“What?” Liberty wondered, cautiously.
“Can you help me get him to my bed? And then help me secure him?”
“Secure him?”
“As in tie him up,” Mercy whispered, worried he might hear. “When he wakes up and sees me here, he’ll leave.”
The look on Liberty’s face said she knew that was true. “Jesus,” she muttered, flopping back in the chair like she was tired at just the idea of the task. “You realize how heavy he’s going to be dead weight? And he may wake up!”
Mercy chewed her lower lip and looked around. “Maybe we can rig something up.”
“Like an elevator?”
“Like an elevator, yes,” Mercy said, undeterred with her sarcasm.
“You’re serious,” she said, fascinated.
“You just said he’s a threat to himself. You know he’ll try to leave when he wakes up.”
“So you’re going to tie him up,” she said, as though making sure she was understanding Mercy’s exact intentions.
“Restrain him.” Medical procedure, dummy. “Like they do in psych wards when people are a threat to themselves?” Where did you get your training, she wanted to ask.
She eyed Sade, head slowly shaking. “How are we supposed to get him up the stairs, why not take one of the spare bedroom downstairs?”
“Yes!” Mercy realized. “That would work.” Quickly standing, Mercy looked around. “We could… roll him onto a blanket and drag him?”
Liberty thought a moment before her mouth turned down with an impressed smirk. “We could manage that.”
Fifteen minutes of huffing and puffing later, they had Sade at the bedside in one of the spare rooms, both of them sweating. “Let’s take a moment,” Mercy said, sitting on the bed. Liberty did the same, not arguing. They sat in the silence catching their breath and Mercy thought about how they were going to get him onto the bed. Maybe they didn’t need to. They could secure his one arm and leg to the bed frame and she would… find other things to secure the other side. “We have any kind of chain?”
Still breathing hard, Liberty shot her thumb behind her. “There’s a supply room. I can dig around.”
“Look for something we can anchor into the floor, something he can’t pull out.”
Liberty went in search while Mercy inspected the bed. It wasn’t sound enough, he could probably break it. She found a spacious spot on the floor. They would have to just put four anchors into it. Like a bed only… not. She yanked all the covers off the bed and made a pallet on the floor where she’d roll him. She’d put the anchors first so she could secure him immediately after she rolled him there. In case he woke up… sober.
She didn’t let herself think about what he’d say or do when he did finally wake and find himself restrained. It was doctoring time for him. And she’d just deal with the angry patient syndrome later.
****
Vomit burned Sade’s throat just as he fought to turn on his side and puke. His hands and ankles were held by something and he only managed to turn his head. “Hey!” he yelled, his throat feeling swollen.
“Oh my God, I’m coming, I’m coming.”
Sade fought to focus his eyes and clear his mind. Mercy. Mercy and those words, oh my God, I’m coming I’m coming translated to one thing for him, but it was said from far, in some place where he wasn’t and it lit an insane fury in him.
Where was he? When was he? What the fuck, why was he tied?
She flew into the room and the first thing his mind saw was that she was fully clothed—blue jeaned shorts and white tank. “I got you, I got you.” She knelt next to him and lifted his head. “Just turn if you need to vomit. Damn, I was worried this might happen.”
“What… the fuck are you doing? I can’t turn, why am I tied?”
“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “But you made me.” He struggled to make sense of the sincere words. “And this shouldn’t surprise you,” she said with light flippancy. “You should know if you become a threat to yourself that I’ll do this. You should damn well know it.”
“Th…” He shook his head out of her hold. “The fuck do you mean?” He remembered shit now. She was supposed to be on the boat, with her father. Safe. What are you doing here?”
“I decided to stay behind.”
“No fucking shit,” he gasped. “Un-fucking tie me, Mercy.”
“Be right back.” She ran off and entered a door in the room and he heard water running. “And I’m sorry,” she called from inside it, “I can’t untie you, not happening.” She returned with a washcloth and wiped his mouth and dabbed it along his body.
