Page 26 of My Skin Begs You Please

“I do. Or I did, I guess.” I bit into my lower lip, trying to explain. “Imagine, Barry, fucking someone who makes you come so hard you see stars and your knees buckle, and you feel like your heart’s going to explode with pleasure. But then you hate yourself for how amazing it is. You tell yourself you’ll never do it again. But you can’t stop thinking about it, abouthim, and so you hate-fuck him, and you comeso damn hardagain. Every time it’s better. Just imagine that.”

Barry wiped a hand over his face. “Fucking hell.”

“Then imagine the guy who makes all that happen for you just goes away.” I tutted softly. “He’ll be looking for me.”

“Minty…”

Another sigh ripped free. “Iknow. I promised Luke. I signed a contract.”

Still, one last brutal fuck would beso good. It’d clear out all the demons, just the way it had when I’d gone to Kyle after going to my mom’s and seeing the bloodstain…

Remembering the first time on the sofa…

Remembering the last time in my room…

Kyle had shaken all that foul stuff free from my mind. He’d been so violent. He choked me out over and over, and I let him… I wanted it. I needed it. But what if I’d died?

And that was the crux of the whole thing, wasn’t it?

Barry was wrong that any part of me was still the Minty who’d dreamed he might be worthy of romance and sweetness, but I didn’t want todiejust yet. I wanted to graduate. I wanted to see the spring flowers. I wanted to go to the ocean one last time. If Kyle killed me, I couldn’t do any of that.

“Whatever you’re thinking, just stop.”

I met Barry’s gaze and reminded him, “I signed a contract.”

“Good.” Barry’s one word of praise hit me like an arrow, and I remembered Luke had used it too. But he’d said it in that sensual voice of his that rubbed at me like sandpaper—good and rough, awful and sweet.

“I just hope Luke fucks me hard and mean enough that Ican’tmake him pancakes the next morning,” I said with a sigh. “Or this isn’t going to work out at all.”

I heard the heaviness of my words. In another place and time, I’d have said the same thing, but with a bubbling lightness that made everyone laugh. Where was my easy mirth, my joy, my sparkle? With that HIV test result, crumpled up in the trash and sent to the dump.

Trash. Like me.

“Oh, Luke will work you over,” Barry promised. “And if he doesn’t, I’ll beat you up and fuck you myself.”

“Ew. Gross.” I shrank away from him. “No. You’re like a dad to me.”

“I’m thirty-two.”

“Yeah? You seem older.”

“Fuck you, kid.”

“Sorry, but no can do. Not interested in getting fucked by my dad.Again.”

Barry’s eyes darkened at my joke, and he didn’t laugh. I did, though. A high peal that cut through the air, swallowing another chirrup from the bird above. The sharpness of it felt good ripping from my still-sore throat.

Barry didn’t budge.

“C’mon,” I insisted. “That was a good one.”

He shook his head.

I scoffed. “If I can’t joke about being raped by my dad, then whatcanI joke about?”

Barry’s eyes teared up, and he grabbed me in another hug. I pushed at him, struggling to get free, but eventually I gave up, going limp in his big arms.

“It’ll never be funny,” Barry growled in my ear. “Not even a little. I’ll kill him if I ever meet him. I swear to God.”

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