As if I don’t have enough on my mind, when I walk into Rockcliffe House, I see the laptop sitting on the kitchen table and from the look on Helen’s face, it’s not good.

“What?” I ask, opening the lid of the box which isn’t closed fully.

“She didn’t want it, Killian,” Helen says, turning her attention to the dishes.

The note inside is out of its envelope. I know exactly why she didn’t want it.

“Helen.”

She switches off the water and faces me, drying her hands on her apron. “Yes?”

“The girls can wash the dishes. That’s why they’re here.”

“I don’t mind.”

“I want them to do it. Not you.” She’s too old to work so hard.

“Okay, Killian.”

“Where’s Cilla?”

“In her room. She went for a run earlier and after taking a few books from the library, has been in the bedroom.”

“Did she eat anything today?”

“Exactly one bite of toast. She got very upset when she read the note,” she says, eyeing the box. “She seems like a nice girl, Killian—”

“It’s not that kind of relationship, Helen.” I open the fridge, grab a beer and twist off the cap. My back is to Helen.

“You don’t have to isolate everyone, you know,” she says.

I don’t respond. Helen’s known me for as long as I can remember. She practically raised me and Ginny.

“Be gentler with her. She’s scared,” she continues.

I close the fridge and face her. “She should be scared.” I pick up the box containing the laptop and walk out of the kitchen, draining half the bottle and setting it on the dining room table before going up the stairs to Cilla’s room. I don’t need this right now. Today has been a shit storm. She’s here for stress relief. Time she learned her place.

Not bothering to knock, I enter her room.

Cilla’s pulled a chair up to the window so her face is in the waning sun. She startles, drops her book as she stands.

“Knocking is polite,” she says after clearing her throat.

“It’s my house.” I go in and drop the box on her bed.

“It’s my bedroom for the next month.”

I go to her, but force myself to take slow, steady steps. I need to keep a tight leash on the anger she manages to bring up in me. She must see it because she backs up a little, although there’s not much space to retreat. She puts a hand on the back of the chair.

“Nothing is yours. Everything is mine.”

“Including me. I know. Did anyone ever tell you you’re like the bully on the playground?”

I stop a few feet from her. “Maybe I like being the bully.”

“You would.”

“I gave you a computer.”

“As payment for fucking you.”

“You said you need one for work.”

“I just wanted mine. I don’t need a brand new laptop, especially not when it’s in exchange for…that. I’m not a whore. I don’t need your money. We made a deal but that didn’t mean I gave you permission to treat me like a prostitute.”

“Permission?” I feel my eyebrows rise. “You needed to give me permission?”

She bends to pick up the fallen book, moves to the side, putting more space between us. I close it, back her into the wall, cage her in with my hands on either side of her head.

“I don’t remember asking permission being part of our deal.”

Emerald eyes stare at me. Her thick, dark bangs come to her eyebrows and only make the green seem starker by contrast. Her mouth is open and I see where I bit it yesterday. Tasted her blood. I touch my tongue to the tear on my own lip where she did the same to me.

“What’s the girl to you?” Hugo’s voice repeats in my head.

Maybe she’s my match.

My gaze drops to her chest where the V-neck sweater leaves her flesh bared. She’s wearing black and her hair’s down. I touch the softly curling strand that rests on her breast, then tuck it behind her ear. Her breathing changes, comes shorter, then stops altogether. She stands perfectly still and I feel her watching me even as my gaze hovers over her lips, the curve of her collarbone, the smoothness of her skin. I touch the necklace she’s wearing. She’s had it on since the first night. It’s a fine gold chain with a small cross hanging from it. I take the cross in my hand.

“Jesus won’t save you, you know,” I say, not looking at her, studying the cross instead. Ginny had one like it. Trapped beneath the rope, the cross had embedded itself into her skin when she’d hanged herself. I remember feeling the divot in her skin after I’d cut her down, torn the noose from her neck.

I remember feeling how her neck had broken. How her head lolled to the side when I laid it on my lap. I hoped it had happened fast, at least. Hope she hadn’t suffered.

No, that’s bullshit. She’d suffered long enough to do that.

I close my eyes, my head is bowed so Cilla can’t see my face. I don’t realize I’m squeezing until I feel the chain break, until I hear her gasp. I don’t look up. Instead, I close my fist over the little figure of Jesus on his cross and steel myself, forcing those images away, burying those memories deep in my gut. Willing myself to not see the chair she’d used lying on its side, not see her shoe on the floor beneath her, in a puddle of piss dotted with red. Not to see the blood on the insides of her thighs, the ripped sheets of skin.

