"You are my mate," Waldo said slowly, his lips curling into a wicked, feral smirk. "No one touches you. No one dares disrespect you—except me."
The words struck Regina like a blow. Her fear, long-suppressed beneath a thin veil of composure, cracked open. She glared at Waldo with burning hatred. She tried to speak, to scream, but the moment her throat tensed, pain shot through her voice box like claws raking down raw flesh.
Despair.
If others' humiliation could grind her self-worth into dust, then being silenced—by him—was a far crueler torment.
Her lips moved in silence, mouthing the word with venom: "Demon."
Fists clenched, her nails digging into her palms, Regina stared down Waldo's darkening expression. There was no fear in her gaze now. She didn't even feel the ache in her heart anymore.
Perhaps, she thought distantly, when pain reaches a certain point, a person simply forgets how to suffer.
