Cassie

 

 

I shoveled another bite of fudge ice cream from the carton into my mouth and ignored Grandmama’s stares.

“You know, you can’t marry Ben and Jerry,” she remarked.

“I’m not trying to,” I said around a mouthful.

“Could have fooled me.”

“Shh, Grandmama, Matthew is on,” I said, hoping she would go back to the movie, which featured one of my dream men, Matthew McConaughey, and quit trying to analyze me.

“You can’t marry him either.”

“Grandmama, I don’t want to marry Matthew McConaughey or Ben or Jerry. I just want to eat my ice cream and watch my sappy romantic comedy.”

“Okay, but they’re not going to make you feel better.”

“They might,” I grumbled more to myself.

I thought that would be the end of it.

“You know, calling the man might.”

I heaved out a deep sigh and set the carton of ice cream down. “Might what Grandmama?”

“Might make you feel better.”

“And who exactly should I call?”

She shook her head and clucked her tongue. “Don’t play that game with me girl, for weeks now I’ve watched your moods shift faster than the weather. I’m old, but I’m not stupid. It’s always after you’ve seen him. And I don’t mean the little one. I doubt very much that he’s the reason you didn’t come home last night.”

I didn’t deny it. There was no point, but I certainly wasn’t about to delve into my complicated relationship with Nikolai. If I told her the truth, she’d be horrified, and she’d call Mrs. Park over so they could douse me in holy water and pray for my soul together.

“Talking is usually our problem, Grandmama. It’s when we do that, that we can’t seem to get along. It’s better if we just don’t.”

“I’m going to pretend like I don’t know what you’re doing if you’re not talking to the man, that’s got you all twisted up, but nothing’s going to get fixed if you don’t figure out how to start talking to each other.” With that sage advice, she left me to my devices. I waited for her bedroom door to close before I snatched my ice cream up again.

When the credits of the movie finally rolled, I was sitting there staring at the nearly empty pint on the coffee table in disgust. I hadn’t intended to eat the entire thing, but. . .

Yeah, that happened.

I grabbed it, my stomach rolling at the sight of the melted chocolate sludge in the bottom, and carried it to the trash in the kitchen. After using the bathroom, to punish myself some more, I stepped onto the scale. And then stepped right back off.

What the hell was I doing to myself?

When had I started coping with life by eating my feelings? All my feelings, apparently.

I knew the answer to that.

Right around the time my boyfriend turned out to be a rapist and a serial killer.

How long was I going to keep using that excuse?

Because chocolate could cure that.

I stared at my reflection in the mirror over the bathroom sink. Who the fuck was the girl in the mirror? How had she become me, or how had I become her? This was still my life, wasn’t it? It was still me in there. Right?

I didn’t even know who I was asking.

I flipped off the bathroom light and padded down the hall back to the living room. My phone sat on the coffee table, a missed call notification on the screen. Before I could check to see who had called, it started buzzing in my hand with another call.

Nikolai.

Did I answer?

It was possible Grandmama was right and nothing would get better without speaking to him, but I wasn’t sure I had it in me to deal with him anymore tonight.

But I was weak.

“Hello?”

“Come to your front door.”

“Why?” My eyes darted toward the door.

“Because I’m on your front steps.”

“How stalkerish of you.”

“Open the door, Cass.”

I walked over to it, but didn’t reach for the handle to unlock it. “Why should I? So you can be a jerk some more?”

“No. So I can apologize.” He sounded contrite. Or maybe just tired. Probably just tired.

“Okay. I guess I’ll open the door.”

“That’s a relief, Cass. It’s not exactly warm out here.”

I pulled back the little curtain that hung over the tiny windows in the top of the door. “How come you don’t have a coat on? It’s October and this isn’t Texas.”

“I thought you were going to open the damn door, pet.” He was staring at me through the glass.

“Right. I’m going to hang up and do that now.” I pulled the phone away from my ear and hit the end button as I watched him tuck his into his pocket.

I pulled the door open and then we both just stood there.

“You want to come in?” I asked after it’d turned awkward.

“Is it going to bother your grandmother if I do?”

I shook my head. “She already went to bed.” I stepped aside to let him pass, and then closed the door softly behind him. “Where’s Eli?”

“Sleepover at Spence and Nora’s”

“Oh. Fun.”

