Dark Duet Platinum Edition

by CJ Roberts

  I can hear him. He moans against my lips. Softly, he inhales and exhales as we kiss. He never stops kissing me; he simply continues to steal my breath, returning it to me only when he’s infused it with his essence. Pure lust lives inside him. Every breath I take should come from his lungs.

  This is what it’s like to dream of him.

  This is what I lose when I wake.

  ***

  The situation is uncomfortable, to say the very least. In fact, it’s closer to insufferable. Agent Reed is not here. His invitation has been revoked by Dr. Sloan. I can’t say I’m unhappy about it. Still, it means I am alone with Dr. Sloan, and I can be unhappy about that.

  She found me crying yesterday. Gripping Caleb’s picture to my chest and rocking.

  I rather like rocking. I’m doing it now.

  She asked about the photo of course, asked about what had happened between Agent Reed and me. I refused to respond to her questions – she had nothing to offer me, no photos to dangle in front of me. I haven’t said a word since I was brought back to my room yesterday.

  Agent Reed returned this morning, ready for another round of what he calls an interview and what I refer to as an interrogation. Dr. Sloan got here an hour before he did. I watched, detached, as she asked Agent Reed to step outside with her. He gave me the stink-eye as he turned to leave. I guess he thinks I’m a rat. I don’t really care though, because it means I can keep quiet a little longer. When Dr. Sloan returned, she was obviously tense. Whatever was said left her in a huff. If I weren’t so grief-stricken, I might have smiled.

  She’s much calmer now. She has shut the door to my room, entombing us, but she hasn’t asked me any questions…yet. I rock back and forth, cradling Caleb’s photo in my hands as I sit on my bed. He is so beautiful. I love him so very much.

  Dr. Sloan is sitting in a chair near the corner, knitting a sweater of all things. It’s a strange design – unless she has a pet octopus she likes to put clothes on. A few times, I’ve been tempted to ask her what the fuck that is about.

  She catches me watching her.

  “It gives me something to do with my hands,” she says through a rueful smile. “A lot of times I am the last person people want to talk to. So I just sit down and knit. I understand the mechanics of it, but I haven’t really learned how to make anything. I guess you could call it ‘free-form knitting’.” She laughs at her own joke.

  This woman is ridiculous.

  For a moment there is a pause and I think we’ve reached the end of our one-sided conversation, but then she sighs and keeps right on talking.

  “I never really had anyone to teach me how to knit. I think most people learn from their mother or grandmother, but I grew up in foster care, so I had to learn on my own. I picked it up a few years ago when a friend of mine suggested I get a hobby. A mindless hobby. I’m a bit of an over-thinker. If I don’t find a way to shut my brain off, I just keep thinking and thinking and thinking. Mostly about work. My job can be pretty thankless sometimes.” She glances up at me and smiles again.

  I roll my eyes. She’s obviously trying to annoy me to death.

  “See, told you. Thankless.”

  For the love of Christ, shut – up! Let a bitch enjoy her mental breakdown in peace.

  “I liked it so much I picked up a few other hobbies.”

  Oh god. Please don’t.

  “I make my own beanie babies. Well, not really my own, because we already know I can’t knit or sew worth a damn, but I like to buy them, take them apart, and then put them back together in some pretty interesting ways. I like to call it ‘interpretive taxidermy’.”

  Kill me. Just, fucking, kill me.

  “It’s a little redundant I guess, since most taxidermy involves putting things together in an interpretive way. Still, I’m the only one who calls it that. It’s my own little spin.

  “Do you have any hobbies, Olivia?” She looks up at me.

  I can’t help the way my eyes narrow. I wish she’d stop calling me that.

  “You don’t like it, do you? When I use your name?”

  I give an infinitesimal shake of my head that isn’t really voluntary. The moment I catch myself do it, I scowl and stare down into my lap, at my handsome Caleb.

  Caleb.

  Don’t. Don’t think about him.

