Because she’s mine.
All mine.
My own Willow Girl.
No.
No, not that.
More than that.
She remains kneeling up, looking at me and I see us like this, me looming over her, her on her knees before me and all I can think is she’s doomed because I’m never going to let her go.
Never.
“What do you want?” she asks again, confused. Maybe a little disappointed. “Our exchange.”
Everything. Doesn’t she know that yet?
I turn to walk to the door.
“Gregory?”
I stop. I don’t look back.
“I’ll collect later.”
13
Amelia
I’m still trying to make sense of what I did when I wake up the following morning. It’s almost like I’ve been thinking about it all night. Like the thought is just continuing. When I kissed him like that, he seemed almost shocked by it. I know I was.
And then, what he did. Putting his hand over my heart.
And what I did. Putting mine over his.
I shake my head, flutter my eyelids open and I realize I’m not alone.
I don’t know when he came into the bed but he’s beside me now and I’m tucked into his chest. He’s holding me and he’s warm and I can’t even remember if I dreamt.
But when I realize what I’m doing, how I’m curled into him, I try to pull away, but his arm tightens around me.
“You talk in your sleep,” he says, and he sounds like he did before last night. Like the door that was, for the briefest moment, open, is, once again, locked and barred.
“I don’t.”
I push against him, and he lets me roll onto my back. I turn to him, find him watching me, see the book in the hand that wasn’t holding me.
“How long have you been awake?” I ask.
“A little while.” He puts the book aside and his gaze travels to my chest and I look down. I’m wearing a tank top and pajama shorts, but I still pull the blanket higher. “I didn’t want to wake you. You didn’t settle down until the sun came up.”
“I’m just not used to it here yet. What time is it?”
“Eleven.”
I sit up, rub my eyes. It must be the time difference.
He watches me and I look at him, at his wide shoulders, the tattoos there, my gaze falling on the broken wings of the angel whose face is hidden behind more ink and it’s strange to see that. Familiar, almost. He moves to sit up and my gaze shifts to the hard ripple of muscles on his belly. Seeing him like this, it makes my mouth water. It makes me want.
I swallow, clear my throat because when I look at his eyes, I know he knows what I’m thinking. I know he knows his effect on me.
“I want something,” I say, pushing that thought aside, because I have an idea.
“Do you?” He grins.
“It’s not what you think.” I roll my eyes, try to make light of it. I start to sit up.
“That’s too bad,” he says, climbing on top of me. “Lie down.”
“This isn’t…” I push against him, but I can’t get out from beneath his weight.
“You should sleep naked from now on,” he says, stripping me.
“Stop.”
“Spread your legs,” he says, looking at me.
“Gregory—”
“You want it. You know you do so spread your legs.”
I look back at him and when I hesitate, he takes hold of my thighs, pushes them wide, pinning them to the bed, and looks down at me. At my sex. He dips his head low and licks the length of me and I gasp.
“You taste good,” he says, meeting my eyes.
“I…” But he’s licking me again, and I don’t know why I go to pull him off me. It’s the last thing I want, but he stops me anyway. He grabs my wrists holds them apart and circles my clit with his tongue before taking it between his lips and sucking.
I can’t speak. I can hardly breathe. All I can do is make this strange sound, like it’s coming from deep inside my chest, and I find myself arching my back, pushing myself into him.
But, abruptly, just when I’m moments from coming, he stops, gives me a wide grin and kneels up between my legs. He bends my knees and pushes them way up so I’m spread wide.
I try to pull away, try to pull free of him.
“Look at me,” he says.
I can’t, though. Not when he’s holding me like that, spread and open to him. Everything exposed to him.
“I said look at me,” he repeats, this time, slapping my hip, making me gasp.
I turn my head.
“This is me collecting from last night,” he says, and purposefully, he looks down at me, down at my sex, at everything. “I told you once that I want all of it, everything,” he says, dipping his head again. “Your pussy.” He licks me there, raising his head again. “Your ass.” He slides his tongue from my pussy to my asshole, circling it, licking me there, too.
I’m mortified, and I turn my face away, but it feels good too, him licking me, all of me. I’m humiliated and I’m going to come all at once and he knows it. He knows it.
“Please.”
He rises up, takes my arms and spreads them wide and pushes into me.
“Give it to me, Amelia. You promised me anything I want, and what I want is everything. Give it to me.”
He twines his fingers with mine and lays his weight on me and kisses me and I taste myself on his lips, his tongue and our fucking is loud, the sounds of us together, our breathing, our sex, wet and hard and deep.
“Give it to me.”
“I don’t know how,” I say finally, and he looks down at me and watches me like the last thing he expected was for me to say this.
“Then I’ll take it until you figure it out.” He’s suddenly angry and the fucking is punishing and his cock grows bigger and it hurts and it feels so good and I want to give it to him. I want to.
But some part of me, it resists him, wants to fight him and he feels that too and he’s holding me down and fucking me and I’m coming. I’m coming so hard I can’t breathe and all I see of him is a blur and maybe this is it. Maybe this is me giving it to him. Maybe this is the way it has to be with us.
