“You like—you like to hurt me. I want you to hurt me.”
I laugh at her. “It’s more complicated than that, darling. I can’t always start with pain for you. It’ll only end up—” Well, fuck. I didn’t intend for my throat to get tight. I didn’t intend to get this close to the truth. That it’s too late for me, but it’s not too late for her. “There’s a limit to what you can take.”
“There’s not.”
I put my hand over her throat and press. “There is. If you want me to find it for you, I’ll fucking find it. But right now you’re going to come from the water running over your pussy.”
“I can’t.”
“You can. I’m making you do this. I’m ordering you to do this. It’s soft, and it’s warm, but it’s fucking relentless. It won’t stop until you come for me. I want this. I want you to feel this, just like I wanted you to feel me stretching your hole until your little ring was white and you were crying.” Haley trembles now, her hips rocking. “And if you’re very good, I’ll fuck you again. But your cunt needs to be wet. You need to come before I’ll touch you. Because once I start, darling, there’s no stopping me.”
She makes a sound of despair. Of hope.
“I’ll tear you apart.” I keep these words soft. Low. “I’ll be too much for you, and you’ll take me. You’ll take this. It’s making you come. You’re fucking filthy, and all it takes to make you come is the water.”
Haley takes in three quick breaths and then her orgasm arrives. It’s a hard victory, and her thigh quakes in my hands. She rocks up onto the ball of her foot and tries to fuck the air. Jesus, she’s sweet. And crying. A relieved cry. I’m going to reward her for it. I’m perfunctory with the towels because I don’t fucking care. All I care about is getting her to the bed and pulling her to the edge so I can kneel between her legs and tongue the evidence of her pleasure off heated flesh.
“Please, Leo,” she begs. “Please, please. I need you.”
One last lick of her, and then I’m on the bed, pushing into her warmth. She’s fucking soaked. I was cruel, with the shower. I knew it would be difficult for her. But I have to erase what they did. And if I have to hide gentleness in a show of cruelty to get her through, I will. I have to hope and fucking pray it works. I have to hope there’s a way to at least replace the sensation. To overwrite the past horror.
For now I fuck her with one hand braced on the headboard. “Hold yourself open for me. Like I just did to you.”
Haley’s breathless as one of her hands goes under her knee. “Oh—it’s deeper like that. I can feel—”
She’s swollen. Sensitive. Tight. The fluttering of her muscles cascades through her body and into mine. “Fuck, darling. I’m going to come. Your cunt is mine. Mine.” Harder. Deeper. Pleasure unhitches itself from my hips and surges into her. Haley puts her hand on the back of my neck. It pushes me over the edge. I can’t stop fucking her. Can’t stop rutting against her. Into more heat now. My heat.
The bedroom door opens.
“Leo?”
Daphne.
Haley freezes underneath me, but I don’t freeze. I can’t. Every muscle is wrapped up in filling her with cum. There is no stopping it.
My sister makes a strangled sound. Like she’s crying. Or about to scream. And I am so fucking sick of screaming. I am so fucking irritated. I push up from Haley as the last shudder fades. “What the fuck, Daphne? You throw a tantrum for days and now you want to talk in the middle of the night? Get out.”
Then I see it. The slant of light through the door. Illuminating our bodies. Mine, mainly.
Haley buries her face in my neck.
My bare neck.
I don’t have a fucking shirt on.
This is what it must be like to step on a landmine. My heart stops. I have enough time to realize what I’ve done before the explosion of heat and shame and rage. Daphne wasn’t supposed to see this. No one was ever supposed to see this. Showing Haley in broad daylight was like excising my soul and laying it out for her.
“Jesus. Daphne—”
She runs out, leaving the door open behind her, and I drop my head onto Haley’s shoulder and breathe her in. With one gentle hand, she rubs the back of my neck. “Are you okay?”
I kiss her collarbone and get out of bed, which is the last thing I want. “I’m fine.” Lie. “I’m going to go talk to her.”
Once I’m fully fucking clothed, I pad across the house. Daphne’s staying in a tower suite overlooking the woods. The floor above the bedroom is a small studio where she can paint.
Light from Daphne’s room cuts across the floor. She’s left the door partway open. It swings open under my hand. This is not the first time I’ve come to Daphne’s room to talk to her. It’s a different room now. She’s older. But some things are the same.
She sits at her desk, head down, face buried in her arms. My chest caves in. I’ve done everything in my power to let Daphne be whoever she wants to be. Sweetness and innocence don’t last long for Morellis. I’ve given her as much time as I could. Shielded her from as much pain as I could. I didn’t want her to be like me.
And yet.
This pose is so familiar. She could be me, sitting in that pew at church, waiting for the pain to pass and knowing it never will.
I step into the light. “Daphne.”
She lifts her head from her arms. In the soft lamplight her eyes are red. Cheeks splotchy. “Who did that to you?” A pause. Her chin dimples, the way it does when she’s going to cry. “Was it Dad?”
* * *
Haley’s in my personal library when I get back, curled up under a blanket with Jane Eyre in her lap. Every one of my scars is on fire. I can feel the individual wounds. My head swims with exhaustion. With the agonizing stress of having to have this conversation with Daphne. So when Haley opens her arms, I go. It infuriates me that we’re limited in the ways I can hold her, that I can be with her, because of me.
But fuck it. I get to my knees by her chair. Rest my head on her lap. Let her fold her arms over me.
It feels familiar here. Haley reaches for the lamp and turns it off. Starshine feels better than naked light.
“You did this once when you were sick,” she says, running her fingers through my hair.
“Did I?”
“Yeah. You were having a nightmare.”
“I was dreaming of hell.” I remember that part. I remember Eva, and Haley. I don’t remember doing this. It feels like a last resort. It feels like having my chest cut open and my heart exposed. “I was dreaming of—other things.”
If Haley asks me, I’ll tell her. I told her after my fever stopped boiling my brain that we would talk about what happened, and we haven’t.
She takes a deep breath. “How is Daphne?”
“She’s pissed at me. Even more now. For not telling her earlier.”
“You couldn’t tell her.”
“No, I fucking couldn’t. She was five years old when Caroline happened.” Regret taps at my ribs. “She’s hurt, and she’s angry that I’m keeping her here, and it’s—” I let out a breath. Haley curves her hand over the back of my neck. “I’m not happy about it. She used to tell me everything. Even shit I didn’t want to know. Not anymore. And now she thinks I kept a secret from her because I thought she couldn’t handle it.” There. Is that enough penance? Everything above my waist aches. “Do you miss your family?”