She’d fucking stayed behind? And now she’d fucking tied him up? He yanked on the restraints and growled, looking around now. “Where the fuck am I? Where’s Liberty!”
She looked at him, her green eyes flashing with anger. “What the fuck does that matter!”
She shot up and went back to what had to be the bathroom. He looked all around. He was on the floor, on blankets. His arms were at his side, nearly immovable except for maybe four inches. His ankles the same. “How’d you… holy fuck you installed shit in the floor?” He stared at her when she came back into the room. “I need to fucking piss Mercy.”
She knelt at his feet and adjusted what looked like washcloths between the chain and his skin before standing and heading back to the bathroom. “Got you covered, there,” she said.
She returned, unscrewing a small mason jar. “Fucking Christ,” he said, “you’re serious?”
“Dead,” she sang, kneeling next to him with the jar. “Not like I’ve not seen you before.”
He needed it too fucking bad to fight at that second. He looked down and groaned as she worked his pants open. “Fucking hurry, Jesus!”
“I’m trying,” she cried, “lift your ass, it’s not tied to the floor,” she grit, fighting to yank his pants down.
He raised up and then she lowered his underwear, making his breath gush out from the pain. “Oh fuck,” he said, when she quickly put the jar over his cock. He angled his hips a little and let his bladder go with a groan at the sweet agony.
“Oh shit,” she whispered alarmed, his bladder releasing with the force of fire hose. “Are you almost done?”
“Fuck no!” he hissed, looking down at the near full jar.
“Angle your hips more, oh my God!” she squealed, “it’s going to overflow!”
“God you’re fucking getting it,” he promised, struggling to turn more. When he was finally done, he moaned in relief, eying her as she very carefully removed the full jar. “Untie me,” he muttered. “I mean it.”
“No can do. Dad thinks you need watching.”
The flippant answer infuriated him. “Fuck your fucking dad!”
She snapped her green gaze at him. “KANE, said to watch you.”
“He told you to watch me?” That was a flat out lie.
“Doesn’t matter, does it?”
“Yes, it does, I don’t want to be around you, he knows that.”
“Oh?” she regarded him with an arrogant look. “Not what he told me.”
“You’re what’s wrong with me and he knows that, there is no way in fucking hell he asked you to watch me. He asked Liberty to, if anything. Didn’t he,” he called to her slow walking form as she navigated his urine to the toilet. She didn’t answer him and he waited for her to return with his dick hanging out of his pants. She took her sweet time and he yelled, “So what the fuck are you doing here? Why aren’t you with Ralph? In your slutty white bikini?”
The toilet flushed and she stormed back in, stopping a few feet before his feet, hands on her hips. But it was that fight in her eyes that made his cock jerk awake. It was almost enough to distract her from her rant as she pointed at him. “You asked for that one, mister.”
Mister? Sade seethed at how fucking angelic she was even after he’d hurt her in hopes of getting her to leave him alone. He yanked on his chains and growled at her. And always, always it managed to bring the
worst out in him. Everything about her screamed crush me and his dick was tall and eager to take part in that sick affair.
“And I’ll tell you something else,” she said, stepping closer with that finger aimed at him. “You… are not going to treat me like this.”
His attention went to her heaving tits beneath the tight white tank. Fucking tease, that’s what she was to his body. And she’d been going far out of her way to tempt him, he knew that’s what she was doing, that was her way of fighting it. But he couldn’t give in, he couldn’t lose the ground he’d gained with her, then he’d have to start over. Do the dirty deeds again, better, harder, worse. “Treat you like what? Not jumping when you shake your ass at me twenty-four seven?”
She gasped. “Shake my ass?”
He recalled in fury how she’d tried to make him jealous with Ralph now. “Did I fucking stutter? And then when you don’t get your pussy’s desire, you shook your ass for whoever the fuck would look. Ralph,” he spelled it out for her, drawling the stupid name. “You two deserve each other.”
