Page 245 of His To Erase

“Get dressed,” he murmurs, pressing a kiss to my forehead like a fucking brand. “We’re leaving in an hour.”

I straighten my spine and whatever warmth was left in me dies right there on the floor, bleeding out beside my pride as I go still.

“Leaving?”

He hums—casually like we’re playing house and I didn’t just hit the floor. “I’ve packed for you. You don’t need any more of that black shit you wear.”

I blink. “You packed… my things.”

“Of course I did.”

He smiles like this is a honeymoon and not a hostage situation. “I take care of what’s mine.”

My stomach turns, but I keep my face still. That’s the game now. Just the dead calm that lives in the space between survival and something worse.

His fingers drag one last path down my cheek, slow and possessive, like he’s branding me with touch. Then he steps back, grabbing his keys from his pocket.

“Oh, and Doll?”

I lift my chin, because even now—even cornered, and bloodied—I will never be small again.

He grins. That same terrifying, perfect politician grin. The one he wore when I thought he was just charming. Not a monster wrapped in silk and way too much cologne.

“Don’t try to leave,” he says, keeping his voice light. “You wouldn’t want to ruin the progress we’ve made, now would you.”

The door clicks shut behind him, and I hear the lock slide into place and I’m left standing in the wreckage of his psychotic episode, wondering how the hell I’m going to survive the next hour.

I wait until his footsteps fade, then I move straight to the corner. To the duffle bag he so generously “packed” for me.

The zipper groans, and when I pull it open—I wish I could say I was shocked. But instead, I just stand there, staring at a pile ofdelicate, barely-there lace that looks like it belongs in a bougie bachelor party gift basket, not my emergency escape plan.

Oh good. Lingerie. Nothing says you're being held hostage by a narcissist with a god complex like six thousand dollars of see-through silk.

I want to cry.

Instead, I pull out the top piece—a blood-red slip that screams power and fuck-you elegance. I’d wear this for Steven, easy. But for Frank? The thought makes me want to claw my own skin off and be done with it.

“Ah yes,” I mutter. “The ‘I may have bruises, but at least my nipples are festive’ collection.”

I dig deeper.Shocking, more lace.There’s some strappy, bondage-adjacent thing I couldn’t figure out how to wear sober—let alone while being emotionally waterboarded. I don’t see any jeans, or shirts. There’s no real clothes, and certainly nothing I actually own.

Just panties that could double as dental floss and a robe. He didn’t grab my clothes, he replaced them. This is a fucking fantasy, and it’s one I willnotbe participating in. I slam the bag shut and the zipper catches my finger and I hiss, pressing it to my lips.

Perfect. Love that. What’s next—a papercut on a Bible? Razor burn in the shape of his initials? Maybe a corset that tightens every time I disobey.Okay, maybe I'm taking it a little too far.

I head for the bathroom desperate for space, for something that isn’t him, but I stop cold in the doorway.

My reflection stares back—red cheek, makeup smudged like regret, lip split and eyes hollow. But none of that registers as I inch closer to get a better look.As if that would help.

Every strand on my head is darker than they’ve ever been.

No fucking way.

I lift a shaking hand to my head, threading my fingers through the pieces like maybe I’m wrong. Maybe this is just the lighting blurring my vision and my white side isn’t just erased like it was never there.

He dyed my hair.

He touched me.