She’s got me there.I’m bullshitting her, and she knows it.But I’m not about to let her out of my sight now to go find some fucking snack in the pantry, if there’s even anything in there.Not now that Elio has left the building.
She stays in my line of sight.Always.
“You know what I think, Curse?”she tilts her head, silky strands sliding with the motion.“I think you’re lying.I think you’ve been lying to me this entire fucking time.From that very first moment in New York, when I asked you why you were there, and you gave me that stupid line about ‘being in the neighbourhood.’Then, the story was that Elio had sent you to marry me, but that doesn’t really ring true, either.Considering when I mentioned our impending nuptials to your brother, he seemed surprised.Like it was fucking news to him!”
Technically, I never actually told her that Elio had ordered me to marry her.She came to that conclusion on her own, and I’d just never dissuaded her of it.But I’m not going to admit that to her now.The whole point of letting her believe this was all Elio’s doing was to extinguish that doe-eyed look of hope she kept giving me.Hope that little Accursio was still in there somewhere.That she could bring him back from the dead.
That shit was strangling me.
“And now you’re lying to me about something as dumb as what you ate for breakfast.Or rather,” she corrects herself archly, “what youdidn’teat.”
“I brought food.In my bag,” I say.That part actually is true, even if I didn’t eat any of it.“More of those protein bars.”
Her lips thin, unconvinced.
“Let me guess,” she replies on a sigh.“Lemon.”
When I nod, she throws her hands up, as if in defeat.
“Fine,” she bites out, turning on her heel and heading further into the bathroom.“Don’t give me the truth, Curse.Clearly, I’m not even worth that much to you.”
I grip the edge of the door so hard I’m half surprised it doesn’t splinter.
Grip it so hard it hurts.
It’s not that she isn’t worth the truth.
It’s that she’s worth every fucking lie.Every gamble.Every risk.
Plastic loops skate across metal as Aurora yanks the shower curtain to the right, steps into the bathtub with the shower attachment stationed above her head, then pulls the curtain back into place.Through the shimmering champagne colour of the barrier, I can only just make out the outline of her as she undresses behind it.She lobs her clothes out of the bathtub like bombs.The jumbled ball that contains her leggings and underwear unfurls on the floor in front of me, revealing the previously-concealed pad, streaked with rust.
I wasn’t gentle.I made her bleed.
I don’t want her to be sore because of me.
I’m aroused by the thought anyway.
“Are you sore?”I ask.Somehow, almost without even realizing it, I’ve made my way all the way into the bathroom.I stand directly in front of the shower curtain as the water turns on behind it.
“I told you that my head is fine today,” she replies.“I’ll try not to get the gauze wet.”
“Not your head.”
For a long moment, the only sound is the pattering of the water.Then, tersely, she says, “I’m fine there, too.I’ll be perfectly capable of consummating the marriage when it comes time for that, if that’s what you’re worried about.”Another hesitation, a tight inhale, then, “Speaking of which, we’re going to need condoms.For the next time.”
“Already got them.They’re in my bag.”
“Oh.”It comes out a little squeaky.“I guess, on the train, there wasn’t really time, or…”
Yeah.That’s one way of saying that I completely lost control and, in the process, lost my goddamn mind as well.I barely remember how the hell I ended up inside her.
But I remember being inside her.That part is seared into every cell of my skin, every snapping synapse of my brain.The exquisite tightness of her around me.The taste of her tears as I fucked them out of her and simultaneously kissed them away.The quiver – then clamping – of her body as she reached climax.
No, I wasn’t gentle.
I was hard, rough, demanding.Everything she never could have deserved.
But she came anyway.