  Once again, I am a fragmented person. I am divided between the soft, sentimental girl who loves Caleb at all costs and the hard, logical version of me determined to survive – even at the cost of pushing Caleb from my heart.

  “Would you prefer Livvie? Your mom says everyone calls you Livvie.”

  Tears sting my eyes as I look up toward Dr. Sloan. She is studiously avoiding eye contact, focusing on yet another ‘arm’ of her strange outfit.

  I wonder, against my will, if my mother is here. I don’t want to see her, but…why hasn’t she come to see me? Everyone I love betrays me.

  Oh, god. Caleb.

  Yes, him too. Don’t think about him.

  “I spoke with her a great deal yesterday; she wanted to see you,” Dr. Sloan says casually. My heart is skipping every other beat. Panic is rising, but I breathe through it. Barely. “But when I stopped by to ask if it was something you might want….” She frowns and shakes her head angrily. I know she’s thinking about Reed. “I figured I’d wait for you to tell me what you want to do.”

  I nod shallowly and feel manipulated when I see her nod too. She’s getting in my fucking head and I haven’t even said anything.

  Caleb says all your emotions are on your face for all to see.

  Shut up and stop thinking about him. Be smart for once. Listen to me.

  I sigh. Thinking about Caleb hurts, but trying to move beyond my love for him hurts more. There’s no getting past the pain. There is only a different brand of pain available for my eager consumption.

  “Do you want to see your mother?”

  I don’t know whether the question is real, or a threat. I carefully abstain from signaling my emotions through my body language or facial expressions. I suppose it works, because Dr. Sloan resumes her ridiculous monologue about her hobbies.

  “I know what you must be thinking.”

  You have no fucking idea.

  “That I’m a silly woman with ridiculous hobbies.”

  Or maybe you do.

  “Though, you’d be surprised to learn, I’m not all free-form knitting and interpretive taxidermy. I have a dark side.”

  Hmm…doubtful.

  “When I’m really frustrated with things,” she giggles, “I like to get online and change things in Wikipedia!”

  This bitch…is weird.

  “I once made up a whole entry based on someone called the Christmas Amoeba. You see, I’m not much of a baker, and I made these holiday cookies for the people at the office. They came out horribly deformed. They tasted fine, mind you, but they were misshapen. Not a round cookie in the bunch.”

  I look at her octopus sweater. I’m fairly sure nothing this woman does with her hands is meant for people to see, let alone consume.

  “So I left a note next to the cookies. It was a story explaining how a small village near K2…. You know that big mountain, right?” She looks at me to make sure I’m following along.

  I lie down on my bed and huff at the ceiling. Where the hell is the nurse with my drugs?

  “Anyway, they made a movie about it. Not my cookies,” she cackles, so fucking amused with herself, “…the mountain. Can you imagine if they made a movie about my cookies? So, I made up this story about how this village near K2 celebrates someone called the Christmas Amoeba instead of Santa Claus. He sneaks in undetected – amoebas are microscopic, so it stands to reason someone who’s an amoeba would be very stealthy – on Christmas Eve and leaves presents for everyone. In return, the people of the village leave a variety of oddly-shaped cookies for the amoeba to eat. Amoebas come in a variety of shapes, so it makes sense.”

  She can’t see my face, so I don’t feel like a traitor for smili
ng at this preposterous woman’s story.

  “Well, the people in my office are just sticklers for the truth. You know, everything must be verified, blah, blah, blah. So sure enough, they do a Google search and – BOOM – up pops my entry on Wikipedia about the Christmas Amoeba.”

  She dissolves into peals of laughter.

  Oh my god, she really is crazy. I bite the inside of my cheeks to keep from laughing. She is laughing so hard. It’s infectious, but I resist it. My shoulders are trembling with withheld laughter. I shut my eyes to assist in the effort.

  Caleb is there the moment I shut my eyes.

  Joy turns to grief and before I can control it, my emotions just spill over. I open my eyes and bolt up in my bed. I laugh for a second before I burst into tears.