He was taking in the house and I followed his gaze, wondering what he must think of all the crosses and pictures of Jesus and weird Korean cross-stitches hanging on the wall. Probably thought my Grandmama was nuts.

“Well, umm, this is my house, or Grandmama’s house, but, yeah, this is where I live.”

He nodded, but didn’t comment on it, bringing his gaze back round to me. “I’m sorry about this morning.”

“It’s okay,” I said, even though I still wasn’t sure that it was.

“Eli finding us like that, it wasn’t ideal, but I shouldn’t have taken it out on you. I want to keep exploring this thing between us, if we can figure out how to stop fighting.”

“I’m not sure that we can.” I worried the hem of my shirt in my hands and glanced at the carpet before looking up to meet his eyes.

“I’d like to try, at least.”

“And Eli?” I folded my arms across my chest.

He shifted on his feet. “Eli’s got nothing to do with us.”

“But you still don’t want me to see him?”

“It’s not that you can’t see him, Cass. I just don’t want him getting so attached that it would destroy him if this thing with us goes south.”

“I think we could be adults about it and leave him out of it.”

“I hope so, but I just think it would be best, for the time being, if the person babysitting him on a regular basis wasn’t the same person I’m fucking like an animal after he goes to bed.”

My cheeks heated at the images that conjured in my mind.

“And make no mistake, Cassie, I’d very much like to keep fucking you.” He took a step closer to me. I backed up, but with nowhere to go, he had me pressed to the wall in another step. Excitement rushed through my veins, warming all my bits, and leaving my senses humming with awareness. The heat radiating off him. The dangerous glint in those dark eyes. The rapid thudding of my heart that felt like it was reverberating off the walls of my insides. His denim clad thigh grazing my bare leg that stuck out of the tiny cotton shorts I was wearing. His familiar scent that caused shivers to run down my spine with the feelings it evoked. I was tuned into it all.

He dipped his head until our mouths were a breath apart. “It’s just about the only thing I can think about. All day, I haven’t been able to stop picturing you in my bed, and imagining all the things I would have done if I’d had the chance.”

I placed my hand against his chest and slid it over the hard muscles beneath the soft fabric of his shirt, and then down over his rippling abdomen. “I have a perfectly good bed upstairs if you’d like to show me.”

His lips feathered across my cheek to my ear. “Think you can be quiet enough?”

“Grandmama’s a heavy sleeper, and her room is downstairs,” I whispered, a tad breathless already.

His hands went immediately to my waist and lifted. I grabbed ahold of his shoulders and hooked my legs around his hips. His hands slid under my bottom as he turned and carried me toward the staircase. I wound my arms around his neck, playing with the hair at his nape as my lips sought out his ear. “Second door on the right.” I bit his earlobe and gave it a tug.

His fingers dug into my bottom and I pushed myself higher up his body in response. “You can bite me all you want, pet, but you know I bite back,” he growled softly.

I was counting on it.

I craved the bit of pain he dealt out with the pleasure. I ached for his rough touch as much as I did the tenderness. I longed to explore more of this side of myself, the darker fantasies I’d never dared give life to before I met him.

He reached the top of the stairs and found my bedroom door. He nudged it open with his booted foot, and then gave it a kick closed. He tossed me down on the bed and I couldn’t help the trill giggle that escaped as I bounced on the mattress. He knelt on the edge of the bed and pressed his hands down on either side of my head.

He feathered butterfly kisses all along my jaw and throat, down to my chest. I reached for him, wanting to twine my fingers in his hair and pull him down for a real kiss, but he caught my wrists and raised them over my head. “Are you going to behave, or am I going to have to find something to tie you up with?”

“I’m probably not going to behave,” I admitted.

A low laugh rumbled up from deep in his gut and he released my hands to push himself up to a kneeling position. “At least your honest.”

I grinned up at him shamelessly. “I can’t help it. I want to touch you.”

“Yeah?” He returned my grin and then bent over me to grab my hands again and bring them up to his stomach, pulling me into a sitting position. “Touch away, pet.”

“Really, I can touch you wherever I want?” I bit my lip as my eyes roamed over every inch of him I wanted to explore.

He gave me a nod and I didn’t hesitate. I sat up on my knees and maneuvered him so that I could push him down on the mattress. He folded his arms under his head and watched me with a narrowed gaze and a wicked grin playing on his lips. “Keep your hands there,” I teased.