When my orgasm finally subsides and I can see clearly again, he’s watching me, his eyes dark and intense on mine and he gives me a smirk, raises himself up and sweat falls from his forehead onto my face as he fucks me harder yet, fucks me to hurt me and all I can do is watch him and he’s so incredibly beautiful.
So fucking beautiful.
And when he comes, his eyes, they’re hard and soft at once, glowing almost, and his face…I can look at him like this forever and never get enough.
Never enough.
When he finally collapses on top of me, we’re covered in sweat and panting for breath.
“Is this how it always is?” I ask and as soon as the words are out, they sound stupid and I wish I could take them back
But then he answers and maybe it’s not stupid at all. “No.” He studies me and sometimes it’s like he sees right inside me. “Never before.”
I blink, look away. I can’t hold his gaze. It’s too much.
“Tell me what you want,” he says finally.
“What?”
He pushes sweat soaked hair off my face. “What do you want?”
It’s almost tender how he touches me. Like he’s being careful. Opposite how he is when he fucks me.
“Why do you do that?” I ask.
“Do what?” he asks.
I think. “Sometimes it’s like I see you beneath your anger. But then, it’s there again and you’re this other person and I don’t know what I’m supposed to do.”
He doesn’t quite meet my eyes, but traces fingertips over my face, my chin, neck, down to my breast. I’m ready for him to hurt me, but he just caresses me and watches me.
“Tell me what you want,” he says again.
I watch him too and I wonder if he,
too, doesn’t know how to be.
“A tattoo,” I say.
“A tattoo?” He looks genuinely confused. Maybe disappointed. “Why?”
“I’ve always wanted one but wasn’t allowed. The woman who does yours does good work.”
“She does.”
“Can you take me there?”
He gets out of the bed. “Why don’t you think about it for more than twelve hours and I’ll see.” He disappears into the bathroom.
I push the covers back, follow him. I almost open the door but catch myself.
“It’s not something I’ve only thought about for twelve hours. And I’m not asking your permission. I’m asking for a ride. Or, or…bus fare.”
I hear his chuckle before the shower goes on.
“Jackass,” I mutter, going back to the bed, pulling on my panties and tank top before sitting down.
He’s done a few minutes later and returns to the bedroom. He gets dressed before coming back to the bed.
“What tattoo would you get? A heart? Some stars on your wrist? Isn’t that some sort of trend?”
“You’re such a jerk, you know that?”
He chuckles again. “I thought I was a jackass.”
He heard that?
I get up, go through the stack of sketchbooks and find the one I want. It’s an old one, one I brought from home. And every inch of every page is full.
Carrying it with me, I sit back down on the bed and open the book, turning through the pages until I get to it.
“Here,” I say, pointing to the very corner of the sheet that’s almost chaotic with all the drawings. “This one.”
He comes over, peers down at it, then sits and takes the book out of my hands and I’m not sure he’s as aware as I am of how close he is. How we’re touching.
What that contact does to me.
“Where did you see this?” he asks after a few minutes.
“Nowhere. Just in my head.”
He looks at me funny, like he doesn’t quite believe me maybe.
“This bird, I see them everywhere. Even here in the library.”
“In the library?”
I nod. I don’t tell him that the same bird was in our library too. Not the same one, obviously, but the same type of bird. Watching us that night, the night of the reaping.
“She must have come in from a hole in the window and couldn’t get back out. I caught her, put her back outside.”
“Did you?” he asks absently. His eyes are still intent on the picture.
“And this, it’s an angel. See this, it’s the shadow of her wing. It’s almost like the wing of your angel.”
His expression doesn’t change, that crease between his eyebrows only deepens.
“Why is half her face a skull?”
“Because she’s watching over the dead.”
I hear myself say it, hear how matter-of-fact my voice sounds, how matter-of-fact my answer is, but how strange it is at the same time.
I take the book from his hands, close it.
“Never mind,” I say, feeling suddenly very exposed, more exposed than I had been moments ago. Not liking the look on his face. “Forget it.”
He stands, takes the book from me. “I’ll take you tonight.”
“Really?”
He nods, walks to the door. “Go get dressed. Have breakfast. I need to take care of some things today.”
“Really? You’ll take me?” I’m shocked.
“That’s what I said.”
“Will it hurt?” I ask when he reaches the door.
He turns, narrows his eyes. “You scared?” Jerk Gregory is back.
“No. I just want to know what to expect so I’m prepared.”
“I think you’ll appreciate the sensation.”
* * *
We don’t head into Rome until after nine that evening. The city is beautiful at night, although I’m too anxious about the tattoo to enjoy it. Gregory is sitting beside Matteo and they’re speaking in Italian. I’m in the backseat clutching my sketchbook to myself and watching the scenery.
“You can change your mind,” Gregory taunts once we park the SUV.
“I’m fine,” I say, relaxing my hold on the book.
He’d also offered me some pills to numb any pain before we left the house, but I refused them. If I do this, I want to feel it. I want to feel every prick of the needle.
