by Lacey Alpha
“Touch yourself,” I growl and she slowly slides a hand down her stomach, reaching between her legs.
A low noise escapes my throat and I unbuckle my jeans, releasing my aching erection. I take my throbbing length in my fist, rubbing up and down in time with her own soft strokes of herself.
She moans and I close my eyes, sighing at the sound.
“This is for you, Ethan,” she breathes and my end twitches with pleasure.
“Are you wet, Lise?” I rub myself harder, growing impatient.
“Yes,” she moans, sliding her fingers into her pussy.
I'm desperate for her, jerking myself off harder.
“Get up,” I snap and she does, her eyes still closed.
I release my cock, moving to the wardrobe and fetching a scarf. Pulling it over her eyes, I tie it tightly in place. She reaches out, her fingers grazing my cock.
Fuck.
In a swift movement, she slides off the bed, dropping to her knees in front of me. I try to move away but she guides me between her lips and I lose the ability to fight. I'm too big for her mouth but she attempts to take me all the way in, tugging off the base of my cock when she fails.
I groan, taking hold of the loose end of the scarf hanging down her back and gripping it tightly.
She slides me further into her mouth and somehow goes all the way this time, my end hitting the back of her throat. I hiss through my teeth, teetering on the edge of coming.
I let her continue until I'm about to explode even though she's anxious to continue. I tug her away, bending low and sweeping her into my arms.
She squeals in surprise and I carry her through to the lounge, darkness swimming in my mind. I take her to the very window she's afraid of. The one she saw me through.
I place her down, ripping the curtains open and pressing against her spine.
She stumbles forward, her body squashing against the pane.
“No one's going to watch you tonight but me,” I say in her ear.
She releases a little murmur of excitement and I press into her harder.
“Are you afraid, Lise?”
“No,” she breathes. “Not with you here.”
“Whoever was out there would probably like to do this to you.”
She inhales at my words. “Ethan,” she rebukes but I can hear the desire in her voice.
“He'd fuck you until you were screaming,” I growl, positioning my cock between her legs.
“You're twisted,” she laughs and I bite her ear.
“You have no idea.” I push inside her, groaning my pleasure at her tightness.
She tilts her hips, giving me access, letting me push in deep. She's soft and warm and wet around me, squeezing me.
I pump in and out of her, crushing her to the glass, resting my hands on the cool pane. I gaze out at the fire escape, seeing myself reflected in the window. I hold her hips, ramming into her, high on this twisted fantasy.
I slow my pace, revelling in her. “He'd be a lucky guy, wouldn't he?”
She moans softly. “I'm the one who's lucky.”
“Are you sure about that?” I fuck her harder, not letting her answer as she arches her back, groaning in ecstasy.
“Yes,” she gasps when I give her some relief, rocking into her slow and steady.
Heat rolls up my cock and I know I'm seconds from finishing. I have to get her there first.
Her body grips me tightly and I force my way into her, driving in so far that she cries out. I move in closer, widening her legs, kicking her heels apart, flattening her to the glass.
I run my fingers in soft strokes up her side, worshipping her silken skin.
I want to claim her orgasm, stealing it for myself. A sick part of me wants her to know that I'm both the man who terrified her and the man who fucked her until she could barely stand.
She goes slack, moaning my name as she comes, clenching me hard. I'm pushed over the edge, groaning, resting my head against her shoulder as I finish inside her.
She falls against me and I catch her, savouring the feel of her around me a second longer. I tug free of her, turning her to me and placing a soft kiss on her lips.
As my desire ebbs away, the guilt sweeps in on cue. What the fuck is the matter with me?
Twisted creep.
I release the blindfold from her and she ducks her head into my chest. I frown, stroking her hair, hating that she has to hide those beautiful amber eyes from me.
“No one's ever made me feel like that,” she says into my shirt.
I raise my eyebrows at the comment.
“I like that you push my boundaries,” she continues. “I like that you frighten me sometimes. Is that wrong?”
