Page 29 of Salt Kiss
I reach for his hand, panicked, air-starved, and his blue eyes sweep over me in a cool arc, assessing. And then his hand is on the back of my neck, and I’m pushed down so my head is between my knees.
“Breathe,” he says, and it’s a command; I recognize it as a command.
I try to obey, my ribs working but nothing else, and I think I can still taste blood in my mouth, and then Mark snaps, “Breathe,” again, in a voice so sharp and mean that I’m shocked into sucking in a breath.
And then another.
And then another.
Mark keeps his hand on my neck, and it’s as cruel and insistent as his voice, and I’m shivering with relief—that the nightmare is gone, that I’m here and not in that cold, gray forest. That someone is telling me what to do and then making me do it.
When he’s finally satisfied that I’m breathing, he lifts his hand. “Sit up,” he commands, and I do. Something rolls down my jaw and drops—tears.
Embarrassment punctures the relief, and I try to wipe them away as quickly as possible.
Mark sits on the edge of the bed and watches me, his face in its usual neutral expression. But his eyes...there’s a recognition in his eyes that makes it harder to stop crying.
“I saw the reports, the classified ones,” he says. Quietly.
“Don’t tell me it wasn’t my fault,” I say. My voice is hoarse, broken. “Don’t say I’m a hero. I am so fuckingsickof people calling me a hero.”
“Heroes are make-believe,” Mark says, and startled, I look up at him.
I didn’t expect him to say that. No one says that.
As if he knows what I’m thinking, a bitter smile crosses his face. “They’re all lying to you or they’re all lying to themselves, and no option is better than the other. I only knew one hero, President Colchester, and surprise, he’s dead now. You weren’t a hero that day because you did something much harder than being a hero, and that was doing the necessary thing, the fuckinghardthing, the thing that no one else in your squad had the guts to do. And no matter how many times you wake up unable to breathe, you’ll know this: you couldn’t have done a single thing differently.”
He stands up and goes to the table next to me. There’s a clink, a glug, and a glass of amber whiskey is pressed into my hand.
“Drink,” he orders, and I drink. It burns, and the scald of it anchors me to...something. Myself, I guess.
“Thank you, sir.”
“Next time, just sleep in the bed,” Mark says.
Eleven
Our first twodays in Singapore go precisely to plan, and enough so that by the time we visit the kink club, a glass-and-metal confection near the massive glowing gardens by the bay, I think I’m ready to talk to Mark.
About being available. For him.
At first, I think the readiness comes from Singapore itself, bright and busy, and still lush somehow, despite the high-rises and car-choked streets.
And then I think maybe it comes from watching Mark meeting with the Lyonesse member, from walking behind them in the gardens and realizing that people are stopping to stare at Mark. He’s that handsome, that well made, that merely prowling around in a casual gray suit is enough to turn heads in one of the busiest cities in the world. And it’s more than his features and athletic frame; it’s the way he moves—effortless, unconscious power.
Who wouldn’t want to give themselves to someone like that? Someone strong and lovely and sovereign?
But I know—and I think I knew it then too—that the readiness is because of the plane. Because he helped me not with sympathy or soft, coaxing words but with sharp commands and a strong hand on my neck. Because he didn’t call me a hero. Because he understood that killing Sims hadn’t been something as easy as being good or being brave.
He is maybe the only person who seems to understand that.
And maybe I want to give him something in return for that gift, that understanding. Or maybe I just want him, and to hell with the consequences. So what if I fall in love with him and he doesn’t love me back? I’ll still be his to use. That’ll be enough.
And so I wait until we’re done at the club, done touring its excesses: the small indoor Ferris wheel equipped for sex, the tractable subs and terrifying Dominants, the wealth dripping from necks and fingers and liberally poured wine bottles. I wait until we get back to our hotel suite, with its two separate bedrooms, the colorful lights of the gardens at night pressing against the windows.
“Sir,” I say as Mark walks toward his room.
He’s already stripped off his jacket and draped it over his arm, and his fingers are on a cuff link. “Yes?” he asks. It’s been a long day and his hair has freed itself from the elegant hairstyle he favors. Some of it has fallen forward over his forehead. It looks heartbreakingly soft.
