The morning after he left my room I woke with the taste of his words still in my mouth.
*The man who claimed you in the dark and has no intention of giving you back.*
I sat on the edge of the bed for a long time, elbows on my knees, staring at the thin c***k in the plaster opposite me. The bruises had almost disappeared. The deeper marks—the ones no one else could see—had only grown heavier. I showered until the water ran cold, dressed in layers that hid everything, and walked to the rink through snow that fell in thick, silent sheets.
Practice passed in a blur of white ice and controlled violence. I skated hard enough that my lungs burned and my vision tunneled. Damian’s voice cut through the noise only when it needed to. He never once looked at me longer than necessary. The careful di
