She bolted upright and fell to her knees in front of him, cutting him off.

“Don’t you dare fucking say that to me!” she shook him by his shoulders violently. “You don’t get to end this game! I say when this game is over! Do you hear me? I have a say in the rules, too, remember?” she yelled in his face.

Dazed, Victor’s eyes widened and a soft gasp left his parted mouth. “But I hurt you. I don’t want to do that again,” he stated even softer than before, his grief-stricken eyes roaming over her face.

Her panic dissipated and her body began to shiver at his look of genuine sincerity. “Then don’t.” Rising to her feet, she stood looking down at him intensely as he gazed back up at her, awaiting her instructions. “Say you’re sorry,” she stated firmly.

He blinked several times as if processing her statement. “I am sorry…”

“Tell me it won’t happen again,” she ordered.

With a slow shake of his head he clenched his fists and licked his lips. “I can’t…”

“Bullshit!” she barked at him when his eyes drifted to his hands again. Startled, his eyes darted back to hers. “You’re the one in charge here, Victor. You make the fucking rules. You. Not Mr. Black. Now tell me.”

Pensive silence.

Her body swayed. If he wouldn’t tell her what she needed to hear she couldn’t continue on… Perhaps he just needed some incentive. She hoped it worked because if he didn’t tell her that he would never lay another hand on her in anger, the game really was over.

“Unless you want me to leave, tell me, Victor,” she reiterated his name. “Or is that what you really want; for me to walk out that door forever and never look back?”

“No,” he croaked out, a look of sheer panic on his face.

Slowly his resolve began to resurface and his childlike look changed to that of the fierce man she knew. Pushing himself off the floor, he stood in front of her. His warm, gentle fingers swept her mussed hair away from her eyes and glided down the cheek he had savagely assaulted. When he spoke again, it was with certainty. “It won’t happen again, Elsa.”

Her brows knit together and her lips parted, but the words stuck in her throat. She needed more from him than just those words…

Without prompting, he gave her what she needed as he pulled her against his chest. “I promise.”

*

She led Victor into the kitchen to make him something to eat. It was the only thing she could think to do.

Victor slumped into a chair. “You’re beautiful,” his statement came out whispered several minutes later.

She paused just as she sliced into a bell pepper, stunned by the sheer emotion and sincerity of his declaration. “I never should’ve pointed Nathan in your direction.”

Elsa froze but was unable to meet his gaze. It was one of the rare times he had spoken Nathan’s name, and the hurt masked by bitterness was easily detectable.

“I never should have…” he gulped loudly. “He’s a lucky man,” a disgusted sigh, “He doesn’t deserve you.”

Elsa set the paring knife down, unsure of how to respond. Slowly, her eyes found his. She wanted to run to him and hold him, and make whatever pain he was feeling, go away. He wasn’t himself, but she liked this man. The one staring at her, waiting for either approval or denial. The real Victor. But Mr. Black was there, too; hiding within the depths of his amazingly beautiful eyes, waiting for the moment he could tear her heart to shreds and brutalize her in some twisted form or another. She licked her lips and picked the knife back up to finish preparing dinner for him, leaving his statement to linger in the air.

Lucky? Hell no. Nathan wasn’t lucky. No one in this make-believe triangle was anything but fucked-over. They all simply existed in a state of self loathing, denial or oblivion. For her, she weaved in and out of all three at any given moment. Right now, she felt nothing but self-loathing for having made Victor confess his worst memory. And for what? What was making him recall all of those horrible details accomplishing? Not a damned thing except to satisfy her own sick curiosity about him and exact revenge on him for having rejected her love and then abandoned her to seek out other chapters.

She willed herself not to look at him, but she couldn’t resist and her eyes once again fixed on him. His gaze had drifted to something that didn’t exist in the physical realm, his expression sullen and withdrawn. What he had confessed was too much for him to bear.

“I didn’t have anything to do with that attack,” he gulped noisily.

She left what she was doing and went to him, seating herself in his lap and hugging him close, not caring if Mr. Black lashed out.

“I know... I know,” she reassured him.

After each harsh thing he had put her through, he had always taken care of her, physically and emotionally, drawing her close and warming her with his body. Now it was her turn to care for him in the aftermath of his admission. She rocked him and barely fought the urge to weep at his feet for having made him speak of the dreadful atrocities of his past.

“My sweet, brave Victor,” she whispered in his ear. “Life is cruel… too cruel sometimes. There’s so much darkness, but it gets better… brighter…” she lied to him and herself.

Things had been dark since that dreadful last day with him. That day, her light had nearly been extinguished. Nearly, but not completely, though it might as well have been snuffed out. Hell, not even Nate could rekindle it. Since that day, her life had become flat - the sex, her emotions, and even the job she once loved. All of her senses which had previously been razor sharp now bore the dullness of a rusty butter knife. No more passion; no more heat. Everything luke. Fucking. Warm.

Victor’s rejection and Mr. Black’s brutalization had condemned her to an emotional death sentence, though she would never give either of them the satisfaction of knowing that. Gazing down at the man in her arms, she realized they both wore their masks of contentment well. To the outside world, they both appeared normal, even well-adjusted. All of it – a lie they both told to the people around them and themselves.

And here she sat, holding onto him trying to ease his pain as she struggled with her own. She hated herself for still feeling compassion and empathy for him after all the pain he caused her and was still causing. But, she couldn’t deny Victor what he so desperately needed. It would be unbearably cruel to do so and she would only end up hating herself if she did. She’d be lying to herself, too, if she didn’t admit that while sitting there, holding him, she felt emotionally alive again and so much warmer than tepid.

“No it doesn’t. The darkness just goes on and on…” he whispered back, his arms hanging by his side as he sat motionless in her embrace. “If only I could experience your light just once,” he choked out.

Victor’s smothered words tore at her resolve. Holding his face in her small hands, she gently pulled away to look into his dejected eyes and lied again. “I have enough for the both of us…” God, she hoped…prayed… she had enough for the both of them.

“Even after everything I’ve done to you?” his brows pinched together.

“I don’t want to think about that,” she swallowed hard, finally speaking truthfully.

“And I can’t stop thinking about it. It’s there. Between us. Like a wall too high to climb. It always will be.”

She shook her head in denial though she knew he was right. In the blink of an eye, he was there in Victor’s eyes, Mr. Black, clawing his way back through his clouded and weakened emotional state. “No, Victor, don’t give in. You’re so much stronger than Mr. Black,” her tears began to fall unbidden.

“I’m not,” he traced the line of her tears, “I wish I was…” and kissed them away before he blinked long and hard.