The Girl in the Mirror(45)

“Stop!” I cry. “You can’t do this! You can’t do this to me!”

“You love it,” he says. He doesn’t stop. Somehow, he’s still holding my hair as his hands force their way under my bra. His palms are calloused, and my nipples respond to their texture, even as my face grows hot with shame.

“I can feel that you want it,” he says. “You know you love it, little whore wife. I saw you looking at those policemen yesterday. Do you know how hot you would look fucking a policeman?” His voice is close to my ear now; he’s leaning into the space between the two machines. “Him in his uniform and you naked. I saw you staring at his handcuffs. He’s gonna lock you in one of his cells and then he’s gonna take you up against those prison bars, and I’m gonna watch.”

Maybe he doesn’t know it’s me. Maybe this is some sick role-play. What happened to Summer’s stories of candles and romance?

I have to play along. “Hmm, you’re so hard,” I moan in my most Summer-ish voice. It seems like a safe thing to say, but it breaks his rhythm. This isn’t what I’m expected to say. I’m not playing my part. I don’t know my part.

Is there a safe word? I don’t want this. I want my husband to hold me in his arms. I want my husband to make love to me.

I try something else. “I’m a good girl,” I lisp. “Let me go and I’ll be good.”

“Too late,” says Adam. “You should have thought of that before you wiggled your naked butt at me, you hot little slut.”

So this is what he wants me to say. Relief mingles with hot shame. This was Summer’s sex life. This is the truth.

“I’m sorry,” I whisper. “I’ll be good next time.”

He picks up speed, thrusts harder, digs his hands into my breasts. The filthy words fly at me—whore, harlot, minx, slut. I don’t seem to need to say anything more. I close my eyes and pretend I’m not here. I’m a body leaning over a washing machine. I’m doing the laundry.

I forget to do anything but hold still, but Adam doesn’t seem to care. He lets go of me as his body’s rhythm takes over. He’s nearly done.

And then my skin catches fire, and my body pulses in an agonizing release. I can’t hide the hot waves of pleasure that wash over me. And Adam comes so volcanically, I swear I can feel his fluid shoot right into my womb.

It’s over.

My mind is my own, but my body is Summer’s body. When Adam pins her against the washing machine and ravishes her, she climaxes. Maybe this is why it’s her favorite thing.



Adam’s in the shower. He’s shut the door between the bathroom and the saloon, and I don’t want to find out if it’s locked. Maybe Summer would sashay in and join him.

There’s no way I can go in there. I drift into the stateroom and throw myself on the bed.

I feel I will never be clean again, but Adam doesn’t know anything’s wrong. He’s singing in there, out of tune and cheerful.

I shouldn’t be so surprised. People don’t tell their kinky secrets to their sisters. What did Adam call it? Rapey sex? No, sexyrape. The word is sickening, but it was obviously part of a shared fantasy. Men don’t say that sort of thing, surely, when they’re actually raping you.

Adam loves Summer. They’re having a baby together. He talked dirty, but his hands roamed over Summer’s body in a good way, and he was rough, but not rough enough to hurt the baby. Sure, Summer told me a censored version of their sex life, but what she told me had a kind of truth. They’re crazy for each other. Just in a sick way. I should have known no man is perfect. The poetic words, the grand gestures. They were too good to be true.

The worst part is, I didn’t want him to do it. I’ve never been into BDSM, never seen the need to pretend I don’t want sex or to be slapped around while making love. I nearly stopped him. A few words would have done it. I’m not Summer. I’m the wrong twin.

But being Summer won out over everything. Adam wanted me. He was inside me. It was my body that made him hard, my body that made him move like that. And even if I didn’t want it, my body did.

Adam was doing what Summer loved. They even had their own creepy little word for it. Sexyrape. They must have a safe word, too, but she didn’t say it. He wasn’t surprised when she came. He kissed her tousled hair and peeled off into the shower.

I’m the one who put myself here. I made Adam do something he would never do. He’s a good guy. If he knew what he’d done, he’d die of shame. And he’d hate me as he’s never hated anyone.

I can never tell him now.

I can never ever tell him.

I lie on my back and lift my legs over my head. Might as well get gravity to help out. Virginia will be sixteen in less than a month. This might be my only chance.



I don’t know Summer’s safe word.

I don’t know any of her passwords. How am I going to get into her phone, her email, her Facebook, her bank account?

Can you forget a safe word? Is that believable?

I swing my legs down into a normal position as Adam emerges from the shower. He struts around, casual and preoccupied, while I try to catch my first glimpse of his naked body.

I’m still wearing the porno-pink lingerie. There’s nothing innocent about this color; in Summer and Adam’s world, pink is the shade of sex. I slip between the sheets before Adam can catch sight of me. He might start thinking about second helpings. But he’s not looking at me. He’s pulling on boxer shorts while staring at his phone. “I need to get Tarq from my aunt’s house,” he says. “I think he was worried by your appearance yesterday—your face is thinner and you’re much more tanned. And I could see you found it hard to be with him—”