A Torment of Sin

by Charlotte E Hart

  Malachi says take another pill.

  I did, and now nothing works.

  I finally get to the corner I was aiming for and huddle myself in it, bringing my legs to my chest for comfort. Cold now. No heat like there was when I was with Gray. Where is he? I clutch the gold chain and stare into the room, eyes slowly registering the books and dust around me. It’s all covered in a layer of dust, forgotten about and left to rot. I’m like that now. Left to rot after the event. Discarded having been used.

  So empty again.

  So lost.

  ~

  I can hear a sigh. Long and blown out as if the world is ending. It’s enough for me to pull the covers up around me and try to ignore it because the world has ended. My husband’s dead, and, previous to him finding the fucking audacity to die, he fucked other women behind my back for fun.

  Asshole.

  I pull my legs up into a ball and snuggle into the pillow, trying to get comfortable so I can ignore the world some more. It isn’t comfortable, though. It’s hard and ridged, as if someone’s stuffed iron bars through it. It feels like a prison would. Unbreakable. Immovable.

  Still, I’m not leaving it yet. I’ll lie here until I can’t anymore and then maybe I’ll be able to make sense of what my life is now. Empty is what it is. I don’t want empty. Empty is cold and lacking substance. I told Gray I needed that – substance. Why I thought he could deliver anything I don’t know. He’s no one. My dead husband’s boss. Attractive, though. Pretty lips.

  Hard and callous on me.

  My eyes fly open, mind reeling with memories, as I suck in breaths. We kissed. I sucked him off and swallowed his come. I stare blankly into the room around me, panting and letting all the feelings come. Hard. Harsh. He slapped me and ….

  “You’re alright, Hannah,” his voice says. Something strokes my head, pushing it quietly back down. “Relax and let yourself ease off.” It’s only then that I realise I’m on his stomach, his long legs stretched out in front of my eyes towards the floor. I slink back against him and rub my face into his shirt, enjoying the scent of it. Potent. Smells manly. Spicy. Soft notes of something else, though. Flowers. Summer in a rain storm.

  “How long have I been sleeping?”

  “A while. How do you feel?” he asks.

  “I don’t know,” mumbles out of me. I don’t. I’m not happy, I know that much. I’m suspended. Stalled in the hours, days, whatever they are, and not caring for any path that presents itself to me.

  I turn and creep my body until I’m looking up at him rather than the room, my body eventually stretching out. “How do you feel?” I murmur.

  He chuckles and runs his fingers through my hair again, tilting his head as if the question is immaterial to anything. I suppose it might be to him, but it isn’t to me. I want to know, need to in the pit of my stomach. His hand moves slowly from my head down my neck, fingers gentle over my skin until he pushes the robe off my shoulder to expose my chest. I keep watching his face rather than acknowledge the move, interested in his motives for avoiding the question.

  “Touching me must cause some feelings. You said you couldn’t.”

  Fingers trails to the peaked bud on my breast, pinching softly and rolling it around the flat of his palm before he spreads his touch over my ribs and stomach. Heavy. So heavy on me. I wince slightly under the pressure, feeling the pain from whatever I was hit with, but it doesn’t stop him pushing harder and then easing off again to smooth the plains of my skin.

  “You should shower,” he muses, trailing his hand further down towards my panties. “Clean up. Sleep again.” The lace moves on my hips, one side of it being pulled until his fingers are edging over the sensitive ridge of my hip bone. Small strokes, easy and tender on my skin.

  I smile and look at him again, lost in the feel of something caressing me for a few moments, and then frown and swing myself off his lap to get up. Caressing isn’t real here. Caressing means niceties I don’t want even if they are tempting. Here isn’t for that. It’s for distraction, as he said. Nothing more. And now my head’s clear, focused on things again, I’d rather play the games with Malachi than teeter on the edge of dishonesty.

  “Are my bags here?” I ask.

  He nods and stands with me, righting his suit. “In the guest room you were in earlier. I’ll take you up.”

  Good. And then more pills again.