And then I sat back on my heels, taking in the large, gorgeous specimen laid out before me. The shirt needed to go first. I wanted all that black ink on display. I worked it up his torso, fumbling as I tried to tug it over his head without his help. It got stuck and I sat back with a huff. “Fine, it can stay like that. See how you enjoy being blindfolded.”

He chuckled and then pulled the thing off and tossed it to the floor. “Better?”

“Much.” I wet my bottom lip and scooched my way up his legs until I was straddling his waist. I could feel the bulge in his jeans through my shorts and panties. It spurred my desire.

I ran my hands up his toned stomach, over his defined pecs and muscled shoulders, taking in the intricate lines and swirls that made up the tattoos that covered much of his upper body. I gripped his thick biceps as I bent to taste all the same places I’d just touched. I scattered kissed and teasing bites all over his torso. Every time he sucked in a breath, or rocked his hips, or let out a throaty groan, I smirked against his skin. It was fun turning the tables on him.

But it didn’t last long. Nikolai was even worse at behaving himself than I was. He might have let me play like I was in control for a few minutes, but he’d been in control the entire time I was working him up.

My hands reached for the button on his jeans and that was his snapping point. His hands came out from under his head in a flash, caught my wrists and rolled us so that he was once again on top of me.

“My turn.” He crawled off the bed and stood at the foot, eyeing me sprawled out like he was envisioning all sorts of things that made my blood heat and liquid pool low in my belly. He pulled my socks off one by one and then leaned over to hook his fingers in the waist of my shorts. I grabbed his hands before he could.

“Turn the light off, please.” I eyed the bedside lamp I’d left on.

He paused and straightened. “Why? I want to see you.”

“Well I just ate an entire pint of ice cream tonight, so I’d rather you didn’t see me looking like a bloated water buffalo.”

He crawled back onto the bed on his knees, his hands returning to my shorts. He dipped his head to mine. “You’re gorgeous.” He nipped at my jaw. “Your curves are perfect.” He nibbled my ear. “And I want to see you.” He crushed his lips to mine as he gave my shorts a tug. He forced my mouth open and shoved his tongue inside, stroking mine. I was breathless and trembling a bit when he pulled away so that he could yank my shorts all the way off, along with my panties.

He stripped me of my shirt and bra next, and then straddled my thighs, running his lust-filled gaze slowly over every inch of me from there up. His index finger traced up my hip and over my pelvic bone, then skimmed along my ribcage and over the swell of one breast. Then he dipped it between them and dragged it down over the softness of my belly. “Every curve perfect,” he whispered. And then his fingers delved lower and I forgot my insecurities entirely.

I forgot everything.

There was nothing but the sounds of my moans and cries mixed with his husky whispers and groans. His fingers on me and in me. His mouth torturing me.

I bucked and whimpered and kicked out and fisted the sheets. I slammed my head into the pillow so many times I was sure it would be permanently flattened. I clawed at his skin, digging my nails into his back, and pulled at his hair. I ignored his growled warnings and threats, eager for whatever punishments he would dole out.

I gasped when he turned me over and stung my backside with his palm. My shocked inhalations quickly turned to breathy moans as he did it over and over until I couldn’t take anymore, and that’s when he took me. Just like that, pinned down on my stomach, pressed deeper into the mattress with every hard thrust. One hand bore down on my shoulder and the other gripped the headboard as he pistoned his hips and drove into me. I bit the pillow to muffle my cries and clawed at the sheets.

I never wanted this to stop. I needed this so bad. I needed him, because only he brought this out of me. These desires would still be buried deep if it weren’t for him, and I knew no one else would ever be able to give me what he did. He didn’t hold back. He demanded I give him everything, but then he did the same. He gave me all of him. He unleashed his darkness and it collided with mine in a beautiful storm of fury and passion that ignited my bones and sparked my soul.

He wrung every drop from me, every last cry, until my voice was hoarse, my bones were liquefied, and my sex was raw and tender. Nikolai collapsed on top of me and then we rolled until we were a tangle of sweat slicked limbs, both of us breathing hard. It wasn’t long before I was asleep in his arms, and like the night before, I slept soundly.

