I want freedom. I want to feel safe. Those two things are opposite desires, and they tear me apart. He turns me on. He conditions me for this. But it’s not either of those things that keep me here. It’s hope, that one day he’ll somehow do both of those things for me—he’ll set me free and catch me when I fall.

“Except you.” A challenge and a plea at once.

He leans back, his expression dark. For just a second I see desire. I see longing. He wants more than what we have in this basement, this dungeon—more than the scraps he gives himself. Then the emotion is wiped away as if it was never there. His face is impassive. He’s a statue, as cold and unyielding as the concrete walls around us.

His head tilts toward the desk. “Bend over.”

My heart beats faster. I don’t want to bend over the desk. I want to be over his lap, to feel him getting hard underneath me. I want to be held by him, touched by him, surrounded by him.

“Candace,” he says, using my real name—and it works. It snaps me right into place, that headspace where all I can do is obey.

The desk is cool against my front, pressing against my breasts, the closest he comes to a caress. I push down my ruffled panties until they’re around my thighs, trapping me in place. Exposing me to his gaze and to his rage.

Then he’s standing behind me. “Did you drink last night?” he asks conversationally.

I remember staring at the bottle, half-full of amber liquid. I remember the dryness of my mouth, the knot in my throat. I didn’t want it. But I wanted this. “Yes,” I whisper.

Only a sip. A sip is all it takes.

His hand comes at me swiftly, a whoosh of air one second before impact. My whole body jerks. Pain explodes in my butt and spreads over my skin like wildfire.

“Well?” he asks, one hand fisting in my hair. He lifts, and I stare into the dark, empty hole that is my life. This basement, this man. This need we both share, under cover of night.

My voice is wobbly. My whole body is wobbly. “Thank you, sir.”

His fist gives me a little shake before he lets me go. I rest my cheek on the desk.

Another blow, this one even harder. There are no warmups, no mercy. Only punishment.

The slightest sound escapes me, a moan, a whimper. “Thank you, sir.”

He leans over me, careful not to touch. Only the faintest ghost of a feeling, his suit fabric against my naked skin. “Did you shoot up?” he asks.

“No,” I tell him, feeling the tears rise in my throat. I couldn’t bring myself to do it, didn’t want the rush. Didn’t want the pain.

That gives him pause. I feel his hesitation hover around us. “Did you smoke?”

“No.”

He stands, cool air replacing his body heat. “Were you a good girl, Candace?”

I can’t hold the sob in. It comes out of me, wrenching my body, relief and regret in one pained sound. “No, sir. No. I wasn’t. I—I touched myself.”

His satisfaction wraps around me like velvet, dark and seductive. Of course he wants more though. Whatever I give him, he always wants more. “Where did you touch yourself?”

I shudder. “No, don’t…don’t make me tell you.”

His hand rests on the curve of my ass, his thumb brushing over my heated flesh, back and forth. He hurts me and he soothes me, but never enough. Back and forth. Never enough pain or pleasure. He always leaves me needing more.

Back and forth. “No, little one. You’re going to show me.”

There are vines that wrap around me, their thorns pressing in, making me bleed. Being with Ivan doesn’t free me from the vines. He doesn’t make the pain go away. He makes me want more.

I shove my hand down, graceless, unpracticed, under my body and between my legs. I don’t slide my hand under my panties or finger my clit, not the way I did last night. I just cup myself, protective, afraid.

“What did you do next?” His voice is low, the grate of stone on stone. “Daddy needs to see.”

My eyes squeeze tight, and I shake my head. I can’t. I sin again and again, over and over. And every time, in the seconds before, with my very last breath, I’m fighting it. Fighting myself. Fighting him.

“Show me,” he coaxes, his voice dark and hypnotic. I would follow that voice anywhere. Even into hell.

I press one finger inside my pussy, where I’m already wet, where I’m burning up with lust and shame. I know my cheeks are pink even though my eyes are closed. They’ll match my bubblegum lipstick.

“That’s right,” he says with a sigh. “Can you find your little clit? I’m sure it’s nice and hard.”

My fingers slide through my wetness and settle on my clit. It’s a hard nub, throbbing at the faint friction. “It is. Please.”

“Good little girls aren’t supposed to touch themselves, are they?”

I’m not a little girl. The words are on the tip of my tongue, but I don’t say them. I can’t. I can’t add a lie to my sin. Because I am a little girl. I’m Ivan’s little girl, for as long as he’ll have me. Even if this is all I’ll ever be to him.

“I’m not good,” I say instead.

“I know. And I’m going to punish you. You’ll touch your clit while I spank you, and then you’ll learn what happens to bad girls.”

I don’t hear the next blow coming. It takes me by surprise, and I jerk, pressing my clit into my hand. Pleasure arcs through me, white-hot from my breasts against the desk to my toes curled on the floor. I moan and rock my hips, seeking more of the pleasure to take away the pain. The next blow comes too fast, and then he’s hitting me in earnest, beating me—it’s too much. My fingers on my clit only make me sensitized, only make me more aware of every ounce of pain.

I can almost feel the calluses on his palm, the signs that he once fought in the streets before he came to rule them. I imagine I can feel the lines of his fingerprints, uniquely him, branding me for his own. It’s at once a sharp blade and a wide blast, cutting me to pieces and spreading me apart.

He hits me harder and faster, until I can feel each blow reverberate inside me. The pain isn’t outside me anymore; it’s inside, digging deep. I can’t reach this any other way. Not with alcohol, not with dancing. And sure as hell not with sex. Only this—being hit over and over again by a man who cares enough to do it. He doesn’t love me, not the way a man does a woman. He takes care of me. He disciplines me.

He draws a circle around me and then hurts me when I step outside it.

It’s the reason I’ve stepped outside the line so damn much. This.

“I can’t,” I whisper, voice broken. I’m sobbing now. This is what he’s reduced me to. A crying little girl, a mess. I’m clinging to the desk. I wish I was over his lap.

I’d be able to feel his erection pressing into my belly. I’d be able to rub against it.

“Can’t what?” he asks, only faintly curious. He isn’t even breathing hard.

“Can’t do it anymore,” I manage between sobs.

I think he knows what’s coming. That’s why he rains down blows on my already aching ass. Much more and I’ll have bruises tomorrow. I won’t be able to go onstage, but then maybe that’s the point. He’s never wanted me to dance.

He hits me until I’m crying even harder, until I’m begging him to stop. No, please, it’s too much, it’s too hard, please stop, I’ll be good, I’ll be good, I’ll be good.

Then he does stop. “What?”

“I’ll be good,” I say again, the words too garbled to understand. He understands anyway.

When he speaks, his voice is deeper, breath coming faster. He could beat me all day, but this is what he wants. This gentleness, this surrender. He has to break me down to get it.

God, he’d be so hard right now.

“I’ll be good, Daddy. I’m so sorry. I’ll be your good girl now.” The words keep pouring out of me, promises and pleas. And prayers.

That’s what he is to me, a new Leader Allen. My personal god.

Ivan replaced everything that came before. I could leave Harmony Hills, but I couldn’t change who I was. I still needed to worship. I still need to obey.