  Chapter 6

  Gray

  I ’m melancholy, as I lead the way back through the halls. Mixed up with feelings as old as they are new. It felt good to hold her while she slept, pacifying, but now I’m in turmoil and wondering what the fuck I’ve done or am still thinking about doing.

  Temptation has become the devil of all torments. It’s reeling through my veins to go further, play more, indulge the basic need inside me to fuck and endure my own discharge inside someone. Soft skin. Warm flesh under me. Real and alive to devour and edge across.

  So many thoughts now, all of them laced with no care to memories passed or times to come. I can be free here. Live and enjoy the time we have.

  As Faith said, it’s just one little fuck.

  I open the door to the room and watch her stride through towards one of the end doors, sighing for some reason. She opens one and finds a walk-in with her bag inside, and then disappears through the other one. The lock clicks firmly, as if I’m nothing but a servant to be locked out while she bathes and brightens herself for the next round of pleasure-seeking. I’m not a servant, though. And I don’t want her brighter either. I like her maudlin and languid in that state she holds so well, like her edging on insanity and falling over it. Amusing.

  And tempting.

  The thought makes me sneer and think back on that blowjob, feet backing away from inevitability. Her mouth around me as I shot my load inside her. Her nails in my leg, digging and clawing at me as I pushed her throat further down on my dick. Her saliva and my come dripped from her lips as I pushed her away from me.

  My toy - that’s all I could think as she gagged and sucked and I looked over the reddening stripes on her skin. My thing to break and play with, fuck for as long as I want. My head shook at the same time, trying to dismiss the notion so I didn’t fall into Malachi’s fun. But then she laughed from the floor. Laughed and crawled, dismissing me.

  My toy.

  I walk over, my fingers gripped into the side of the door frame. No right. Not even after that fuck up in the formal dining room we’ve engaged in. I shouldn’t have, but she fought me as I tried to get her to this room to sleep it off. Kissing her was the last option I had to calm her down. It worked, and then my dick took over as she panted and moaned in my lap because of that kiss. Just like it is doing now because this goddamned door is in the way of something I want.

  My shoulder barges at the damned thing separating us, and I watch as the splinters fly and the wood slams back against the tiles. She barely reacts other than to look back at me in the mirror, a small arch to her brow as she fiddles with her hair.

  “Did you want something?” she eventually asks, pushing her panties to the floor and flicking them into a corner.

  “Don’t lock a fucking door on me.”

  She turns to look at me and then walks for the shower, switching it on rather than reacting to the order. Steam starts building around the small space, heat building at the same time as the screen fogs up. I don’t need any more fucking heat. I’m hot enough as it is because of her naked frame waiting for me to play with it.

  “Are you joining me?” she asks, with a sigh. “Too many clothes, Gray.”

  Her fingers wander across her stomach, pads trickling over the skin I touched earlier. I growl at the tease and try to dampen down the vibration all over me to fuck her and not care, but it’s building like this steam is, aggravating me beyond sensible process.

  “So tense, Gray. Where are the pills?” In my pocket. We’re not having anymore. “Malachi says take another pill,” she mumbles, laughing to herself. “It’s just a distract
ion, Gray. Just some fun before the world comes back to bite us. None of it is real, is it? You told me that.”

  She slips behind the screen, disappearing into the fog, and sighs as the jets of water hit her.

  Thirty fucking seconds listening to her moan and I’m following her in, fully dressed and not giving a damn for anything. Not real. Nothing here is. She’s right. We can forget it when we leave, pretend it never happened.

  My hand reaches for her in the steam to prove it, the other one ripping at my belt. Water sluices down on me, as she laughs again and comes in close. My mouth’s on hers before she gets a chance to look up at me, perhaps question what the hell this is. I don’t know what it is. It's need and desire. Nothing more.

  And I’m damned if I’m holding off any longer with things like this to tempt me.

  My jacket gets pushed from my shoulders, her nails making short work of the buttons on my shirt after that until it’s open. Everything’s slung to the corner in our haste, needy hands grabbing for each other. My teeth bite down on the side of her neck, fingers taking her hand where I want it rather than let her touch me everywhere else.

