have no business relationship anymore, why have lunch?" Do I? Do I tell her? Do I run the risk of telling her that not only did I do these things, but that there's evidence to prove it? Do I let her know that being with me means living with the risk of this shit coming out at any time? Her eyes plead with me for the truth and I realize I have no choice. Anastasia will always demand the best of me and the best of me is honesty.
"She has pictures. Of me when I was at Harvard. The photos are less than flattering."
"And she is going to release them if you don't give her something. What?" I really need her to work for me.
"Well, she wants me back but she knows that's never going to happen. I'd sooner cut my own dick off than fuck her with it." A giggle, thank god. "So now she wants money, a lot of it." Her eyes grow wider as her voice drops to a whisper.
"And you're going to give it to her?"
"No, I'm not. That's what I was talking to Welch about. I met with her on Friday to get from her the pictures and to let her know that I'm gunning for her. And I am, Ana. I want nothing more than to have her out of my life and be done, totally done with that chapter."
"What are you 'gunning' for?" Now I need the wine. She pours herself some more as I drain mine and lay it all out for her.
"Right now we're investigating her financials and a few illegal bank accounts that we've discovered of hers. We're still not sure of the significance but we're following every lead until it runs dry." Her eyes narrow, her teeth bite at that lip. She's way too smart for me.
"Is that all? I'd rather you just told me instead of me having to badger you for information. Have you not learned by now that secrets are a bad idea?" Seriously, I should hire her, I'd pay her an astronomical salary and provide hourly orgasms.
"No, that's not all." I say slowly. The food arrives just then, giving me a moments respite which I use to gather my thoughts. "I have reason to believe that she's found another young boy to…initiate." Her fork drops and her manicured fingers cover her mouth in horror.
"How? How do you know?"
"I found a few pictures a few months ago. There've been rumors in the community that someone was bringing in younger submissives and something clicked. At a dinner party she hosted I wandered into her hidden playroom and looked in her safe to see if it was her. I found three pictures, just three but it's obvious that the kid isn't near 18. I gave her a copy of it on Friday to buy myself some more time to really nail her."
"So, you know that she's abusing someone and you've not gone to the police?" She looks horrified. It's an argument Welch and I have been having for two months now. He's adamant that without a victim to press charges, that she'd get, at most, four years for possession and with her influence and cache of secrets, possibly less not to mention the fact that without a victim, we don't have proof that this kid is underage.
"Yes, but it's not a decision I've taken lightly. I've had someone watching her house 24/7 to see if any children go in, if they do, the instructions are clear that they need to notify the authorities immediately. Plus, we have no way to prove that the person in the picture is underage unless we can find him. Trust me, Ana, I've thrown as much money and personnel at this as I can, it's not an easy find." I'm tugging at my hair so hard my scalp hurts and only when I really look at her do I stop.
She looks relieved, assured that I'm not somehow being negligent. She eats in silence as she struggles to take it all in and make sense of it.
"So, basically, even after all these years, Elena Lincoln is still controlling you. Only now it's through blackmail and fear instead of sex and punishments." Holy fuck.
"I never saw it that way, but yes." The fish taco sits heavily in my stomach and I sit back, my hands limp on the table while she calls for the bill.
"Christian, you're the only one who can stop the influence she has over you. But in order to do that, in order to be free of her, really free, you have to figure out what it is you're so scared about and face it head on." She winks at me, "Just like you've been telling me. Now let's go, I want to see what we're doing now, I want you all to myself."
As we walk to the car she stops and turns to me, that V between her eyebrows clueing me into the way she's feeling inside.
"You said you got the pictures?"
"Yes, though I'm sure there are more."
"What did you do with them?"
"After I left your office I went back to GEH and shred them into thousands of tiny pieces."
"When you saw them, when you saw yourself with those women, doing those things that you like so much, did you miss it? Did it bother you that I don't do that stuff?"
"Sweet girl," I wrap her in my arms and press her head to mine. "I only saw enough to know what they were before I destroyed them, face down. That's how much I didn't want to be reminded of it. And there is nothing lacking in what you and I do, it's been the most satisfying, erotic, pleasurable time of my life. Now, can we stop talking about this so that I can get you alone and show you just how much you satisfy me?"
When I pull into the marina her hands clasp together with delight and she bounces up and down in her seat.
"I forgot you had a boat! Are we going on it? Oh my god, are sleeping on it?" Her joy is infectious and the weight of the last 24 hours sloughs off with the combination of sea, open air and Ana.
"Yup, follow me." I grab the bag of food from the back seat while she grabs our overnight bag, a satisfying thrill running through me when I see it. Our overnight bag. My boat is hard to miss, it's the biggest one here and the only one with a security guard in front of it.
"Ryan." She greets him as he tips his head to her.
"Sir. Mac is on board finalizing everything, we've completed the sweep, all is secure."
"You'll be at the hotel?"
"Yes, sir. Should you need me, I can be here in less than five minutes."
"The Grace? You named your boat after your mom?"
"Yes. I didn't know you then." I wink and she blushes before I take her hand and lead her onto the deck where Mac comes up from below.
"Mr. Grey, good to see you. You must be Ms. Steele. Liam McConnell, first mate." Ana greets him before walking past us to get on board. Once I get our travel plans from him along with a rundown of any pertinent information he disembarkes. All I want to do right now is take her below and ravish her but we're still docked and, well, turns out she is a screamer.
"Ready, baby?" She just gives me that heart stopping smile and walks to me, kissing me soundly on the mouth when I pull her between my legs as I sit in the captain's chair.
"I'm ready. Where are we going?"
"Nowhere. We're going into the middle of the Pugent Sound where nobody can hear or see us, and then I'm going to make you scream for hours." My lips brush the back of her neck as I steer, "Ms. Steele, I am going to fuck you on every surface of this boat."