I expected to find him gone when I woke in the morning, but as I stirred, I felt his warmth beneath me. I blinked my eyes open to the sight of his tanned and tattooed chest, dusted with a smattering of coarse hair. I groaned and glided my hand, which lay on his belly, up over his chest, and traced my finger over Elijah’s name that was scrawled across his heart.

The arm that was curled under me began to stroke up and down my back. I tilted my chin up to see his pale blue eyes watching me. Then his hand slipped lower down my back “Good morning, sunshine,” he said, grabbing a handful of my backside.

I smiled and hitched my thigh a little higher on his. “It is a good morning.” His hardness twitched against my leg and I bit back a smirk. He let out a long groan and squeezed me tighter to his side by my ass.

“Is your grandmother a late sleeper?” His voice low and raspy from sleep.

“No.” I shook my head.

“Then you’re going to have to be quiet.” He rolled me to my back and reached for the string of condoms we’d left on the nightstand. He tore one free and then tossed the packet down on the bed beside us.

By the time he rolled it on and pushed inside me, I think I’d forgotten about being quiet. He kept shushing me, even as low, throaty groans, rumbled from his chest with each slow, hard thrust. He didn’t restrain my hands this time, and allowed me to run them up and down his back, scoring his flesh with my nails, digging them into the meaty areas of his back and ass. He stuffed a corner of the blanket in my mouth at one point to quiet me, and then sank his teeth into my shoulder to silence his own grunts and curses.

This time our fucking wasn’t frenzied and savage. It was still rough and hard, but slower. He peppered my body and mouth with kisses, stroked his hands up and down my skin. It felt more like a form of worship than fucking and I came twice before he finally emptied into me.

I think we both fell back asleep before we finally found the strength and will to get out of the bed. I tried to pretend I wasn’t totally mortified when we descended the stairs and found Grandmama in the living room with the volume on the TV turned up louder than she would normally have it. I wondered how quickly I could sneak Nikolai out the door, but Grandmama heard us and then it was too late. She lurched out of her recliner, flipping the TV off, and made a big deal out of greeting Nikolai.

“Good morning, Cassandra and Cassandra’s handsome fellow.” She hurried as fast as her arthritic limbs would carry her to us. “Come on,” she grabbed my wrist. “There’s breakfast in the kitchen. You both must be starving.”

I choked on a cough and felt my cheeks grow hotter.

Suffice to say, the entire morning up to the point I walked Nikolai to the door was mortifying. Grandmama dragged us to the kitchen for breakfast, not even giving Nikolai the option of turning it down. Then it got worse.

As she served him his plate of toasted sweet bread and sausage and fruits, she asked him if he intended to marry me. He was the one to choke this time, on a bite of sausage. Grandmama laughed and then waved her hand in jest, assuring him she was only kidding, but all through the meal she had her fun, until I think Nikolai couldn’t get out of there fast enough. I was sure my face looked like a tomato.

“Your grandmother is an interesting woman,” he said once we were alone, standing out by his truck.

“That’s one word for it,” I mumbled through my embarrassment.

“It’s okay,” he laughed, pulling me into his chest and kissing the top of my head. “I like her.”

“You do?” I pulled away and looked up at him.

“Yes. I do.” He kissed the tip of my nose. “She’s funny. And feisty. Like you.” He caught my bottom lip between his teeth and tugged on it before pressing his lips to mine. I grinned against his mouth and fisted my hands in his shirt.

He pulled away slightly. “Do you have to work today?”

I shook my head. “I don’t work again until tomorrow. Which reminds me, I need to go pick up my rental car. I was supposed to do it yesterday, but didn’t get around to it.” And once the check from the insurance company came, I would have to go car shopping. Something I was dreading without my dad here to go with me and be the hardass to make sure I didn’t get taken advantage of.

“Have you heard from the mechanic?”

“He called yesterday. My car is toast, and it would appear that the brake hose was cut.”

“Dammit Cass, why didn’t you tell me that?” Now he looked angry. I didn’t think it was really me he was angry with, even if he was sort of yelling at me.

“Well, I wasn’t speaking to you when he called, and it sort of slipped my mind last night.”

“Have you filed a police report?”

“Do I need to?”

“Cassie,” he lowered his voice to the tone of a parent scolding their child, “your brakes were cut. That means someone cut them.”

“Yeah. I guess that’s pretty bad, huh?”

