Page 43 of Gideon
“Please,” I asked, my voice feeling choked with emotion. My eyes stayed dry, but as the tension melted away from me, the truth of what I needed to do settled in, sure and heavy.
I needed to tell him. For the first time in my life, I wanted to believe in something. I just had to make sure I stayed protected through it all. As we circled around yet again, I knew just how to ensure my safety as I took what was possibly the biggest risk of my life.
The sun had faded into the horizon, leaving the sky just this side of dark as we neared the dock once more. It was time.
“Gideon?” I asked as he helped me back onto the dock with a steady hand.
“Yeah?” he asked, grunting slightly as he jumped onto the dock, rope in hand, and secured it with assured ease. I waited until he finished and had turned to face me before I spoke. I needed that time to steady myself, just as he had secured the boat.
I took one last deep breath and drew up every last bit of courage I could muster.
“I’m ready to talk.” I didn’t want to look at his face. Didn’t see whatever emotion he had. I needed to keep my focus. So I turned away from him, arms wrapped tightly around my upper body, shielding myself from the wind as it picked up. The air smelled like rain.
A storm was coming, and I wasn’t sure if it was the heavy clouds rolling in or the conversation that was about to happen inside the house that was being foretold.
I opened the door, hearing the scuffing sound of his shoes not far behind me as I kicked off my shoes and sat on the couch, my arms still held tightly around me. Whether from the growing cold in the air or as an added sense of security, I wasn’t sure. Perhaps both.
I looked down at my lap as I heard his footsteps in front of me. He sat in the chair opposite, nearly mirroring my stance as I caught him just barely in my gaze. I thought he would say something, start the conversation somehow. But how could he? He had no idea what I wanted to talk about. He had no idea that I was about to send his entire world crashing into a burning blaze of destruction. It was a heavy burden, but one I needed to be honest about. And I was ready.
“Gideon, you asked for my honesty. You stated it was necessary in kink, in the world you know,” I began, feeling my heart thunder in my chest. Almost everything inside of me was telling me to keep quiet, to hold this truth to myself, to keep myself safe from harm. But something else, small but somehow bigger than it all, told me to take this chance he had given me. A chance to be free from the heavy burden I had been carrying around alone for far too long.
“That’s right,” he agreed. His tone gave me only the feeling of calm acceptance, making what I had to tell him both difficult and easy.
“I want to be honest with you. Completely honest, but I need you to understand just how difficult this is for me,” I urged him to understand.
“Genuine honesty is rarely easy, and I don’t take that lightly, Naomi. I’m here to listen and I’m not going anywhere,” he reassured me. I looked up at him, his open and easy acceptance of my moment making my heart clench. How was I supposed to tear his world apart when he looked at me with such open trust?
“Thank you for that, but I have a feeling this might be even harder for you than it is for me,” I muttered, wringing my hands together. He looked at me expectantly, ready to hear me when I was ready to begin.
Deep breath, Naomi.It was now or never.
“There is a reason that I freaked out like I did after we had our little scene last night,” I began with a giant huffed exhale. He simply nodded, taking in my words. Okay, this was it. “Being tied by ropes was okay at first, but once I came back down from the scene, as you put it, I remembered why such a thing is so difficult for me. I remembered why I had promised myself to never ever again allow myself to be in a situation like it.” I paused, watching as something crossed his face. Some look of guilt or dread or something else that I couldn’t quite put my finger on. Whatever it was, it was not good. Still, I continued.
“Being tied up is a… I don’t know… a thing for me,” I searched for the right words to explain.
“A trigger,” he murmured, his tone going deeper, darker and his brows furrowing just slightly.
“A trigger?” I questioned, not understanding the terminology he used.
“It triggered a memory or something unpleasant for you,” he explained, his tone almost monotone and emotionless.
“Yes, that’s it exactly. I don’t know how else to tell you this other than to just rip the bandaid off, as it were,” I sighed heavily.
“I’m ready,” he stated, seeming to bolster himself for whatever I was about to say, just as much as I was.
“As I know you know, I was adopted when I was younger,” I began. Before I could utter another word, I saw his hands grasp his thighs, nearly white-knuckled. “The thing is, I wasn’t actually adopted.”
I waited for some kind of reaction, but none came.
“When I was eight years old, I was taken from my family — my actual family. I was kidnapped by the Elders of Zion and brought here. They kidnapped me and gave me to a family here, all under the false guise of adoption.” Nothing like ripping that bandaid off.
My eyes scanned over his features, waiting for some reaction. Anger. Denial. Sadness. Something. But there was nothing. He was as stone still as a statue.
“Gideon?” I pressed, unnerved by his lack of reaction.
“I’m here. I’m listening.” He barely got the words out through clenched teeth. His arms crossed over his chest, his biceps bulging as though he had tensed into a tense knot of… well, whatever he was feeling.
“I’m not sure what to say now. That was kind of the big reveal,” I muttered, not knowing what to do with myself. I didn’t want to go into more detail until I knew what he was feeling.
