She came out as I finished putting out her tea. She wore a long-sleeved, black turtleneck and skinny jeans. She walked stiffly, but her smile was loose and relaxed.
“Good morning,” I said.
“The king sets the table.”
“He’s hungry.” I put my hands at her neck and kissed her. Her lips tightened. I pulled back and saw what had made her flinch—a tiny smear of reddish-grey where my fingertip had touched her jaw. Stroking her collar away, I saw that her neck was covered in bite marks and bruises. “Jesus Christ.”
She refolded the collar until her neck was covered. “I didn’t know whether to show you or not.”
“Up.” I tugged at the hem of her sweater. She bit her lip. “Come on.”
“The last time I looked like this, you felt too bad about it to f**k me.”
I pulled up the shirt. She lifted her arms, her face contorted in pain. I pulled the sweater off completely, and she tucked her head so the collar would expand around her. She stood before me, naked from the waist up, looking as though she’d been beaten in a back alley. The curves under her br**sts were deep red where blood vessels had broken under my teeth, and the mounds themselves were bruised. The bend of her neck had the same beaten mottle. Her biceps were blackened in fingertip shapes. I touched them lightly, drawing my fingers down to the striated ligature marks on her elbows.
“Your knees?”
“Yeah,” she said. “Matching marks on those. You tied me really tight.”
“You said it felt okay.”
“It did.”
“Your thighs? Your ass?”
“I’m fine.” She put her hand on my face, but I didn’t want to be comforted. I unbuttoned her pants.
“Come on,” I said. “Let me see.”
She slid her pants down, pain on her face. She’d have to put them back on and that would hurt, but it was too late to undo the order. I kneeled, sliding the jeans over her legs. Her thighs were a mess, and her knees did indeed have matching marks from when I’d tied the joints together with an extension cord.
“Don’t be sorry,” she said, stroking my hair as I kissed her bruised legs.
“I am.”
“I said not to be.”
“I don’t take orders.”
“You should try it. It’s amazing.”
From my kneeling position, I eased her into a chair and spread her legs, kissing the devastation inside them. I didn’t have a mother’s healing kiss on a scratched knee, but I had no other way to show her the pain in my heart at seeing her hurt and knowing that I’d done it and I’d do it again and again.
“You only came six times last night,” I said. “I promised seven.”
“I couldn’t take another.”
I probed her folds with my tongue. “Take it now.”
“I need my tea,” she groaned, running her fingers through my hair. I didn’t touch her with anything but my mouth. My hands had done enough damage. Though pain had been welcome a few hours earlier, the aftermath would be straight pain, without the accompaniment of pleasure. I wove my arms around her until her hands found mine, and I clasped them as my mouth worked in service to her. Gently. Without urgency. Her sweet, sore cunt tasted coppery, like raw flesh but got wet and responsive, her clit filling into a hard, slick pebble under me.
She groaned as I worked her with my tongue and lips, teeth tucked safely away. I looked up at the broken skin of her chest, making eye contact as her lips whispered my name, and I prayed to whatever deity would listen to please, please not take her away. She arched, clenched, gasped like the beautiful kitten she was. When I leaned up to her, fresh cunt on my lips, my phone dinged.
“You gonna get that?” she asked.
“When I’m done kissing you.” I put my hands on the arms of her chair and slowly put my lips on hers. I wanted an unrushed moment of forgiveness and gentleness.
“Can you make love to me?” she asked.
“No.”
“Why not?” She drew her legs around me. I knew it hurt.
“I’m flattered, but I’m simply not attracted to you.”
She had her hand on my erection before I could back away. “Really?” She smiled, kissing me, stroking me.
“That? That’s nothing. Something I left in my pocket.” She could stroke my dick all day, but there was no way I was taking her in the condition she was in.
“Please? I’ll beg.”
“Tempting offer. But I’m hungry.” I pulled away. As I went to sit down for breakfast, my phone dinged again, then rang.
“You’d better check it,” Monica said, pulling her sweater back over her head. “Could be a towering inferno at Hotel K and you didn’t know about it because you were eating eggs.”
I checked. Margie. And it was Sunday. I looked at Monica then pocketed the phone.
“Jonathan, I see your face. Take the call, would you?” She stepped into her jeans gingerly, eyes like chocolate coins, looking at me as if I was being serious over nothing.
“Save me some,” I said as I started to step away from the table.
“You got enough for an infield and everyone in the dugout.”
I slipped my phone out of my pocket and walked down the stairs to the driveway. With one look back at my goddess buttoning her pants, I answered the phone. “Margie. Working on the Lord’s day?”
“Your problems never rest, Jonny. Your beautiful and talented ex-wife wants a meeting.”
“Today?” I climbed up to Monica’s front porch, noticing the cracked, slipping foundation still hadn’t gotten fixed.
“Tuesday. And in other bad news, are you sitting?”
“Out with it.” I sat on the porch swing. It creaked.
Margie took a deep sigh of a breath, which she never did, because she was utterly unflappable.
“Come on. Speak. I’m sitting.”
“It’s Rachel.”
My brain stopped functioning.
“Jonny?”
“Can you be more specific?”
“Why did you move her a month ago?”
I heard Monica getting plates and silverware together. If I could hear her, she could hear me unless I was careful. Even if I remained cryptic, Monica had enough intellectual curiosity to connect the dots into the shape of a web of lies.
“I moved her to protect someone.”
“Monica? Or yourself?”
“Yes. I’m a selfish prick. I have someone I don’t want to lose, and I needed to protect that. If I left her where she was, Jessica could have shown Monica where she was. I needed to maintain a little plausible deniability.”