I remain silent. Yeah, it's wrong. Mainly because she has a very good reason to be genuinely frightened of me.
I grip her tighter, running my hands over her naked body, eyeing our reflection in the window. I'm a dark figure, barely distinguishable with the way the light is directed on her. She's bared in my arms, surrounded by me.
My time without her has left me sinking into darkness again. And now it's endangering her. I'm becoming the monster I was beyond the glass, right here beside her.
ETHAN
I'll see Clarissa again today. The torture is the only time I escape the guilt. And after yesterday, I'm riddled with it.
I roll over, reaching for the phone on my bedside table, finding Annalise calling.
I'm lifted from the darkness momentarily, holding it to my ear and answering.
“Hello,” my voice is dry, croaky. When was the last time I drank something?
“Ethan?” she says, a note of hope in her voice.
“Hi, how are you?” I ask, genuinely concerned, my ache for her stirring deep in my body.
“I'm...okay. Are you busy today?”
Busy. When was the last time I was 'busy'? “No. Do you want to come over?”
The deeper I get with this girl, the harder it is to pull myself out. I crave her like a wolf craves meat.
“Yeah, okay.” I can hear the smile in her voice and I know exactly what's on her mind. My end twitches at the thought of what I did to her yesterday.
Filthy, fucking, freak.
My gut writhes as I check the clock on the wall. I have to be at Clarissa's soon. Perhaps her torture will prepare me to spend an evening with Annalise, without the voice in my head.
“Can you come over at six?”
“I'll be there.”
She waits on the line and I ache to say something worthwhile. The L word hovers on my lips and I bite my tongue.
You can't love, Ethan Harding. This is obsession.
“See you soon?” she says, hopeful. And I'm glad she hasn't lost that part of herself since her father's passing, her hope, her light.
“See you soon,” I echo, hanging up, standing.
I shut my eyes as my world shifts precariously, making me feel unbalanced.
You shouldn't see her, scum. Let her go.
A sharpness rips through my chest.
There is only one reprieve from my pain, the bitter voice in my head, the person who understands me best.
Clarissa.
⊱✿ ✿⊰
“Tell me what you are.”
I screw my eyes up, the agony in my head a thousand times worse than any physical torture she can inflict on me.
My father is more present than ever and I know it has to do with how I acted yesterday. I'm losing myself to darkness, succumbing to it. And this is the only way to fix it.
WORTHLESS. PATHETIC. COWARD.
“Just fucking do it!” I bark at her.
She twists the tazer into my side, the serrated edges burrowing into my skin, electricity pouring through every fibre of my body.
I hang my weight on the leather buckles around my wrists, roaring through gritted teeth.
All at once, it stops.
“Tell me what you are, Ethan.”
I open my eyes, panting, hanging forward, gazing do
wn into Clarissa's puddle-green eyes. She's close, just a few inches from my face, looking up at me, her mouth open, panting.
I groan at the sharpness in my chest. It's like my father is nearby, lurking in the shadows. He's just out of sight, carrying a cricket bat, dragging it along the ground, the wood chafing on the floorboards, sending fear into my veins.
I'm there again, cowering on the floor.
“What's the point, Ethan? Why do you even bother to fight?” His voice is a snarl, dripping with hatred. He kneels before me, exhaling the smell of vodka, making an acrid taste rise in my throat.
My head is sticky and warm, my cheek turning to ice as it lays against the cold floor.
Fingers slide into my hair and I'm forced to look up at him. He's impossibly huge, his form dominating everything in my sight.
“Be a man, Ethan. Get the fuck up,” he's slurring now, standing, moving to the bottle of vodka he left on the dining table.
I push myself up, my hands trembling. I curl them into fists as I gaze down at the harsh grain in the floorboards. Blood drips in a steady stream from a split by my eye. The same blood that's on the edge of the cricket bat.