“Cassie, someone tried to kill you, or at the very least, injure you.”

When he said it like that, it really started to sink it.

“I guess I should call the police,” my voice shook a little.

He rubbed his hands up and down my biceps. “Yeah, you should. I can go with you if you want. I’m not working today. I just need to check in with Spencer. He has Eli this morning. Promised to take him to the offices and show him where we train and shoot. I’m supposed to pick him up there this afternoon, but I can call Spence and see if he wants to hang out with him a little longer. I’m sure Eli’s having a great time.”

“Okay. If you don’t mind. I don’t really know what to tell the police.”

Nikolai called Spencer, but before he could ask about Eli he got some bad news.

“He what?” he practically yelled into the phone. “How the hell did he pull that off, and what are we doing to find him?” The conversation went on like that for a few minutes and I was able to figure out that Eli’s step-dad had disappeared. I fully expected Nikolai to bail on me after that, but surprisingly I heard him tell Spencer he had something to take care of and asked if he would keep Eli until this afternoon. When he hung up, I asked him if he needed to leave, but he just told me to go inside and get dressed.

Grandmama stopped me on the stairs to inform me that she liked my fellow. This was a shock considering she knew what we’d been up to last night and this morning, but it was also a relief. Grandmama was a good judge of character, and if she liked him, it meant I wasn’t crazy to think there was something there underneath the hard and rough exterior.

His lips twitched with a smile when I climbed up in the truck and told him what Grandmama had said. He didn’t comment, but I think it pleased him. I was just relieved his mood seemed to have calmed. He’d looked pretty murderous after the phone call.

The police station didn’t take long and then Nikolai took me to get my rental car and then suggested we stop by my insurance agency to give them a copy of the police report and to speed up the process of them issuing the check for my totaled car.

When we left my insurance agent’s office, Nikolai suggested grabbing lunch. I was a little shocked that he didn’t appear to be in a hurry to get rid of me. That was a nice change. We drove to a local place known especially for their brunch, and we stayed a while after we’d cleaned our plates.

The next day I was able to pick up the insurance check and Nikolai took me car shopping. He drove me from lot to lot and we argued over gas mileage and reliability versus paint colors and fancy controls. I’m sure you can guess which were at the top of my priority list, but Nikolai managed to talk me out of the brand-new cherry red Charger with the pretty interior and the payments I would have had to sell my body to afford.

“But it’s so pretty,” I whined.

“Sorry, pet, you can’t have that one.” He steered me toward a not quite new silver Subaru Crosstrek with low mileage and a better price tag. After test driving it, I did fall a little bit in love, but I still gave the Charger wistful looks as I headed inside to sign papers on the Subaru. After talking the salesman down to a price all three of us could live with, Nikolai had to leave me to get to work. The actual paper signing and finalizing felt like it took forever. I was hungry and tired when I left the dealership, but I had a spanking new—or spanking new to me—car.

I wanted to show it off, so I texted Reggie and made him meet me for dinner and drinks at our favorite bar. Today had been a good day and for the first time, I actually felt like going out with a friend.

Burgers and beers and watching Reggie hit on our cute server was the perfect ending to this day. The poor kid didn’t know what to do with Reggie. He left our table blushing every time, but in the end, Reg tipped him well, so the kid probably wouldn’t mind that Reggie had flirted with him.

We said goodnight in the parking lot, after I made Reggie sit in and admire my car. I was about to back out of my parking spot when I realized I hadn’t grabbed my debit card after paying my check. It was still in the black book sitting at our table. Reggie and I had been in the middle of a conversation and I walked away without grabbing it after our server brought it back to me. I put the car back in park and ran back inside.

It was only after I came back out, with my card this time, that I realized the parking lot was a little bit creepy in the dark, when you were alone. Most of the parking was around the side or in the back. I was parked out back and as I rounded the corner from the front of the restaurant, I picked up my pace. It was chilly, and I got one of those prickles on the back of my neck that made me nervous. I didn’t see anyone else in the parking lot until I rounded the corner again out back. Someone was standing beside my car. I could just make out their outline. Whoever it was wore dark clothing with a hood pulled up, which prevented me from being able to see their face. I only knew they were looking at me. I stopped short, unsure of what to do. They were just standing there, watching me. I looked around. Yup. We were alone. I looked back. The creeper was still staring.