I step back, turn away from Cilla, my hands on my face, my eyes, rubbing away the pictures that haunt me every day, every night.

“Dinner's at eight. Be dressed and at the table.” I force the words out, my voice sounding strange, haunted.

On the verge of a break.

I walk out of her room without turning back, head to my master suite at the end of the hall. Inside, I strip off my clothes, change into running gear, head back downstairs and out the back door. From there, I run. I run hard, not caring that the ground is still soaked after too many days of rain, not caring that darkness has descended and that the woods will be pitch black. Not caring about anything at all but the exertion, the exhaustion of muscle, the pain which is the only thing that can force away those images.

It was like that in prison too. That’s when I got so big. I lifted weights. I ran. I fought. Fuck, I raged. Pain is my Prozac. It’s the only thing that keeps the demons at bay. Without it, rage will take over. And it will level everything, leave a wasteland behind.

It will decimate me.

* * *

Cilla steps out of her bedroom at 7:59PM. It’s the same moment I exit mine. She stops dead when she sees me, presses her back into her closed door. I’m not sure if she’s aware her hand is touching her neck, the place where her necklace once was.

I smile. I almost want to say it’s to reassure her. Let her know I’m not going to hurt her. But the look I get makes me think I look like I’m baring my teeth in warning. I literally just ripped her necklace from her throat. I scare the shit out of her. It’s what I want, right? It’s what I told Helen earlier. So why do I feel like a shit?

“You look nice,” I say awkwardly when I reach her.

She’s wearing a knee-length black dress, this one with long sleeves. Her hair’s pulled up into a tight bun and her bangs pinned back.

“Thank you,” she says, her voice cautious, eyes never leaving mine like she’s searching, trying to figure out which version of me this is.

“Shall we?” I gesture to the stairs. She looks down and nods, turns to walk ahead of me. The dress plunges low and I suck in a breath at the sight of her naked back, the curve of her spine.

She shudders, hugs her arms around herself. She stops, I almost collide into her when she turns. “I should get a sweater.”

I shake my head, touch the flat of my hand to her lower back. A little shock sparks at the contact of flesh to flesh. I turn her. “I like you like this,” I say, feeling like a Neanderthal.

Her eyes search mine and I wonder what she sees. A monster, perhaps. A beast she fears. That thought equally draws and repels me. Silently, she nods, turns and we go down the stairs and into the dining room.

Throughout dinner, she’s cautiously quiet, watching me, eating her meal without a word. Drinking the wine I pour. The only sound is that of clinking silverware as we eat in silence. I know she has a hundred questions. A thousand. But she’s smart enough not to ask them.

When we’re finished eating, I set my napkin down and we stand. She follows my lead and I notice how she isn’t quite sure what to do with her hands. I gesture for her to walk ahead of me and she knows where to go. She doesn’t glance back as she makes her way to the library where I open the door and we enter.

“Sit down.” Like the night before, I pour us each a drink, hand her a glass.

“Thank you for the computer,” she says.

I’m not expecting that, but I nod in acceptance.

“Why do you want me here?” she asks right away.

“You asked me the same thing last night.”

“I still don’t understand.”

“Why did you offer yourself?” I ask. Same as last night. I guess we’re both on repeat.

She shakes her head. She won’t answer.

I slide one hand into my pocket, search her eyes.

“Do I scare you, Cilla?”

She shakes her head, but the way her throat works when she swallows, the way her eyes widen, it tells me I do.

“You’re a liar,” I say. I swallow my drink, set the glass down and kneel on the floor before her chair.

Startled, she sits up straighter, her free hand grips the arm of the chair. I put my hands on her closed knees and push them apart. She makes a sound, and the ice in her glass clinks when she sets it down. I can’t see her expression because I’m not looking at her face as I push the dress up, draw her toward the edge of the chair. I hold her legs wide, exposing her inch by inch until her pussy comes into view.

My hands squeeze her thighs. I study the wet, pink mouth of her sex, draw her folds open with my thumbs and bring my face to her, my nose to her, my mouth to her. I inhale deeply, her scent an aphrodisiac. She swallows audibly and her fingernails are digging into the arms of the chair. And when I sweep my tongue over her clit, she gasps.

I have never enjoyed eating a woman like I do Cilla. After that first taste, I devour her, tasting every inch of her, dipping my tongue inside her, taking her swollen clit into my mouth and sucking. I watch her face when I do, feeling her hands lock around my head, pulling me to her and pushing me away at once, and it’s not long before she throws her head back, giving herself to it, to the pleasure, to me, coming on my tongue, her taste the most delicious taste.