My father weighs it in his hands. “One good swing. That's all it took to knock you down. You're no fucking son of mine. You're pathetic,” he spits, saliva flying through his clenched teeth.
I brace myself on the dresser that houses are family photos. My father left them there, after my mother walked out. They sell the lie that we're happy, but the last photo added to that cabinet was when I was barely three years old. Just before she left.
I'm woozy, seeing double as I try to regain my thoughts.
“Tell me what you are, Ethan,” Clarissa's voice fills my ears but I can't see her.
“You're pathetic, boy.” My father spits at my feet, moving forward and grabbing my collar in his fist. “Say it.”
“I'm pathetic,” I breathe, the words leaving my lips in both the vision and reality.
My father shoves me against the dresser. Electricity simultaneously explodes through my body.
“Worthless, piece of shit!” he roars at me.
I remember this day. The day I fought back.
He grabs me by the throat with both hands, the bat dropping to his feet. I'm almost as tall as him, sixteen years old and starting to fill out. I grab his wrists, trying to pull him off.
“You're just like your mother. A failure at life.” His eyes blaze at me, the same shade as mine but they're bloodshot too, red around the rim.
I'm not sure if it was the dig at me or the dig at my mother that made me snap. But either way, I broke, the chains around my body finally loosening enough to give me a glimpse of hope.
I find the strength in me to snatch his hands away, shoving him back. I don't know if it was the fact that he was inebriated or just caught off guard by me fighting back. Either way, he lost his footing, stumbling.
I rush at him, my hands around his throat, forcing him to the ground.
“FUCK YOU!” My grip tightens, my fingers aching, cramping. I squeeze and squeeze, desperate to steal the life from him.
He knocks the table with his flailing legs and the bottle of vodka drops to the floor with a clunk, rolling toward his hand.
“Eth-an-” a choked noise. A woman's.
I'm jolted back to the room.
I'm on the ground, knelt over Clarissa, my hands around her throat, crushing her windpipe, the remains of the broken leather straps on my wrists.
My heart lurches as she jams the electrode into my side.
I convulse, falling off her onto my back, gasping.
She sits up, holding her neck, her eyes wide. Her skirt has ridden up her thighs, her body twisted awkwardly toward me.
I pant, my mind reeling, my hands hurting. The scars on my forearm burn afresh, the memory of the broken vodka bottle lacerating my skin bursting to the forefront of my mind.
Clarissa scrambles onto her knees, eyeing me, drawing down breaths in deep rasps. I jam my fingers into my eyes, trying to recover, desperate to get a handle on the panic invading my body.
“Ethan,” Clarissa says in a rasp.
“I'm sorry, I'm sorry,” I murmur, screwing up my eyes.
“You're a force to be reckoned with, Ethan.” There's pride in her voice and I don't understand it, I just roll onto my side, bringing my knees to my chest, holding my head in my hands.
She lays a palm on my back; it's cool against my burning skin.
Gently, she strokes me.
I crumble, my body shivering, my heart aching.
“Hush now,” she breathes, continuing to soothe me in patient strokes.
When I finally stop shaking, she stands, walking around so I'm faced with her crimson high heels.
She crouches, slipping a finger under my chin and tilting my head back.
My heart clenches as I meet her eyes. She done something to me, something I can't quite comprehend. Like all the fear I have for my father has been transferred onto her.
“You'll come upstairs now, won't you?” she says softly.
I nod, my heart racing.
I push myself to my feet and Clarissa takes my arm, her fingers curling around my bicep.
I don't need much encouragement, hounding after her like she's holding a leash around my throat.
“I'm sorry,” I repeat, hanging my head.
“It's alright, Ethan. I understand.”
And I really feel that she does. Like she's the only person in the world who truly understands me. She sees me for what I am and there's something both freeing and terrifying about that.
“Go home,” she orders, opening the front door for me, handing me my shirt.
I tug it on, nodding and walking away, feeling like a crucial part of me has been wrenched from my body. Like I'm not the same man I was when I came here today.
