32

Sienna didn't hang out at the skatepark. She'd never even been there before, being aware it wasn't her scene or her territory. The freaks, geeks, skaters, and stoners owned this space, and even if she had any interest in skating, her kind wasn't welcome.

Today, she arrived alone, searching for Damien. With her new look, she didn't stick out like a sore thumb. Nobody paid her any attention as she ambled about, trying to pick Damien from the crowd of Damien look-alikes.

Eventually, she spotted him skating up the side of the half-pipe. After he spotted her, he kicked the board to his mate who took over without pause as Damien ran over to her.

"Come here," he said, leading her to the bench in the corner of the park. It sat beneath a tree—the leafy branches providing shade from the harsh glow of the sun.

"Are you sure you want to know this?" he asked. "Because I feel like it's wrong of me to tell you. I'm honestly in two minds about this."

"Please, Damien, I have a right to know," she pressured him.

He looked down for a minute, eyes glazed over as if deep in thought.

As Sienna stared at him, she noticed his belt, crisscrossed with chains and a pair of handcuffs that looked real. The longer she looked, the more she liked what she saw. She imagined how it would feel if he used them on her.

'Great. I'm getting turned on by Damien's fashion choices,' she thought, wondering what on Earth was wrong with her lately.

"You remember when you force-fed me that burger?" he asked.

Scarlett felt her stomach turn. Would he refuse to tell her because he was still mad?

"I'm sorry—" she started to say.

"No, I forgave you, I'm just starting the story," Damien said. "As you might know, my Mum is a prosecutor. I told her I wanted to sue you at the time. I was pretty fucking angry."

"I'm really really sorry, Damien," Scarlett told him again, pressing her palms together in a prayer for forgiveness., Tear formed behind her eyes, making them sting. Every time he mentioned it, she felt sick with disappointment in herself. How she could ever have found such an act funny was beyond her.

"When I told Mum your name, she turned pale because it was a name she recognised. She begged me to forgive and forget, but I was beyond livid at the time. In the end she only convinced me to drop it by telling me about your past. Your case was one of the first high profile cases she worked on. She told me some of the specifics because I pushed her and it's bad," Damien said. "And I promised never to tell."

"Oh," Sienna mumbled, afraid of what he was going to say next, even though she knew deep down. She occasionally had flash-backs—little snippets of memories that made little sense and filled her with sick dread.

"Did they lock me in cupboards," Sienna asked. She didn't like crying in front of people but couldn't control the flow of tears that streamed down her cheeks.

"Yes," Damien nodded. "They locked you up and they hurt you. That's all I'm going to tell you. Okay?"

Sienna nodded as she thought back to the movie that had horrified her the other day.

'Because I'm the little girl,' she thought, letting out a loud sob that shocked her.

She jammed her fist into her lips, trying to hold back the sobs, but it was like trying to stop a hurricane with a windbreaker.

Damien pulled her head into his chest, letting her cry on him. The more she cried, the sadder she became. She wasn’t even sad about her past. It was everything. Everything and nothing.

'Why doesn't anybody want me?' she thought. 'My own parents hated me, my Dad barely sees me once a month, Scarlett ditched me, Tom didn't want me and now Adrian only wants me when his dick is hard.'

She cried so hard that when the tears finally ran out, Damien's T-shirt was wet through. As she sat up, he wiped her cheeks with his fingerless glove encased hand.

He pulled off one of his gloves and passed it to her.

"You need accessories," he said.

Sienna slipped the slightly wet red and black striped glove and held it up to show him, smiling through her tears.

"I like your belt," she blurted, tugging gently on one of the chains.

"Yeah?" He smiled.

"Do you erm..." Sienna asked, gently prying about the handcuffs when her nosiness got the better of her. "Use these on girls."

Damien laughed as if she'd asked something ridiculous.

"Yeah," he said and raised his eyebrows. "I mean, it goes both ways. I'd never do something to a girl that I wasn't willing to have done to me. BDSM is about trust and should be an equal partnership, even if you are dominating the other person."

Sienna looked away guiltily. Adrian was dominating her, but it wasn't an equal partnership. She knew that much.

"I was angry with Adrian for what he did the other day," Damien added, as though reading her thoughts. "I'm not sure I want to hang around with a guy who pulls that crap."

"Don't fall out with him because of me," Sienna pleaded. She dreaded to think how Adrian would react if he did.

"You don't get it, do you?" Damien tutted. "It wouldn't be because of YOU. It would be because of HIM."

Sienna nodded. She understood what he was saying but knew she would be blamed and probably punished for it regardless of semantics.

"I get what you're saying, just... please don't fall out with him over this?" Sienna pressed her palms together, squeezing them tight as she stared into his eyes. "Please, Damien?"