I button my coat as we get out of the car, Matteo lighting up a cigarette and following close behind as Gregory and I walk ahead.
“Why do you need a bodyguard?” I ask.
“A bodyguard?”
“Matteo.”
“He’s not a bodyguard.”
“What is he then?”
Gregory shrugs a shoulder. “Anything I need him to be.”
I recognize the alley-like street where the tattoo parlor is located. Apart from a few lights in the windows of the buildings and that of the parlor itself, it’s pretty dark compared to the rest of the city.
“Are you sure she’ll have time for me?” I ask.
He opens the parlor door and turns to me. “I booked her especially for you. But if you’re rethinking it…” he trails off, taking hold of my collar, tugging me closer.
“I’m not chickening out.”
“Good.”
We walk inside and the place is empty but for the girl I recognize. She’s leaning on the counter reading something on her phone and when she sees us, she smiles at Gregory then at me, takes the gum out of her mouth and throws it into a trashcan before sorting through the papers in front of her.
“Amelia, this is Laura, Laura, Amelia.”
“Nice to meet you,” I say.
She says the same and turns to Gregory, opening a folder beneath that stack of papers and laying out some sheets. They start speaking in Italian and I peer at the pages.
“How does she already have the drawing?” It’s my drawing but she’s sketched it bigger, placed it differently so it’s longer with the bird tucked beneath the wing of the angel. Their wings are almost merged and the skull is less prominent, but there.
“I emailed it to her, told her what you were thinking.” He stands aside, lays out the three different sketches, each just slightly different than the other.
“They’re beautiful,” I say, looking at each of them.
“You can change the color if you want,” Gregory says.
The wings are darkest blue with hints of turquoise, that same turquoise that’s in his eyes, and the bird’s belly is red. And the angel herself, her face and arm, they look like they’re made of stone. Of crumbling stone.
“It’s perfect. Better than I imagined.”
He nods.
“You did this?” I ask the girl.
She looks up at Gregory, starts to say something but Gregory cuts her off.
“Yeah. Laura’s the best.”
“Thank you,” I tell her.
“Do you know where you want it?” he asks.
“Oh.” I hadn’t really thought about that. “Um…”
“Here?” he asks, turning me a little, touching the space along my upper back, my left shoulder blade, the curve of my arm. “What do you think?”
I look up at him and nod.
“It’ll sort of trail off, like this,” he shows me the edges of the drawing, like sand blowing away in a wind.
Like ash.
And it’s so beautiful.
I’m overwhelmed and all I can seem to do is nod.
Laura straightens, takes the sketches. “Ready?” she asks.
Gregory is still watching me. He leans behind the counter to pick up a bottle of whiskey from a shelf underneath.
“Yes,” I say, wanting some of that whiskey now. Thinking maybe I should have taken the pills he offered.
Gregory takes off his coat, hangs it up.
I follow Laura to the same seat where Gregory sat to have his done. I take off my coat and Laura tells me to straddle the chair so my back is to her. I do. It’s comfo
rtable and I can rest my head against the back of the seat. I unbutton my shirt, slide it off both arms.
“Bra too,” she says.
I glance at Gregory who is watching from the other end of the parlor as I reach back to unhook my bra and take it off.
Laura positions me slightly differently. The leather feels cool against my bare breasts. She trains the light on the spot where the tattoo will go. The only sound is that of Gregory shoes as he walks toward us while she cleans the area, the antiseptic cold on my skin.
“It’s okay,” she says. She must see how nervous I am. “It will be so beautiful.”
“Thanks.”
Gregory comes closer, sets the bottle down, holds his glass out to me.
I look up at him, take it, drink a sip, hand it back.
He leans against the wall and Laura begins, the sound of the machine sounding much louder than it did the other day, sounding much scarier.
“Relax,” Gregory says.
I take a deep breath in and uncurl my hands and close my eyes as she begins to work. And somehow, it’s not unbearable, the sensation strangely satisfying. Almost.
The only sound is that of the needle buzzing for the next few hours until she’s finally finished and she looks up at Gregory.
He peers closer and the intensity in his eyes as he watched for the entire three hours is only darker as he studies the tattoo, and, finally gives her a nod.
Laura takes a mirror and holds it out behind me, and I peer over my shoulder and my mouth falls open.
It’s perfect.
It’s beautiful.
No. More than that.
It’s almost…alive.
And the blue of the angel’s wings, it’s the same blue as Gregory’s broken angel.
“Do you like it?” she asks, her accent heavier. I think she must be exhausted.
“Yeah. It’s...”
Laura smiles, nods at me like she gets it. I’m grateful because I can’t seem to find words to describe what I see.
She stands, stretches, walks to another part of the shop.
I look up at Gregory and he shifts his gaze from the tattoo to me.
“Do you see ghosts, Amelia?”
The question is so abrupt and so out of place, that all I can do is stare stupidly up at him.
“That angel,” he continues, “she stands watch over the Scafoni Mausoleum.”
Twisted Page 10