Not wanting to get mugged or worse, I turned around and calmly (not calmly at all) sprinted back inside. I didn’t care if I looked like a crazy person. Inside I dialed Nikolai right away.

“There’s a crazy person standing by my car?” I huffed out, a little short of breath from the sprinting.

“Slow down, what about a crazy person and your car?”

“I met Reggie at a bar for dinner. I forgot my debit card, so I had to go back inside and when I just went out to my car to leave, there was someone in a hood standing beside my car, watching me. Like they were waiting for me or something.”

“You need to ask the manager to send someone out there to check it out, but I don’t want you to go back out. And given that we still don’t know who cut your brake hose, I don’t want you to drive it until I can check it out.”

“But I just got it,” I whimpered.

“I know, pet, but you can’t take any chances. Call a ride and I’ll get over there first thing in the morning.”

I did what he asked, but when the manager and one of the servers went out back, they returned and said they didn’t see anyone. I ordered a car from the app and waited inside the bar until my ride showed up. I sulked like a child who’d had their new toy taken away the entire drive to my house. If the psycho creep messed with my car the same day I got it, I was going to be pissed.

I was dropped off in front of the house. I thanked the driver and then he drove off before I even made it up the walk. I heard another car coming down the street and turned to glance over my shoulder. It was a light-colored sedan, and it slowed as it neared my house. I don’t know what it was about it that struck me but rather than continue inside, I watched it. It rolled slowly down the street until coming to an almost stop in front of my house. I couldn’t see inside the car, but I got the same neck prickling feeling.

I bolted for the door and almost tripped going up the steps. I let myself in and hurriedly locked the door behind me. The house was quiet, so I assumed Grandmama was in bed. After making sure the back door was also locked, I ran up the stairs and shut myself inside my room. I called Nikolai again and told him about the car.

“Relax, Cass, it might have been nothing. You’re probably just on edge. You didn’t see the car at the bar, did you?”

“I don’t know, I didn’t see it all that well just now. It was white, or maybe silver, or it could have been beige. All I know is that it gave me weird, creepy vibes, like whoever was in the car was watching me, just like at the restaurant.”

“Your doors are locked?”

“Duh.”

“Okay, look out your window and see if you see it.”

I went to the window that looked out over the street and drew the curtain back. I didn’t see it. “It’s gone.”

“Then it was probably nothing. Get some sleep, pet, and I’ll come over and get you in the morning.”

“You don’t have to work?”

“I have a night shift tomorrow, so after I get Eli to school, I’ll be there, and we’ll go check out your car.”

Feeling slightly calmer after hanging up with Nikolai, I got ready for bed. I only looked out the window half a dozen times to make sure the car hadn’t come back before I finally got into bed. The next morning Nikolai did pick me up and drove me to my car. After a thorough inspection, he declared it perfectly safe. I worried he’d think I was crazy and had exaggerated or overreacted to everything last night. He didn’t though. He kissed me on the head and told me to drive to the restaurant down the street where he bought me coffee and breakfast.

Like car shopping yesterday, it almost felt like we were a normal couple. I knew that we weren’t, and in the weeks that followed we didn’t have many more days like that.

Our time together became limited to nights. He’d find time between work and relieving the nanny to sneak over to my place. Or he’d call late at night after Eli was in bed and I’d go over there so he could wear us both out in the best way possible. Afterward, he’d slip from my bed, or I’d have to crawl from his at the crack of dawn. There were moments, before we said goodbye, where we’d both lay there, wrapped around each other, and we’d talk about our days or whatever random thoughts were on our minds.

Those moments never lasted long, though, and then I was reminded of what we were doing. After three weeks, it was starting to feel like not enough. I was craving more than the sex. I wanted to go back to those couple days where he acted and felt like my boyfriend. But he wasn’t.

I knew that getting my feelings involved at all was playing with fire, but those moments were the reason I kept going every time he called or texted. Those moments were why I waited at home every night hoping for a call or text. And it started to hurt a little more each time he left me alone in my bed, or reminded me that it was time for me to get going. But I couldn’t walk away. Some nights I’d tell myself to turn my phone off. Just one night. Go just one night without him, I’d tell myself.

I couldn’t do it.

