That, and her scent, and the steam lingering in the room from our shared shower.
And my protectiveness.
I cannot leave her alone just yet.
Not when my cum is inside of her.
In my head, I see her cradling a baby.
My chest feels heavy. Would I dare?
Everything aches as I think about it; my body is a map of ruin. The stitches are tight, where Stein stabbed me. My shoulders burn. My head is a mess. And there is something in the latter I keep tripping over.
It is almost embarrassing to admit. Weak.Pathetic,like the word carved into my chest.
But no one is here, except a sleeping Karia, and she will not judge me when she does not know.
Sully,she begged.
Stein calls me that, when he wants to feign love or affection for me. Or even just to sharpen the knife of abuse.
But he got it from my mother.
I remember, when I allow myself, whispers of her tenderness. The only woman who ever offered any to me.
The only woman… until Karia.
A giddiness I do not believe I have ever felt in my life runs through me like a current. A live wire. A smile shapes its way on my face and it is not born from torture or cruelty but something I cannot name. Maybe it is love. Maybe I want to keep discovering this feeling over and over again, with her.
The only thing I know with any certainty is whatever she has freed in me, there is no going back now. Her jealousy and mine, it broke me free from a cage I have created inside my mind to survive my life.
But now I am out.
Reluctantly I get up, but if I am to live for her, I have to start by being a man she can rely on.
I am careful and painfully quiet; every part of me wantsmoreof her. And yet there is another truth: I want her to sleep. Rest. Be at peace.
She is mine to protect. Her sanctuary is mine to build.
In the dark, I stare at her for another moment. Memorize her, as if I haven’t already. I drink in the sight of her trust in me, evident by her sound sleep
Then I slip on pants and a hoodie, and I reluctantly leave the room. I have to be what she needs.
Haunt Muren is alwayscold in the corridors. A fault in the pipes or perhaps the fact the only thing maintained here was the surface because the depth—me, as Stein’s project—was always meant to die. Why keep a corpse warm?
But I know the quirks of this house in ways the rest of them won’t. I had to memorize the sound of Stein’s footsteps, and where I could steal pockets of time without him, for my own sanity. The library—my mother’s room for all intents and purposes—was always a momentary safe haven, when he wasn’t dragging me out of it.
For one moment as I move through this house, I think of her again.
What would she say, about Karia? About the week? About what is to come?
Aboutus?
She would be horrified, and full of rage. She might even loathe me, in the moments I have been too weak to be strong for the princess of Writhe. But if Mercy Rule had to pick a woman to be by my side during it all, I think she would have recognized Karia’s stubborn bravery. Her beauty is a given, but her mind is what my mother would want for me.
“I assume she is still alive.” Cosmo’s flippant voice in the kitchen drags me out of what could have been.
He has his back to the island, and he is on the floor. There is a glass in his hand, resting on his thigh. He is not looking up at me, standing in the doorway, but he knows I’m alone. Does he recognize her steps, too? A shame I have to end their close friendship. There are some lines I will not bend for her.
