Chapter Thirty-Seven

I barely remembered how I got to the hotel room - it had all been a blur. I was still in Milpitas, but I had disabled the tracking app she had installed on my phone. That hurt so much to think about. It hurt so incredibly much knowing that it had all been a lie. In my daze I was too gone to realize how my habit of cuddling my purse had saved me - Forrest had still been on me when I went to collect the box, I still had my ID and my credit card. I could pay for a hotel room, I could pull myself out of the situation long enough to think.

If I could just remember how to think through the haze of raw pain.

It hurt.

I was sitting on the floor of the hotel room, just inside the door. The smell of strong cleaning agents and air fresheners lingered, so far from the scents of vanilla and candles that I was used to. That Vanessa had preferred. How deep was I in? I had thrown myself at her, I had fallen for her.

I loved her.

It felt like I was gushing from a gut wound, like Lauren had stabbed me in the stomach and I was slowly but inexorably bleeding out from a gash I could feel but couldn't see. I held my hands to my stomach as tears streamed down my face. I wracked my brain, trying to sift through the feelings of betrayal and the feelings of the deep love that I had for Vanessa.

After long minutes, I called the only person I thought might understand.

"Hello?" A flood of relief went through my body when Jess answered the phone - it was her number, but Seth's command over her was so complete, I could see him answering her phone under normal circumstances. They seemed happy but everything was jumbled and strange to me now.

"Jess," I sniffled, wiping my face. "Thank goodness. Jess, I don't know what to do."

"Dani?" she asked, surprised. I was deeply glad that we had traded phone numbers the last time we had gotten together, that night in her room. "What's wrong? What happened?"

"It was all a lie, Jess," I sobbed. "It was all a lie!"

"What was a lie?" she asked, her voice concerned. "What's going on?"

"Everything! Our meeting at the coffee house, our first date, the gifts she bought me - it was all a lie!" The pain spilled out of me, the whirl of thoughts and insecurities. It hurt to breathe.

"How was it a lie? I don't understand."

"She spied on me, Jess! She hacked into my online accounts and read all of my private information. She studied me like a bug under glass, she installed a tracking program on my phone and was watching my every movement!"

"Oh, that," Jess sounded... unsurprised.

"Wha... you knew about it?" I asked, shocked. Betrayal upon betrayal.

"Of course," she said with tone so casual it was infuriating. "She did the same thing to me when I met Daddy. She does the same thing to all of her girlfriends, she taught Daddy how to do it too."

"But... Jess, that's wrong! It's wrong to spy on people, it's lying! It's taking advantage of their trust!"

"I didn't understand at first either," Jess was saying, but I suddenly felt like I was talking to a creature from another planet. "Daddy and Nessa don't think the same as normal people. They're smarter than normal people. I'm not saying what they did was okay, but it's not like they use it to steal identities or take peoples' money. They just use it to find out what people like, what they're doing, the things that people are usually too afraid to tell each other. Communication is important, you know - but it's scary to open up to someone. And it's flattering to have someone spend so much time and effort on you, to learn your every want... "

"You can't violate someone's privacy to get to know them better!" I shouted. It felt like I was the only sane person in a world of crazy. "Communication is important, but it has to be voluntary!"

"Dani, you just spent a week learning how much fun it is when things aren't voluntary," Jess laughed.

"That's not the same," I snapped. "It's still voluntary, she would stop if I used the safeword. It's still consensual. She violated me."

"Listen to yourself," Jess said derisively. "Look, we're having a sleepover tonight. We'll talk it all over then. Daddy said he has a surprise and I can't wait to find out what it is!"

"Jess... I can't stay with her. I can't trust her."

"Of course you can - has she ever hurt you? Has she ever done anything except love you? Yeah, she's a little weird. Yeah, she's a little cold sometimes, but she's a good person, Dani. And she loves you. Where are you going to find another Mommy like that? Nobody is ever going to understand you the way she does."

"Because she violated my privacy!"

"You have to decide what's more important," Jess said. "Your privacy, or your love. You weren't going to have privacy anymore anyway, Dani! You're a Little! Even the condition of your underwear wasn't going to be private. Yeah, she probably shouldn't have hacked into your accounts. Yeah, she probably should have told you about it. I remember being really upset when I found out about it too... but Daddy's one-of-a-kind. I traded everything for him, and I'd do it again."