I’d avoid Grandmama’s knowing eyes as I kissed her cheek, and then hang my head on my way out the door, because she didn’t have to say a word for me to know what she wasn’t saying. It was in her eyes.

What are you doing, baby girl?

I hope you’re being careful.

I couldn’t even assure her, or myself, that I was.

And I doubted, if I asked her now what she thought of Nikolai, she’d say the same thing she had when she first met him. I think she knew what was becoming clear to me. I was in over my head with him. But isn’t that how it happens? By the time you realize how deep you’ve gone, it’s too late to turn around and go back. You’re already drowning.

I felt like a little girl playing at being grown up.

I thought I could do it. I thought it was only about the sex. Exploring the darker side of desire. Letting him teach me things about my own body, and show me how freeing it could be to give up control to someone else.

What I hadn’t counted on was the intimacy of it all. I wasn’t just giving him my body. I was opening myself up to him in ways I hadn’t with anyone else. Ever. When he had me beneath him, I was flayed wide open. There was darkness there. Part of me that was so angry, so hurt and lost. The piece of me that had been whispering fuck it all, for so long. That voice that told me not to care, that life would always be like this. Hard. Ugly. Full of pain and confusion, so why try to make it anything else? People weren’t worth the effort of caring. We were all fucked up and just looking for whatever helped us cope with the world we lived in.

But underneath all that, was a girl who desperately wanted someone to prove the voice wrong. Prove me wrong. I wanted someone to make me care again.

I didn’t know that’s what I’d been waiting for until he did it.

And he didn’t do it with the sex.

It was everything else.

I don’t know why they call it falling. Falling implies that it’s sudden and fast. Hurtling a hundred miles an hour toward impact. This wasn’t that. Or maybe it was, but I was fighting the fall. Still hanging onto the ledge by my fingers, feeling gravity pulling me down, toward something terrifying. The pull got stronger and stronger every day and I grew weaker.

The secret smiles when he came into the shop. The occasional, flirty, and unexpected text message that let me know he was thinking about me.

My fingers slipped a little more.

The ice cream—my favorite flavor, loaded with chewy brownie bites, caramel gobs, and crunchie fudge clusters—he’d show up with the rare nights he came over when Eli was staying with Spence and Nora. Sneaking up the stairs with spoons, trying not to wake Grandmama, and lay in my bed and eat the entire pint. He said it was because I needed the fuel. He wasn’t wrong.

My grip weakened further.

The way he rushed over the morning I walked out of my house to find the tires on my new car slashed. He calmed me, and once again took me to the police station to file a report, even though there wasn’t much they could do for me.

It didn’t stop there. Two nights later, I came out of work to find my window smashed and the words “WHORE” and “BITCH” carved into my paint job. I drove straight to his house, too upset to go anywhere else or call anyone else. He came running outside when I called him from in front of his house because I didn’t know if Eli might be awake and if I could go in. Eli was in bed, so he brought me inside, made me coffee with whiskey, and sat with me until I could breathe without feeling like my chest was constricted. Then he took me upstairs and made me forget until morning.

The two-year anniversaries of the first girls Aaron had taken had passed. Their faces were all over the papers and in the news again, and it seemed someone was harassing me, possibly the same person who’d cut my brake hose. I was a mess, but when Nikolai promised me it would be okay, and we’d figure out who was doing it and make them stop, I believed him. He made me feel safe and protected.

I slipped a little more until I was dangling by just the tips of my fingers.

Then there were the fleeting moments when we were both spent and flooded with the after effects of orgasms—usually multiple for me—and our guards were down a bit, and we’d talk.

I think I talked more than he did. But he listened.

I even opened up about Will, or Aaron, I guess even though in my head he was still Will. Yeah, I’d even found myself able to refer to him by name without disgust, nausea and crippling shame overtaking me. Nikolai’s arms were the first safe place I’d found, where I felt like, maybe, just maybe, I would be okay. I could tell him that my don’t-give-a-shit attitude was a front, and that when I told people, my friends even, that I was fine and moving on, it was a big lie.

I even admitted to him that I was hurt and a tiny bit resentful of my parents for packing up and moving cross country at a time when I was going through the hardest shit I’d ever dealt with. I was maybe even angry with them, even though they’d asked me to come and find a fresh start in Florida. It was me who insisted I didn’t need too. I’d wished they could have understood that a big change was the last thing I could handle. I just wanted to find normal again. Get back to my life, the way it had been. I didn’t want to have to move and start over, because somehow that felt like letting Will take even more from me. But how could they understand that when Nikolai was the first person I’d ever told it to?