Her bare foot slammed in his ribs and blasted the wind from him.
“You fucking bastard,” she grit. “You ignore me for weeks? What have I done to deserve that? Love you? Take care of you? Try to fucking protect you?” she screamed, kicking him again. “Which of those things are you hurting me for?” Another slam of her foot in his side made his cock harder. Especially because she was holding back. Even in her fury, she didn’t want to hurt him. But the physical pain taunted other things in him, things he couldn’t stop once they started.
“Mercy, Mercy, Mercy,” he said with lethal intention, glaring up at her. “How about you untie me and we sort this out?”
“You can sort it right where you are, you lying bastard.”
“What the fuck do you want from me,” he roared. “Unfucking tie me!”
“I want the man I love back, that’s what I want,” she yelled. “Where is he?”
“Here I fucking am, Mercy. What you see is what you get,” he grit at her, seething with anger. “Don’t fucking like it? Huh? Well, get the fuck over it, because that’s what you get when you fall in love with a sadistic motherfucker like me,” he said with growls. “But you knew that, right? Miss Mercy?” He licked his lower lip, winded. “Miss help the bad man? Did you really fucking think you could just stare into these eyes and fix everything? Huh baby?” he mocked.
She knelt next to him and gripped his jaw in her hand and made him face her. “Listen up. You listening tough guy? You need help. And I am the crazy bitch that plans to get it for you. You feel me? Mr. Sade?” she mocked back. “Don’t be fooled or intimidated by my name, Mr. Meanie pants, because I sure as hell am not fooled or intimidated with yours. You’re getting help. End. Of. Discussion.”
Her determination set off every sadistic devil inside him and he yanked at the chains and roared in her face. “You can’t fix this, Mercy, I don’t want to be fixed, I don’t want you. Do you hear me? You and me? We don’t mix, we don’t fucking match. I love pain, getting and giving it! You can’t handle that!”
“You’re such a coward,” she muttered.
“Fuck you,” he muttered back.
“Oh I will,” she calmly said, standing. “I will most certainly fuck you, Mr. Sade. But on my terms. My way. The right way.”
He glared at her, his body in chaotic confusion with her threat and all the needs he’d denied. It was ready to take whatever it could get. “Fine baby, take it. Take it, give your pretty pussy what it needs. Right here, right now.”
“You want it?”
He tried to read what that quirked brow meant. He didn’t really care, either way. “I so fucking do.”
“Well if you want it, you’ll have to work for it.”
“I should’ve known,” he muttered. “I guess we’re back to reading romance books? Soul meshing?”
As pissed as he was, his heart broke in his fucking chest at the thought of it and how it was the road to a heaven that ended in a dead end. And she would force him down it and he would go. He would fucking have to go, just so he could show her. See Mercy? See the brick fucking wall, here? See those words there, Angel? They say damned beyond this point. You cannot pass. You’re not allowed in. You’ve reached the bottom, the end, the place where anything remotely normal stops and darkness begins.
“You’ll get no details until you agree to let me help you.”
He stared at her, his head shaking a little. “Back to square fucking one. Unbelievable,” he muttered. She was blind. She was so fucking stubborn. She was the kind of person who had to get burned, had to feel it down to their fucking soul before they understood.
“Not square one at all,” she said, oh so confidently. “I’ve come a long way baby. Paid close attention. Took notes. And what you need is something no therapist could ever give you. But I can.”
His jaw slid slowly left as he studied her, back to battling his crazy urges for her. Battling those demons now plotting how to have what he fought to deny. How to hurt her. “Keep talking, baby.”
She seemed taken aback by his cooperation but recovered almost immediately. Sade groaned when she reached for his groin and tugged his underwear back on. “You’ll need to sign a contract,” she said firmly, jerking at his pants next. “Lift your ass, you’re not an invalid. And you’ll agree that you’ll allow me to perform sessions with you every night. For four hours.”