When I’m finished, I stand. I wipe my mouth with the back of my hand as Cilla watches me, her breathing short, her face flushed. The shoulder of her dress has slipped, exposing one breast. I reach down, take hold of the dress and push it to her waist so she’s sitting with her pussy and her tits exposed.

“Hands and knees,” I say, pointing to the floor at my feet.

She doesn’t move, just sits staring up at me. I bring my hand to her face, touch her cheek, twist it around to the back of her head and urge her down.

“Hands and knees,” I repeat as she slides to the floor, but doesn’t quite get into the position. She remains kneeling there, looking up at me.

I strip off my jacket and open my shirt. I don’t have time to undress. I walk around her, kneel behind her. She doesn’t look back. I slide her dress up her back and when it’s at her neck, I push her head to the floor. She lowers herself onto her elbows, her forehead on the carpet. I undo my pants, widen her knees with my own as I take my position behind her. I settle in, take her hips in my hands, spread her wide, and I look at her. I just look at her for a long time. Her back is arched, her cunt is dripping. When I close my thumb over her tight little asshole, she gasps, clenches. I slap her hip.

“This is mine too. I want to see what’s mine. Touch it. Fuck it.” My voice is a low, deep growl. She cranes her neck to look behind her. “Mine, Cilla.”

She swallows, faces forward. I wonder if she’s preparing herself to be fucked in the ass, but that’s not the hole I want tonight. Still, I close my finger over it, push a little, only because I can. Because I want her to know I own her. I own this hole. I own every part of her.

She makes a sound, but I see how her pussy is leaking down her thigh. I guide my cock toward her wet cunt, take my time tonight, watch her stretch to take me. She’s tight, so fucking tight, and I know from the sounds she’s making it hurts her, but I also know that pain will only intensify her pleasure. Intensify mine.

I push deep into her, taking in a breath, closing my eyes as her warmth engulfs me, resting here for one moment before pulling out to fuck her. I watch my cock disappear into her folds, hear the sounds she makes when I do, feel myself thicken inside her, until, finally, I bury myself in her, gripping her hard, her throbbing walls milking my cock, taking everything I give, everything I have.

I slump backward, my back to the chair. Cilla pulls away, draws her dress up over her shoulders, down over her hips as she stumbles to her feet, her hair out of it’s neat bun, now looking like she’s just been thoroughly fucked.

She’s watching me with a look on her face I can’t quite figure out, can’t quite look away from.

“Am I getting another computer tomorrow?” she asks, pushing the shoulder of the dress that keeps sliding down her arm back up.

I rise, closing my pants as I do.

“Or something else?” She takes a step backward, and I realize she’s now barefoot. I don’t know why that strikes me. She looks around like she’s thinking. “Maybe a car? I don’t know. I mean, what’s next when you start with a laptop?”

I chuckle, make my way to the liquor cart.

“It’s funny to you, isn’t it? I’m funny to you.”

I pour a whiskey into a new glass, cap the bottle and take my time turning to her, the crystal tumbler in my hand. Studying her, I sip. Swallow. Feel it burn my throat.

“Is my cum sliding down your thighs?” I ask.

After everything, she’s not expecting that. She shifts her gaze, her eyes glisten like she’s on the verge of tears. I don’t need tears though. I don’t want them. She’s here for one thing and one thing alone. I have to remember that.

“I hate you,” she finally says.

“You’ve told me that already.”

She walks to the door, puts her hand on the knob, turns it.

“Cilla.” It’s a quiet command to stop.

She does but doesn’t turn to face me.

“You’re not excused.”

She stands there, clearly unsure what to do. How far to push me. So I push her instead.

“I need you to get back on your knees and clean my dick.”

Tears have wet the skin around her eyes when she slowly turns her face to me. I watch her. I sip my drink. I’m an asshole, I know. But I can’t be anything else. She can’t be anything else than the thing I brought her here to be.

“Clean your own fucking dick, Killian Black.”

With that, she pulls the door open and rushes from the library and I laugh. I laugh so hard, I double over with it. So fucking hard, I almost spit the whiskey out of my mouth. But when I stop, it’s finished.

I look out into the hallway and wish I could hear her thoughts right now because she’s running for her life. I go to the door, close it. I then take the bottle of whiskey and sit in the seat she was just in. Her shoes are on the carpet, and the room smells of sex. I leave the glass and drink straight from the bottle. Because I won’t go after her tonight. I won’t punish her tonight.

This is good. What happened is good. Because it puts us firmly on our separate sides of the boxing ring, where we belong. We’re not friends. We’re not lovers. She is nothing to me and what happened this afternoon, that goddamned cross, it won’t happen again. I won’t lose control to those memories again. I won’t ever let them own me again.