Page 104 of Honey Cut
I seize abruptly, my womb clenching into a fist, my breath shivering in my chest without leaving my lungs. And then with a cry, everything shudders into undulations of filthy, gorgeous pleasure, and I’m grabbing Tristan’s head and fucking his face as hard as I can. That dark-gold hair is still in my mind, though, that hot mouth around my nipple. And there would be cruel words as I came, for Tristan and me both, and the cruel words would be unbearably depraved; they would light me on fire.
I’m still rocking my hips into Tristan’s mouth when I hear the voices.
Tristan and I are fast—faster than most people—and tonight, we are almost fast enough.
Almost.
Mark, Andrea, Dinah, Lady Anguish, and a handful of people I’ve never seen before emerge from the fog, clearly on some kind of pleasure stroll. They’re in club clothes, holding drinks, smiling and laughing, and Tristan and I have fixed our clothes and sprung apart by the time we can all see each other. Except…
Except my panties are lying crumpled on the flagstones near Tristan’s feet. A white-silk beacon in the dark.
The laughter and chatter die down as everyone sees us, as everyone sees that Mark’s wife and Mark’s bodyguard are standing alone in a dark corner of the garden. I can see them starting to look at Mark, straining to see his expression in the hazy gloom, to see if he’s angry or indifferent or confused.
I pray the darkness is enough to hide my and Tristan’s swollen lips and stained cheeks. I pray that he doesn’t see the panties, that he will come to the conclusion that would have been true fifteen minutes ago—that I was alone in the garden and Tristan was trying to fetch me because that’s his forever job. Isolde fetcher.
I pray even that Mark’s pride will urge him to cut the moment short, to pull me close and pretend nothing is wrong and then punish me and Tristan later.
But then Andrea says, her voice full of malign triumph, “I told you, Mark. I told you they wouldn’t stop.”
I can’t see enough to be sure, but I think Mark closes his eyes. The people around him are completely silent now, and their curiosity is as thick in the air as the fog, and Tristan is angling himself in front of me, like he can shield me from their suspicion.
I wish I could shield him from whatever happens next. I wish I could shield him from what I’ll have to do in the name of the Church.
Something pinches in my chest as reality returns. As I remember that it doesn’t matter how Mark feels right now or what he does.
I’m still supposed to kill him.
Mark steps forward, his dress shoes moving from wet grass to the damp flagstones. He bends down and picks up the handful of silk at Tristan’s feet.
“Your mouth is still wet,” he says to his bodyguard as he stands up.
And then to me, he says, “We’ll talk tomorrow.”
I step forward, but it’s too late. He’s moving, taking his retinue with him, and with one last venomous look from Andrea, they’re all gone in the fog.
forty
TRISTAN
Isolde didn’t cry againafter Mark left or while I took her up to the apartment. He wasn’t there, was presumably back in the hall, and I could sense her miseryandher relief that she was alone.
“You shouldn’t be here with me tonight,” she’d murmured. “In case he comes back.” And she was right, of course, but I still hated leaving her. I still hated walking away knowing that she’d be alone with her thoughts, that she’d have to lie down in that empty bed and stare up at the water, not knowing whether Mark was going to come back.
After that, I debate going to the hall—I am still his bodyguard, even if he did just pick up his wife’s panties near my feet—but I don’t think I can bring myself to face him right now. Not in front of all those prying eyes, not in front of Andrea. Not when I don’t even know what I could say to begin to explain myself becauseIdon’t even know. That she was just so pretty and so sad and when I’m not touching her, my breath can’t settle in my lungs?
That loving her feels like loving him?
No. Even I can hear how stupid all of that is. That it happens to be true doesn’t make it any less cheap.
So I go back to my apartment, and I shower and brush my teeth and pull on a soft shirt and drawstring pants like I’m going to fall asleep, and then I lie on my bed and stare at the ceiling. Thoughts don’t come—neither do feelings. It’s just images and sounds, slices of memory all jumbled together: Mark standing up in the garden with the silk underwear in his hand, Mark’s foot kicking mine away from the shattered glass on the ground as he fucked me in two, Isolde looking up at me from the cage of my arms as we screwed slowly in the October sunlight. Mark and Isolde arguing over a chessboard, Mark and Isolde kissing at the altar on their wedding day, Isolde with sea spray on her mouth. Mark at Morois House, the smell of rain on stone.
Mark, Isolde, Mark, Isolde.
Is it really the worst thing you’ve done?a cruel voice asks me.Get in the middle of a marriage? When you let McKenzie die in a dirty puddle behind some Soviet-era opera house? When you shot Sims in the neck? When you killed scores and scores of other people and never even learned their names?
I can’t lie in bed anymore after that.
I get up and find a beer and go out to the shallow balcony just off my living room. It’s brisk outside, but the night air feels good, a reminder that I’m still pumping blood and absorbing oxygen, that I’m still a body and not just a collection of bad decisions.