Holy fuck. She was like Mercy only… more so. Mercy high octane. The notion that he was dealing with a new-ish personality, brought on a burning hot eagerness, followed by dread. He finally busted out in low chuckles. “You’re dead serious.”
She zipped his pants, not giving him a glance. “You have no idea.”
God, the threat in that tone. So fucking irresistible. “And what do I get if I cooperate?” he asked, the monster in him calm now that it knew it would get a chance. That’s all it ever needed or wanted. One tiny chance.
She suddenly soul meshed with him and his heart hammered with what burned in those gorgeous green eyes. Sheer strength. Sheer power. “You get fucking well, you get help. If you want more, I can give little gold stars too.”
Fucking. Priceless. “And what if you fail?”
She shrugged her shoulders. “Then we can say we tried.”
“Ohhhh, so you’re asking me to sign my body over to you for you to experiment on and I’m just supposed to go with that? Did it occur to that lovely mind of yours that I don’t want your fucking therapy?” Judging by the look on her face, it had definitely occurred that he might not want it, and she didn’t care one bit. “If I’m going all in, I want something in return.”
She stared at him and crossed her arms, the look on her face stirring some of his nastiest demons until he yanked on his restraints, hungry to crush her to smithereens and make her a slave to his every devious desire. “Fine, what? What do you want?”
His body answered first and his tongue slid out and licked hungrily over his lips as he thought about his answer. This was it. The turn of the table he’d been looking for. She’d gain his cooperation in her efforts and he’d gain hers in his. “If you fail… we’re done.”
She stared at him and his heart hammered fiercely with too many fears to name. “Done? You’ll need to be more specific.”
Pain sledge-hammered him at seeing the first peek of the devastation he was about to deliver to her. Seeing her unable to hide it confirmed what he knew. But the choice was break her heart or break her spirit, and he would not leave this world with that sin on his hands. Not that. She could recover from the first, but not from the second. She could not recover from having her spirit broken by somebody she loved. He would fucking know. “Done, me and you. Break up, divorce, whatever you want to call it. No more me and you doing whatever the fuck it is you call what we do together.”
She continued to stare at him, an open book of raw emotion that stole his breath. He let out a bored sigh and stared at the ceiling to get away from the p
ower in that gaze. “How long?”
“How long what?”
“How long do I have? To try?”
He shrugged, fighting not to feel what her tone did to him. The desperation to fix him. The desperation to have him normal. “You tell me.”
She stared absently between them, her pretty brows drawn hard in careful thought.
“Yes, think carefully. Because I mean it. You fail, we’re done.” His entire chest felt crushed under the weight of knowing she would fail. Because he’d make sure of it. He’d make so fucking sure that she’d quit after two days. Three tops. Clean cut. Precision. Him out of her life and his sweet Mercy safe from all the monsters that had eaten his soul and left nothing but a shell of bones.
She swallowed and finally turned that innocent gaze to him. But there was something in it that intimidated even the cruelest of his demons. He wasn’t sure what it was, but he felt the quake inside. “Five days,” she whispered.
He barked out a laugh, mostly to hide his fury at the ridiculous amount of time and the impossibility of what she was attempting. It was like he couldn’t help wanting her to win while knowing she couldn’t. At finding her dead serious and those green eyes on fire with more of what he’d just seen a second before, he realized what that shit was in her stare. A whole lot of fucking fight. Again the weight in his chest became nearly unbearable until he growled and yanked on the chains, bearing his teeth at her. She’d fucking fight and make this hard. Make him crush her quick. Without mercy.
“You laugh…” She set her jaw and stood tall, looking down at him for several seconds, her chest heaving. “But you won’t for long.”
Sade’s heart thundered as she turned and walked out in a boldness that made him roar and yank at the chains. The door shut hard, and the sound was a final nail in her coffin, his coffin, their coffin, slamming home. He gasped and strained on the agony, clenching his eyes tight until his body trembled with it. He wouldn’t laugh. God, no, he wouldn’t, not even for a fucking second, Angel.