"I can't... "

"Think about it, Dani. Talk to Nessa, hear her side of the story. She loves you."

"Goodbye Jess," I said, feeling weary, defeated.

"I'll see you tonight!" she said cheerily.

I felt like I was taking crazy pills. Jess had known about it the entire time. She had expected it. She had justified it all to me, hand-waving away a gross violation of my privacy like it was no big deal. Like I was the one who was in the wrong for not understanding Vanessa. Yeah, I was giving up a great deal of my privacy in my game with her, but I was doing that with my eyes wide open. It was my choice.

I looked down at my phone, staring at it, nothing quite feeling real. I noticed the voicemail icon and tapped it, listening to Vanessa's message.

"Dani. I'm sorry. But right now I'm worried about you, I'm worried about your safety. Please, let me drive you back home. If you want to leave me, fine. I don't want you to, but I won't stop you. I just want to know you're safe. I just want to know you're okay. I can't stop thinking about the possibility of you getting hurt and it's tearing me apart. Please Dani, call me back. Tell me where you are. I'm scared."

She sounded genuinely worried, but could I even trust that?

I rose, stumbling to the bathroom and vomited my lunch, not my figurative pain, into the toilet.

* * *

I searched Milpitas for an hour before I gave up. I had left four messages on her phone, trying hard to hide my panic, to show only concern.

I was losing her.

And I wanted to kill Lauren. The dual sensations of agony and rage were too much, and in defeat, I went home.

The urge to get into her credit card account, to see if there were any new charges, was overwhelming. It would be so easy. I had left a hidden, secondary login on the account so that I would be able to gain access without the hassle of breaking in every time. Just a quick check, I would know if she was safe - if she had gone to a restaurant, if she had checked into a hotel, if she was still out there on the street - she didn't carry cash, if she had gone anywhere or done anything, it would be right there in her pending charges, telling me the exact address of where she had used it.

But this was what tearing us apart. It was logical for her to feel betrayed by the invasion - she was never supposed to find out. It was a Mommy's job to know everything about their Little... but that was a lie I was telling myself. Part of me had always known that what I was doing was wrong.

It just made everything so much easier. Anyone's details could be open to me with a little effort. Little bits about themselves that they might not think to tell - communication was hard, opening up was hard, it was so much easier to just read and connect the dots. I could get a much better picture of someone than they tell me themselves.

Most people didn't even understand themselves - how could they communicate it?

Feeling sick, I wandered to the nursery and set Dani's box down on the ground before laying on the crib matress, staring up at the ceiling.

I felt like I was torn in two. Part of me, some deep part, was feeling awful for betraying Dani's trust, that this was all my fault, that I deserved it. Part of me was saying that everyone would get that kind of information if they had the ability, that it wasn't my fault the systems were insecure, it wasn't my fault that the information was there for the taking. Part of me thought that the crib needed a mobile.

I was a jumbled mess as I lay there, trying to figure out what was right and what was wrong. Dani had been very hurt, and that meant I had done something wrong. But part of me said she just didn't understand - that if I could set her straight, the problem would go away.

I was miserable. I felt like I was torn in two, arguing with myself, like the proverbial shoulder angels from the cartoons were having a screaming match in my head.

I wanted a drink.

But I wouldn't. I couldn't. I never, ever drank when I was angry. I never drank when I was sad. I had seen that addiction eat its way through my family and I wouldn't give it so much as a toe-hold on me. I needed to be sober in case she called... but that didn't mean the desire wasn't there. It would be so easy to slip to the bottom of a bottle, to drown all this away, this fresh pain - so much like Lauren leaving and yet so different.

Dani had been so perfect. Laying in the nursery had probably been a mistake. Everything in here made me long for her, and she had barely explored the splendor that was the collection I had amassed over the years. So many outfits I wanted to see her in, so many toys for her to play with...

I closed my eyes, just feeling the agony wash over me, pushing away all of the thoughts, unable to trust any of them.

And I waited. Dani would call. Any minute, she would call. She was a submissive. All of her belongings were here. She would call, she would come home...

To get her things at the very least. And I would get another chance - a chance to explain, a chance to convince, a chance to bare my bleeding heart to her.

I loved her.