Every once in a while, he’d share something too. Something more than just about work, or his day. He’d tell me a story from his childhood that would make me laugh, because Nikolai as a child was everything I would have expected. Precocious, curious, and rebellious.

He told me a little bit about his mom, who’d raised him as a single parent until she’d passed away his senior year of high school. I suspected losing her had a lot to do with his decision to join the military. He’d been looking for something. A purpose. A place to belong. People to belong to. He didn’t talk much about his time in the Army. Just a few stories of his and Spencer’s antics, and enough to know that there was a reason he didn’t like to talk about the rest. He had scars. Physical and non. It was the ones under the surface, the ones I couldn’t see on his skin, that were the worst. That much wasn’t hard to figure out.

I realized the man I’d taken for being cold and callous, wasn’t. You just had to look harder to see it. He was good. Better than most. An asshole at times, yes, but his sense of loyalty and honor ran deep. He’d do the hard things, the ugly things, and had done them, so that others wouldn’t have to. So they could be safe. He poured all of himself into his work because he believed it mattered. Whether it was protecting some spoiled actress, or working to stop human trafficking rings.

And here I was, pouring coffee and serving muffins to folks, feeling purposeless and like my contributions to the world were pretty insignificant.

But being with Nikolai and getting to see the man that he really was, was changing me. Each time he let me in, even though it was just a little bit, it affected me.

I started looking forward to each day instead of dreading the monotony of it. I began thinking about the future with a sense of hope instead of looking at the direction my life was heading through despondent eyes. How could I not want to let go when he made me feel this way?

I found myself wanting things out of life again, instead of settling for the way it was.

One of the things I wanted was a real relationship with Nikolai.

Only, I was pretty sure I couldn’t have it.

Nikolai was the one who made all the rules. This was his game, and he didn’t want the same things I was beginning to. I don’t think he saw the two of us going anywhere beyond whatever we were doing. I didn’t know if he felt anything more for me at all, because even though we did talk, we didn’t talk about us. I was terrified that if I brought it up, he’d figure out I wanted more from him, and then I wouldn’t have any of him at all. I wasn’t ready for this to stop.

I knew eventually it would have to. I couldn’t keep going like this, pretending not to feel what I did, forever. And how much longer until this got old for him? Desire would fade if there wasn’t something more, something real, underneath it all, that held two people together. If I let go, I knew that at the end of the fall, it would be painful. That was the only thing that kept me hanging on.

It was clear to me that he didn’t want me in his life any more than I was. One of the ways he made that obvious was with Eli. He talked about Eli the most during our times together.

He’d tell me what kind of silly trouble he’d gotten into that day at school, or brag on how he’d done on a math test, or recap the highlights of his latest soccer match now that he was on a team. Hearing the pride in his voice and seeing the love on his face, I think was what got me the most. He loved fiercely and there wasn’t anything he wouldn’t do for that boy. It was enough to make any woman turn into a pile of goo.

Yet, as much as I loved hearing him talk about his son, it also killed me, because hearing about Eli was the only way Nikolai let me into his son’s life. He hadn’t budged on me spending time with Eli. In fact, the more complicated and intense things became between us, the more determined he seemed not to let it, or me, anywhere near Eli. Occasionally, he’d bring him into the shop for a treat, and I’d get to see him for a few minutes, but I missed him. I missed playing board games, and Xbox, and fighting invisible ninjas, and letting him kick the soccer ball at my face twenty times in a row so he could practice shooting goals.

Every time I broached the idea of me spending time with him to Nikolai, he shut me down. I could only have one of the Markov men in my life. And I couldn’t even have him fully, because if he wasn’t willing to share the most important thing in his world with me, it was pretty obvious that he didn’t consider me a part of his world.

I wished I could be okay with that, and I tried to be, because I was happy with what I had with Nikolai. I think I was anyway. I mean, I didn’t want it to stop, but I also wasn’t sure how much longer I could keep being his secret. Not even our friends knew what we were doing. He said that was also better for everyone. Less complicated. Less messy. To me, it just made us feel less . . . real.