  It reaches inside my pants and draws the length of me out, her grip tight and unrelenting as she winds me up further. The groan that leaves me comes from years of pent up aggression, making me push her back to the wall harshly so I can lean on it. Both my hands palm the tiles and I watch her fingers moving on me.

  “Harder,” growls out of me. “More.”

  She gives more with her hand. Grip tighter, thumb and forefinger running over the ridge at the top of me quickly and painfully. I groan again, my breath stuttering under the bane of potential release, and then swipe her hand away and turn her around.

  My body pushes hers to the tiles, flattening her against it. I want to fuck. Come inside her and listen to her beg me for more of it. Nothing more than that. Harsh, antagonistic fucking. We’ll play afterwards. Torment each other for hours if that’s how I feel, but for now – my hand slaps her ass hard, sending her squealing and reeling for the wall – we’re fucking.

  “Open your legs,” I demand, slapping her thigh again.

  She inches them out. Not fucking quickly enough for my liking. My fingers delve straight between them, two sinking straight into her pussy and my thumb pressing on her ass to make her widen more. She tenses at that, her body suddenly rigid. I don’t care. I’ll take what I want now, engage fully and regret it somewhere down the line when I remember I have to think about what I’ve done.

  I let my thumb move lower until it joins the other two fingers moving inside her, stretching, widening. So wet. I’d forgotten that, forgotten the feel of a woman around me. Moans come loud and clear from her, making the need for more consume me further, and my dick throbs in my hand as I line up. It strokes softly over her ass cheek a few times and then sweeps through the crease of it as she pushes back at me.

  “Gray,” moans out of her.

  Gray.

  My hand pulls out at the same time as my dick rams in hard. She gasps and squashes up against the tiles, taking the brunt of my weight on her as I pull out and ram in again. I like the sound of the gasp as much as the feel of myself inside her. So fucking tight. Warm. I watch her back move, shoulders shivering under me as the water pours down on us.

  Everything burns in me because of the visual, and I pull out again to watch myself push back in slowly. So long since I've done this. Too fucking long. Rage mists over. A rage that comes from deep inside me and erupts onto her skin. My hand grips her neck and slams her onto the tiles again, heaving her about like a body to be used. Harsh and fast. Aggressive. Hips working hard. Fingers digging in to cause pain and a memory she won’t forget. I want her hurting, feeling me inside her for weeks, let alone these minutes.

  One hand goes under her thigh to bring her leg up so I can get deeper in, the other turning her head so I can see her face. Her hair’s slicked back, lips trembling as I slam in over and over again and send her crashing to the wall every time. I don’t even care if she comes. I am doing. I can feel it building as she pants and moans for me, feel it travelling over me, through me.

  Four more shunts in and she reaches her hands back for me, somehow twisting her body under my assault. My dick falls free as she climbs up me and settles herself on my hips, one arm wrapped tightly around my neck and the other reaching for my dick between us.

  “Use me,” she moans, edging it across her pussy. One swipe, two.

  I groan and look at her waiting there, my hands under her ass to hold her up on the wall. She giggles, swipes again, and smiles. Sultry lips beckon me on, wet hair pushed back to show her hollow features more clearly. “You can’t hurt me, Gray. No one can anymore. Look at my skin.”

  I do, relishing it like a treat to be attacked, injured, and one punishing drive in and she howls in the small room because of the attack. All of me sets loose, and I forge in harder and harder the more she calls out in pain. She’s ravaged. Held fast and fucked until she screams and moans and then finally goes quiet under my assault.

  My lips travel along the sweet stretch of her neck, teeth biting in as I feel the pull start low down. More fucking, regardless of her limp form. Never ending fucking until I can barely hold back my need to push my come inside her.

  I pant for more strength, as I feel her nails begin to grab and grip at me again, but the panting’s all I can hear now. Just that and the water pounding down, my pulse loud in my ears. So close. So fucking close to coming in her and filling her body with me, and yet still I try to find some way to keep this feeling going as long as I can.