  I can hear Dr. Sloan moving. Her steps are coming toward me, cautiously. I don’t care. I’m too tired to care. After so many months of being careful, and hiding every emotion as best I can, and fearing the future, and not knowing what’s going to happen next, and thinking I might die, and fighting for my life, and hating Caleb, and loving him….

  For fucksake – I watched a man die!

  When Dr. Sloan silently puts her arms around me, I crush her to my body. I hold on to her with all my remaining strength. I cry all over this ridiculous fucking woman.

  She doesn’t say a word, and I’m grateful. Please, just hold me. Please, just hold me together.

  I’m so tired of holding myself together.

  She rocks me.

  I rather like rocking.

  Back and forth we sway for endless minutes while I cry and sob all over Dr. Sloan’s suit jacket. She smells nice. Her scent is light and almost fruity. It is distinctly feminine, and therefore far removed from Caleb. With this feminine scent saturating my nostrils, my brain cannot connect to memories of Caleb and the way he smelled when he held me. It feels nice, being free of the pain of missing him.

  Reluctantly, I pull away from her. I am still humming with shame. I don’t know what’s come over me. I wrinkle my brow in confusion and shake my head.

  Caleb’s scowling face is staring up at me from the photograph in my lap. I feel a pang of longing. Dr. Sloan pushes my hair from my face and I can’t help but think of it in a sexual way. In another time, I’d have thought nothing of it, but now all my interactions seem tainted by my newfound lust. Caleb trained me well.

  “I want to help you, Livvie. Talk to me,” she says, softly. I know she doesn’t want to startle me, but already I feel the tension creeping back into my shoulders. She’s standing too close, and the fact she’s talking to me makes me feel cornered.

  She must be able to tell, because she backs up. I relax, just a little.

  “I would like to see the charges against you dropped, but you have to talk to someone. Agent Reed is…” she searches for the word she wants to use, “very good at his job, and despite his behavior yesterday, he’s a great guy. However, his first priority is solving his case. My first priority is you. He shouldn’t have pushed you the way he did.”

  I look up at her from beneath my lashes. I wish she would hold me again.

  “I’d like a lawyer,” I whisper.

  “Of course. If you’re ready to talk, I’ll find a lawyer for you. But, Livvie, the things you need to talk about go far beyond the legal charges. I’m here to help you with that.”

  I nod, but say nothing else.

  Dr. Sloan returns to her chair and sits. She looks at me expectantly with her green eyes. She’s pretty, in a very down-played sort of way. With her red hair, the brown suit she is wearing does her no favors. Still, there is something about her, something warm and pleasant.

  When it becomes obvious I won’t be the one to keep our little conversation going, she reaches for her knitting and resumes the mindless design.

  Dr. Sloan presses her lips together, searching for words.

  “Do you want to see your mother?”

  I don’t hesitate. “No.”

  She stops knitting. “Livvie, the people who love you accept you for who you truly are. No matter what has happened to you.”

  “Well there you go. My mother doesn’t love me, Dr. Sloan. She wants to love me, I think, but…I just don’t think she does.”

  She nods, but I can tell she doesn’t believe me. What would she know?

  “I think your mother loves you a great deal.”

  I stare down at my picture of Caleb. I thought he loved me. Could it be the one person I discounted loves me more than the one I trusted completely? My heart aches. It’s a question I am not prepared to have answered.

  Slowly, I crawl under my covers. I want to go back to sleep. I want to be with Caleb again. In my dreams, there is never a reason to doubt my heart. In my dreams, he is everything I want him to be. He is mine.

  As if on cue, Dr. Sloan stops asking me emotionally-charged questions and once again regales me with tales of free-form knitting and interpretative taxidermy.

  Chapter Five

  Day 8:

  I’m feeling somewhat better today. I still miss Caleb; I don’t think the feeling will ever go away, but I can get through several minutes without wanting to break down and weep for him. It’s progress. Dr. Sloan says one day I’ll make it to an hour…a day…but that’s as far as I let myself hope. The thought of one day not thinking of him at all is just too much for me. It feels like a betrayal to ever hope for such things.