And the worst thing of all – or perhaps it's the best thing - is the fact that I feel nothing, like that vacant space inside me is growing, sucking every part of myself down into it, erasing who I am forever.
ANNALISE
I'm anxious, waiting on the step outside Ethan's house, hugging my knees to my chest. Rain pours down from the sky, the porch just covering me.
It's funny how a million sounds can become one. The singular drips slowly gathering into a thundering roar.
I gaze at the sheet of water hammering the ground, shivering from the cool air.
I don't know if I should wait for Ethan. He said he'd be here over an hour ago. Where is he?
I go through stages of anger to intense worry. Switching from 'what if he doesn't want me?' to 'what if something's happened to him?' every few seconds.
A dark figure appears through the blanket of rain, his hood up, his eyes shadowed and dark.
I spring to my feet, hurrying into the rain to meet him.
“Ethan!” I cry over the rush of noise.
He doesn't stop, his shoulder rubbing mine as he passes me, heading up the steps.
My heart wrenches as I turn, gazing after him, my body already soaked from the few moments I've been exposed.
“Ethan?” I try again.
“Go home, Annalise,” he orders, his tone flat.
My heart aches at his words. But I've been here for over an hour and I'm not going to just let him away with abandoning me like that. He was the one that invited me here!
He unlocks the door, pushing inside.
I hurry after him, catching the door before it swings shut.
He heads upstairs and I stomp after him, rage burning in my chest. “Hey! Are you seriously not going to give me an explanation for this? I've been waiting for you for over an hour!”
He ignores me, continuing to climb the stairs.
I frown at his silence, jogging after him. What the hell is his problem?
I reach his flat, slipping in after him, my pulse rising.
“Ethan?!” I snap, my patience at an end.
He turns to me, pulling off his shirt in a s
wift movement. His eyes are hollow, gazing at me like he's not really seeing me.
My rage flatlines at the sight of his marred body. Bloody wounds cover his torso, still oozing, each one a perfect triangle.
I gasp, clapping my hands to my mouth. “Who did this to you?”
My eyes water as I approach, my hands shaking as I reach out to touch him.
He remains stock still, silent as I gently circle my fingers around one of the punctures.
“What is this? Tell me,” I demand, fear darting through my body.
Has someone hurt him? Or did he do this to himself?
“This is the answer to my problems,” he growls, dropping his shirt to the floor.
I frown, not understanding, but desperate to. I lift my eyes to his and he stares blankly back at me, not even flinching.
I inhale slowly, holding his gaze, wondering how this is possible. How is he looking into my eyes without being in pain?
“I've been cured,” he says, his voice low.
I shake my head, moving away, disgusted that someone would do this to him.
Heading to the kitchen, I try to stop my hands from shaking as I search the cupboards for antiseptic. Finding a bottle of iodine and some cotton wool, I return to him. He's sunk down onto the edge of the bed, his eyes on the floor, his shoulders sagging.
“You're not yourself,” I breathe, kneeling on the bed beside him, eyeing his back where more of the bloody marks are branded on his skin. Between them are faint lines, scabbing over.
“What are these?” I murmur, grazing my fingertips over the marks.
He says nothing and I sigh, opening the bottle of iodine and pouring some onto a bud of wool. Carefully, I dab his wounds. He doesn't even flinch, though it must hurt like hell.
I work slowly, meticulously, making sure every one of them is tended to.
When I'm finished, I place the bottle on the bedside table, standing.
I move round to face him, crouching down and taking his hand. He doesn't move, gazing through me, unseeing.
Tears prick my eyes and I choke them back, lifting his hand to my mouth and kissing it.
“Ethan, please talk to me. What happened to you?”
His eyes find mine at last, giving me that same blank stare that is entirely unaffected by me.
A tear leaks from my eye and slowly, he lifts his hand, wiping it from my cheek. I reach up, cupping his jaw, running my thumb in soft strokes over his stubble.