  The harsh bite into her neck signals my own need before I can stop it, and the come rips out of me into her so violently my own knees weaken. I pull her legs apart further, spreading her ass cheeks, as I look down and watch it pumping in. Everything pulses and vibrates. My ears, my dick. Even my back seems to pound under this soaked shirt and her hands.

  Breaths heave in and out, hers and mine, and then lips hit mine. My own instantly respond, the intimacy of the moment making all thoughts of not complying irrelevant. Slow kisses are rolled over me, as I catch my breath. Soft and wet. Divine and heavenly. And then a throaty chuckle comes from her, and her hands pull the shirt up my back.

  “You should lose these clothes, Gray. We can go for round two.” She pulls back and rests her head on the tiles, her fingers running along the side of my jaw. “If you can manage it.”

  Manage it? I’ve got ten years’ worth of managing it to get through.

  And she’s going to feel every goddamn inch of me.

  Still, I snarl at the taunt and move backwards, dropping her body as if she’s nothing but a tool. She laughs at that and picks herself up, rolling her neck as she reaches for soap.

  No more words from her. Just a continued half giggle as she washes herself, turns her back on me, and regains her calm breathing. That’s fine by me. I’m not in here to talk. Not in here for conversation or some in built mechanism to fall in love either. I’m here because of need and want.

  That’s it.

  I strip the rest of my clothes and sling them, my hand reaching for the soap as soon as she’s finished. She bats me away from it and lathers up her hands, eyes finally coming back to mine. Time stalls as we look at each other, nothing else in the room but us and the sound of water running, and then she palms my chest to start washing me.

  The move makes me frown, but I don’t stop her as she starts rubbing. I watch, letting the gentle tickle of the chain bounce around my skin as she washes me. Soft strokes, cleansing. Every inch of me. Chest, stomach, thighs. Dick. It hardens again under her touch, making me crave for more again.

  She giggles and let’s go of me, loose hands gripping the top of the shower screen rather than me. Her back turns away, shoulders shrugging as if I should return the gesture of washing. No. That’s not what this is. Intimacy isn’t an option. Fucking and playing are.

  I walk out and leave her there, grabbing at a towel as I wander i
nto the bedroom. The evening’s coming now. I gaze out the window into the snow lit lightly by the castle's menacing glow, and rub at my hair to dry it off. Night time. This place is always better by night. Darker. Dirtier.

  The thought makes me chuckle lowly and listen to her come in the room behind me. She’s so quiet around me, barely a whisper of movement as she gets dressed. I keep staring out into the night, dismissing memories and thoughts other than the here and now. I’ll take a few days. Indulge myself with everything I want, and then we’ll leave.

  Finished.

  A sharp knock sounds on the door. I turn to the sound lazily and watch her opening it without regard to her lacking clothes. Lace panties again. Nice.

  “Mam, Malachi asked me to bring this up to you,” the maid says, offering her a large flat box.

  She takes it and backs into the room, closing the door behind her, and then looks at me as if I should know the answers. I don’t. I know less about Malachi’s mind set with her here than I normally do. He’s different with her, as if she’s worthy of a new game to him.

  “No idea,” I muse, wrapping the towel around my waist and moving to the walk in. “But whatever it is, it will be uncomfortable.”

  I pull out some black pants and shirt and shrug into them, uninterested in his game. There isn’t one as far as I’m concerned. There is nothing but desire and focused intent. I frown and think on that time we were drunk. Laughing. I can’t afford laughs now. Laughs will mean something other than what this has to be.

  “Gray?” I wander out at her call, buttoning up my shirt, and look at the straps of leather all over the bed. “What is it?” she asks. I walk closer and take in the ensemble, unsure myself because of the way it’s haphazardly distributed on the sheets. “It’s nothing but straps and buckles.”

  “Malachi likes straps and buckles.”

  “I’m sure, but how does it go on?” she mutters, tilting her head.