  Once again, I am sitting in the dreadfully cheery room they use to interrogate kindergarteners. This time, I don’t have to do very much talking. I have a lawyer to do it for me. He and Agent Reed have been battling it out for the last hour. David, my lawyer, isn’t much to look at, but he’s very smart and incredibly aggressive. There’s something super hot about watching the two of them argue…or maybe I just like Reed when he’s unsettled.

  His hair is somewhat disheveled from where he’s run his fingers through it so many times to keep from punching David in his face. Every now and again, his eyes flick to me and I feel a dark thrill just thinking about what he’d like to do to me if only he could. If he were Caleb, I would assume a spanking is most certainly in order!

  “When exactly did you imagine yourself as…? My lover?” My heartbeat vibrated my skull. “Was it the first time I made you come with my mouth? Or one of the many times since that I’ve put you over my knee? You seem to like that.”

  And there he is – Caleb, in my thoughts, in my blood. I can feel my face getting warmer, my stomach getting tighter, and already there is the drumbeat of my arousal pulsing between my legs. I squeeze them together and get so lost in my thoughts it takes me a second to realize Reed is still staring at me. When our eyes finally meet, I blush – hard. I smile when he blushes too.

  Agent Reed clears his throat and takes a drink of water. It’s enough to bring back his control. I sigh through my disappointment.

  “Agent Reed,” David says, reclaiming Reed’s attention, “my client is being held on ridiculous charges that would never stand up in court. She was living with her mother and attending high school at the time of her kidnapping. Even though she’s eighteen, the U.S. Attorney would be hard-pressed to try her as an adult. If she’s considered a minor and involved in a human trafficking case, under Section 107 of the Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2000 she’s protected from the FBI’s tactics of investigation. There’s no point in us even sitting here. I should be talking to the U.S. Attorney, not you.”

  Reed does not look happy, but he doesn’t look beat either. “Your client has two hundred fifty thousand dollars in a foreign bank account. How did it get there? She won’t say. Also, she’s been living with suspected terrorists. She’s admitted to it. Then, there’s the small matter of her knowledge of a meeting between enemies of the United States taking place in less than a week! We need information, and her refusal to give it qualifies as an obstruction of justice –”

  “What terrorists!?!” I yell at Reed and move to stand, but David calmly pushes me back into my seat.


  “Muhammad Rafiq, Jair Baloch, Felipe Villanueva, and of course Caleb,” he says. “Do you or do you not also have information about Demitri Balk?”

  “I never said I knew him!”

  “You said you knew where he’d be,” Reed says with a raised eyebrow.

  “Miss Ruiz, please stop talking and let me handle this,” David says in an irritated tone.

  “By the way,” begins Reed anew, ignoring my lawyer and focusing on me, “Balk is suspected of having ties to arms dealing and narcotics trafficking. And until I know how you,” he jabs his finger in my direction, “are involved, you’re a suspect too. You can deal with me or I can let the DEA and Homeland Security in here, and when they use Patriot Act against you, don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

  “That is enough,” David said firmly, glaring at us both.

  “Caleb is not a terrorist. I don’t know about the rest of them, but he’s not a terrorist! And neither am I! And–” A cold wave crashes over me. Felipe. I never said anything about Felipe. Reed knows things he’s not saying.

  Caleb! Fuck!

  I can’t breathe; all of the oxygen is suddenly being sucked from the room, from my fucking lungs! I keep taking deep, deep breaths, lots of them, but I can’t get any air.

  My heart is racing.

  I can’t breathe!

  “Olivia?” says Reed, and I can hear him shuffling around.

  “We’re done here, Agent Reed. I’ll be speaking to your superiors.” David reaches for me and tries to get me to stand. I don’t like his hands on me. I can’t breathe! He’s suffocating me. I need to think. I need to breathe.

  “Shut up! Everybody just shut up!” Reed and David go silent and I ignore them as I put my hands on the table in front of me and try to catch my breath.